Life continues. Sorry again for the delay in updating - I guess it doesn't really count as a delay now that there's always more than week between postings. The truth is, there just isn't that much to write about.
Life is still good. I still love my job. I still don't know what I want to do next year, although I know that I want to be Austin for most of it (barring any unforeseen circumstances) and I know I'm going to figure it all out.
I have two more weeks of work before Christmas break and one more week of classes to teach - and man am I ready for the break. I love my kids - I do - but class wears on you, you know? And we've moved into SAT prep, every class requires more set up and it's harder to slosh through. I just need a few weeks to rejuvenate.
To be honest, that applies across the board. Outside of class, work has also been wearing on us a bit. I have 45 progress reports to write by the end of wednesday, last week we established just how horrible our staff meetings can get, and Joe and David finished their term at CF. I wasn't super close to either one of them, but I feel like we're this family at CF, and I don't want anybody to leave. I'm going to miss them. I can't imagine how it's going to be when the rest of us leave.
And then there's that - the whole social thing. I have these like... 20 friends. I work with most of them, we hang out every weekend and most nights after work. And it's amazing, I love them all so much and I feel super lucky to have just walked into such an awesome situation. But man, I'm tired. I am so socially burnt out, and I just wish I could have a full day just to myself. I'm never alone and there's always something going on and I hate to miss anything. But we had the most awesome party ever at Amy's on friday, and then a dance party last night at Amelia's with these Swedish guys and they were both fun -- but man I need a break. It will just be nice to get away for a bit.
I'm watching Brothers and Sisters on ABC right now and it's really messing with my mind. You know I don't regret coming here and I don't want to leave, but every once in awhile I really just wish we were the kind of family that all lived in the same place. I want us to be that family someday. I want my kids to grow up with their cousins. I want to see my brother and sisters and parents on a regular basis. But I guess - that's not reality right now. In the meantime, I wish we could have this huge movie kind of Christmas. With everyone. I mean everyone - every impossible person there. A huge feast, and mostly unfunny jokes, and a sprinkle disfunction - sounds amazing. But I'll take what I can get, it's more than a lot of people could hope for.
That's all from me for now. Signing off...
- L
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Friday, November 28, 2008
Some Kind of Wonderful
Wow. It's been a heck of a week! I'm sorry I've been so bad about updating this things lately, but I think it's at least a good sign that I'm more about being present than blogging these days, right?
I missed seeing everyone at Thanksgiving, but to be honest - I'm kind of glad I stuck around here. I'm also glad I didn't go camping like we were planning - it has been so nice (and necessary) to just have a few days to myself to veg out and recuperate. And the best part is... I STILL HAVE TWO DAYS LEFT! Haha, I'll tell you what - working 60 hours a week certainly makes you appreciate your vacation time a bit more.
I worked Monday and Tuesday, but I think mentally I checked out last Friday and since we didn't have to teach class this week, that was kind of okay. Our two days of work consisted of a lot of goofing around and pretending to be busy and it was nice to be at work without all the stress. The one important work thing that did happen was I had my midyear evaluation. I'll admit, I was a little nervous but everything went pretty well. My boss was nice, and the few more negative things he had to say were things I already knew to be working on.
Tuesday at lunch we all went to the Five Guys that just opened up by campus. Amy's from D.C. where Five Guys was started, so she was even more excited about it than I was. It was some serious greasy goodness - the only thing that would have been better is the Varsity. Tuesday night I hung out with Kevface and J Foulke for some roommate bonding time and then I went over to Amy's and watched "The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys." I liked it so much I watched again on Wednesday night! I can't believe I'm so type-able about what I like - give me a good angsty coming-of-age story any day and I'm happy.
Wednesday - J Foulke and I worked on our personal projects all day and right about 5 o'clock we both FINISHED!! Those of you who know what crazyness I've been working on all month - know how monumental it is that I'm finally done (ish) - and those of you who don't know what I'm talking about... be patient. You'll find out soon enough. Anyways it felt so amazing to finally be done - and as promised I gave myself the reward of a yearlong subscription to Entertainment Weekly - wooo! And at only $20 for 55 issues, it ain't bad. I'm pretty sure if I were a magazine I would be that one. And have I told you my friend Adam's cousin used to work for them in NYC. Aaaahhh!
We went to Denny's to celebrate (yeah... we're poor) and I realized that I am no longer capable of truly enjoying a belgian waffle with strawberry and whipped cream on top. Surprise surprise.
Thursday - HAPPY THANKSGIVING!! Though those of us still in town were far from our homes and families, we managed to have several awesome invites for Turkey Day. First, Rocky, Jess and I went to our boss's boss's house (Betty - she's the retired english teacher that is the program manager now at CF) for the big meal. It was really nice of Betty - she invited all of us homeless kids (in the home sense) over to her house to spend the day with her family. She has this beautiful ranch house down in Kyle, right near where I teach. And her whole family was there - her husband, bro-in-law, three kids + one daughter-in-law, and 3 grandkids including one very oversized baby boy who looks nothing like my nephew, Hunter, but made me think of him nonetheless. The food was DEE-licious. They also had unsweet ice tea which I never realized til yesterday was a staple of my Thanksgiving experience. The best part for me was the dressing... which I figured is specifically southern, being made of cornbread rather than bread bread. Awesomeness. To top it all off we had pecan pie for desert, but I was too full to enjoy a whole piece.
After hanging out at Betty's for a bit and watching a video of her granddaughter Riley shooting a dove with their BB gun in their backyard that morning (they made her eat it! it's their rule - you shoot it, you eat it), we headed out and went straight to Amy's for a second Thanksgiving feast. Amy's roommate Clara cooked the whole thing - including a homemade salad dressing from scratch! Unfortunately I was too full to eat anything other than some garlic mashed potatoes. We hung out at Amy's for hours, just vegging out and talking. And then Rocky and Jess left and Amy and I hung out some more. And then we came back to my place and played Wii! Woo! It was an awesome day of a whole lot of friends, "family," food, and fun.
This morning we got up early (10 am actually) and went to see the new Baz Luhrman movie Australia with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. It was AMAZING. Totally cheesy at parts and not at all surprising - but beautiful and epic and very well acted. It felt like what Hollywood is supposed to be about. It's not about real life - it's about romance and adventure and the things we dream about played out on screen.
Which reminds me - I have a small self-discovery moment to share. Another exceedingly obvious moment that took me 22 years to stumble into. I couldn't decide what I wanted to do with my life, right? Teach kids/work with kids -- or make movies? I love making things - writing and visualizing and bringing things to life, but I also know I get teenagers. I connect with them and I love them and I know how important that time in life is. So how could I in good conscience walk away from my gift with kids just for my own pleasure of creation? But what if? What if? What if my goal in writing and film was to speak to teenagers? To resonate with them and affect them the way certain movies and books affected my life back then. Everything seems so much more important when you're sixteen - even the stuff you read and watch. I could do that. And I'd be working with kids too, wouldn't I? And maybe someday down the road I could start a school - just like I talked about. A school that teaches teenagers how to channel all of the emotion and drama into art. Man - if I can speak to these kids - who knows? And if I could give them a voice... - this is everything - teaching, and helping, and film, and writing, and Invisible Children. Talk about a burning bush, right? Can I get an A-MEN?!
I don't know that I'd never made another kind of movie or book - but I've always had trouble trying to pick a focus - maybe now I have one. I feel more inspired than ever. My time is here.
Speaking of... do people really think that college is the best time of their lives? Do people really hate the time right after as much as they say? And does my life not count cause I'm hiding in AmeriCorps? Or did I just get super lucky?
Anyways - Australia was an awesome movie. And if you're on the fence, you should definitely see it. After the movie, we went to Kohl's so Jess could get a coat. I almost made it out the door without getting anything, but then I found this super cute and super cheap hoodie schwacket (sweater-jacket) that I had to have. After that I got on this super shopping kick - and Amy and Jess were in on it too so we went all over. But I didn't find anything so that was bad for me and good for my wallet.
I just want lots of cute winter skirts that I can wear with leggings. I have none. Old Navy used to have all these corduroy minis but they're sold out, and Target used to have this plaid mini dress but it was sold out too! BUMMER! I hate how winter confines me to jeans. In 10th grade I had this wool mini skirt that was sort of brownish gray - and it was the coolest thing ever. I wish I still had it. Alas.
Anyways, we finally came back home and now we're getting ready to go to dance at this electronica show. Ain't life grand?!
And btw - I almost forgot the best part of this week - we're catsitting! It's this adorable 6 month old orange tabby named Omar that belongs to a friend of ours at work. I love this cat. He's so much trouble but he is so stinkin' cute!
On the boy front: Joe has fallen off the grid -- apparently. His family's in town - so hopefully a better update on that scene after the holidays. We'll see!
Otherwise, my life continues to be awesome!
*Peace*
I missed seeing everyone at Thanksgiving, but to be honest - I'm kind of glad I stuck around here. I'm also glad I didn't go camping like we were planning - it has been so nice (and necessary) to just have a few days to myself to veg out and recuperate. And the best part is... I STILL HAVE TWO DAYS LEFT! Haha, I'll tell you what - working 60 hours a week certainly makes you appreciate your vacation time a bit more.
I worked Monday and Tuesday, but I think mentally I checked out last Friday and since we didn't have to teach class this week, that was kind of okay. Our two days of work consisted of a lot of goofing around and pretending to be busy and it was nice to be at work without all the stress. The one important work thing that did happen was I had my midyear evaluation. I'll admit, I was a little nervous but everything went pretty well. My boss was nice, and the few more negative things he had to say were things I already knew to be working on.
Tuesday at lunch we all went to the Five Guys that just opened up by campus. Amy's from D.C. where Five Guys was started, so she was even more excited about it than I was. It was some serious greasy goodness - the only thing that would have been better is the Varsity. Tuesday night I hung out with Kevface and J Foulke for some roommate bonding time and then I went over to Amy's and watched "The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys." I liked it so much I watched again on Wednesday night! I can't believe I'm so type-able about what I like - give me a good angsty coming-of-age story any day and I'm happy.
Wednesday - J Foulke and I worked on our personal projects all day and right about 5 o'clock we both FINISHED!! Those of you who know what crazyness I've been working on all month - know how monumental it is that I'm finally done (ish) - and those of you who don't know what I'm talking about... be patient. You'll find out soon enough. Anyways it felt so amazing to finally be done - and as promised I gave myself the reward of a yearlong subscription to Entertainment Weekly - wooo! And at only $20 for 55 issues, it ain't bad. I'm pretty sure if I were a magazine I would be that one. And have I told you my friend Adam's cousin used to work for them in NYC. Aaaahhh!
We went to Denny's to celebrate (yeah... we're poor) and I realized that I am no longer capable of truly enjoying a belgian waffle with strawberry and whipped cream on top. Surprise surprise.
Thursday - HAPPY THANKSGIVING!! Though those of us still in town were far from our homes and families, we managed to have several awesome invites for Turkey Day. First, Rocky, Jess and I went to our boss's boss's house (Betty - she's the retired english teacher that is the program manager now at CF) for the big meal. It was really nice of Betty - she invited all of us homeless kids (in the home sense) over to her house to spend the day with her family. She has this beautiful ranch house down in Kyle, right near where I teach. And her whole family was there - her husband, bro-in-law, three kids + one daughter-in-law, and 3 grandkids including one very oversized baby boy who looks nothing like my nephew, Hunter, but made me think of him nonetheless. The food was DEE-licious. They also had unsweet ice tea which I never realized til yesterday was a staple of my Thanksgiving experience. The best part for me was the dressing... which I figured is specifically southern, being made of cornbread rather than bread bread. Awesomeness. To top it all off we had pecan pie for desert, but I was too full to enjoy a whole piece.
After hanging out at Betty's for a bit and watching a video of her granddaughter Riley shooting a dove with their BB gun in their backyard that morning (they made her eat it! it's their rule - you shoot it, you eat it), we headed out and went straight to Amy's for a second Thanksgiving feast. Amy's roommate Clara cooked the whole thing - including a homemade salad dressing from scratch! Unfortunately I was too full to eat anything other than some garlic mashed potatoes. We hung out at Amy's for hours, just vegging out and talking. And then Rocky and Jess left and Amy and I hung out some more. And then we came back to my place and played Wii! Woo! It was an awesome day of a whole lot of friends, "family," food, and fun.
This morning we got up early (10 am actually) and went to see the new Baz Luhrman movie Australia with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. It was AMAZING. Totally cheesy at parts and not at all surprising - but beautiful and epic and very well acted. It felt like what Hollywood is supposed to be about. It's not about real life - it's about romance and adventure and the things we dream about played out on screen.
Which reminds me - I have a small self-discovery moment to share. Another exceedingly obvious moment that took me 22 years to stumble into. I couldn't decide what I wanted to do with my life, right? Teach kids/work with kids -- or make movies? I love making things - writing and visualizing and bringing things to life, but I also know I get teenagers. I connect with them and I love them and I know how important that time in life is. So how could I in good conscience walk away from my gift with kids just for my own pleasure of creation? But what if? What if? What if my goal in writing and film was to speak to teenagers? To resonate with them and affect them the way certain movies and books affected my life back then. Everything seems so much more important when you're sixteen - even the stuff you read and watch. I could do that. And I'd be working with kids too, wouldn't I? And maybe someday down the road I could start a school - just like I talked about. A school that teaches teenagers how to channel all of the emotion and drama into art. Man - if I can speak to these kids - who knows? And if I could give them a voice... - this is everything - teaching, and helping, and film, and writing, and Invisible Children. Talk about a burning bush, right? Can I get an A-MEN?!
I don't know that I'd never made another kind of movie or book - but I've always had trouble trying to pick a focus - maybe now I have one. I feel more inspired than ever. My time is here.
Speaking of... do people really think that college is the best time of their lives? Do people really hate the time right after as much as they say? And does my life not count cause I'm hiding in AmeriCorps? Or did I just get super lucky?
Anyways - Australia was an awesome movie. And if you're on the fence, you should definitely see it. After the movie, we went to Kohl's so Jess could get a coat. I almost made it out the door without getting anything, but then I found this super cute and super cheap hoodie schwacket (sweater-jacket) that I had to have. After that I got on this super shopping kick - and Amy and Jess were in on it too so we went all over. But I didn't find anything so that was bad for me and good for my wallet.
I just want lots of cute winter skirts that I can wear with leggings. I have none. Old Navy used to have all these corduroy minis but they're sold out, and Target used to have this plaid mini dress but it was sold out too! BUMMER! I hate how winter confines me to jeans. In 10th grade I had this wool mini skirt that was sort of brownish gray - and it was the coolest thing ever. I wish I still had it. Alas.
Anyways, we finally came back home and now we're getting ready to go to dance at this electronica show. Ain't life grand?!
And btw - I almost forgot the best part of this week - we're catsitting! It's this adorable 6 month old orange tabby named Omar that belongs to a friend of ours at work. I love this cat. He's so much trouble but he is so stinkin' cute!
On the boy front: Joe has fallen off the grid -- apparently. His family's in town - so hopefully a better update on that scene after the holidays. We'll see!
Otherwise, my life continues to be awesome!
*Peace*
Monday, November 17, 2008
The Taskmaster's Enemy
There are significantly more important things I should be doing with my time, but -- as someone so astutely pointed out to me -- I can hardly demand that everyone update their blogs without updating my own. So thanks to you guys that updated - here's my turn.
Life continues on here in Austin. As usual, things are pretty good, albeit stressful. It's a stress I've come to expect, and even enjoy for the most part. That doesn't quite mean I want another year of it though. But I'm not quite knocking it off of the list yet.
I had a few of my kids drop the program last week and another kid fully (and obviously) plagarize an essay -- all of which were a bit of a downer. But my attendance is back up and my kids really dug the project I had them do last Thursday. Considering I deviated from the curriculum and made it up. I may have decided teaching isn't what I want right now - but it's still really cool seeing that I'm capable of it. Everyday I'm doing things I would hardly have thought myself capable of 3 months ago.
Speaking of which, this past weekend I celebrated my 3 month anniversary of moving to Austin. Ironically enough, I was in Atlanta at the time. I went home this weekend on a quasi-impromptu trip to witness Dr. Price's last Sunday at St. Luke's. I won't dedicate too much space on here to recounting my itinerary since I'm pretty sure most of the people that read this already know most of it. Suffice it to say that it was absolutely 100% worth it. The church party Saturday night and the service and luncheon Sunday were equal parts heartbreaking and warmly nostalgic.
Here are the highlights:
* seeing all of my parent's friends on Saturday night. I might be the only person on the planet that actually enjoys being smothered by church ladies but I sure do. It was also nice getting to tell everybody about my stellar new life. Made it seem even more real.
* getting complimented about 500 times on my rockin' new hairdo. How's that for validation?
* two words: Southern. barbeque.
* hanging out at Shannon's Saturday night with her, Don, Juan Martin, his CPC friend Ashley, Austin Igleheart, and Merdo. There's something so distinct about being a part of this St. Luke's generation, I can't get past it. In fact - it's inspired an entire other blog entry - so expect that as soon as I have some free time.
* "The Church's One Foundation" & "Blest Be the Ties that Bind" - Lord, I love church music. Speaking of which:
* The offertory song: text arranged by D. P. himself. Music arranged by Sue Mitchell Wallace. Beautiful. And somehow appropriate.
* The kid's sermon: D.P. talks to the children about saying good bye. He chokes up when telling them how much he loves them and how proud he is of them and how they are the future of the church. The rest of us choked up too.
* The announcement that Sara Barnhart and Nathan Kratzert both passed the bar exams, while Betsy Martin passed all 5 of her ordination exams.
* D. P.'s sermon: he forewent the words of wisdom I've come to somewhat expect from him in favor of a few important announcements. Namely:
- Shout outs to Terry Nall, Jane Allen, and Mary Martin. Could they have been anymore deserved?
- The big one: D.P. calls an older black man named Cleveland to the front of the church. My mom tells me he used to be our church janitor. D.P. thanks Cleveland for his friendship and tells the congregation that he had gotten ordained some time ago. Then he tells Cleveland that he wants him to have his pastoral robes. There was an audible gasp from the congregation, and those who weren't already crying started to. I can't even write about it without tearing up. He takes off his faded robes - the ones he's worn for decades and hands them to Cleveland, who accepts them and gives him a hug. D.P. reminds us that this means he is officially out of the pastor business and finishes his final sermon in his tie and slacks.
* D.P. announces his future plans - to start a summer camp for young girls, to encourage them and help them have positive self images in spite of all the pressure society puts on them. This was unexpected but cool, and given that he raised three daughters it makes sense.
* Presentation of gifts to Lauren and Jennifer - also Kate and June but they weren't there. The girls get beautiful shaws made by the SLPC knitting group, but the most beautiful part was the presentation by Dorothy Kitchens. She goes on and on about how much the girls have meant to her and how she loved getting to know them as a youth advisor. Then she breaks down completely as she tells them that if her girls end up being half the women they are, she'll know she's done a good job as a parent. Betsy Martin gives them the shaws, also crying a lot.
* Some Columbia Seminary guy charges D.P. and makes sure to tell him that God gave him incredible gift for preaching and that he should find a way to put that to use in his new life, THANK YOU!
* D.P. gives his last benediction - go in peace.
* At the luncheon the church unveils thte cherry tree they're planting in D.P.'s honor.
* The bitty children sing a song and Jack McKenney (as in the kid I babysat for in high school who is now 11) comes up to me, points to the kids and says: "aren't they cute?" OMG
* I go up to give D.P. a hug goodbye and - surprising myself - I tell him to call me if he needs employees for his camp. He responds seriously, saying that my name had actually come up and that he most certainly would. I'd never considered it before, but who knows. Life is funny that way.
All in all - it was an incredible experience and I am so grateful that I got to be there. You know it's been a long time since I've held any delusions of perfection about D.P., but he has helped shaped my life in so many ways. Every kid needs their Dumbledore and he was mine - right down to his humanization in the later years of my teenagehood. I don't know everything, but I know I'm going to miss him. I'm really really going to miss him.
Other good things about being home:
Seeing my dad! It was sooooo good to see him, and we had drinks together at Taco Mac. And then we had some delicious crab legs at Red Lobster for lunch the next day. And I got to hang out with Ansley and M.E. for a bit. And I got to see the skyline of Atlanta. Oh my God. Beautiful. From the condo til downtown, it was just a sea of trees in a thousand different colors and rising up out of this sea like a fairy tale castle was the skyline of this magnificent city. Life abounds endlessly in every direction. Austin is fabulous - but I love Atlanta.
In other news - things with Joe continue to be good. He drew me!
See below:
How cool is that? I don't know why it's so flattering when someone does something artistic that's about you - but man - it really is. Joe is nice. :)
Okay - that's all!
Life continues on here in Austin. As usual, things are pretty good, albeit stressful. It's a stress I've come to expect, and even enjoy for the most part. That doesn't quite mean I want another year of it though. But I'm not quite knocking it off of the list yet.
I had a few of my kids drop the program last week and another kid fully (and obviously) plagarize an essay -- all of which were a bit of a downer. But my attendance is back up and my kids really dug the project I had them do last Thursday. Considering I deviated from the curriculum and made it up. I may have decided teaching isn't what I want right now - but it's still really cool seeing that I'm capable of it. Everyday I'm doing things I would hardly have thought myself capable of 3 months ago.
Speaking of which, this past weekend I celebrated my 3 month anniversary of moving to Austin. Ironically enough, I was in Atlanta at the time. I went home this weekend on a quasi-impromptu trip to witness Dr. Price's last Sunday at St. Luke's. I won't dedicate too much space on here to recounting my itinerary since I'm pretty sure most of the people that read this already know most of it. Suffice it to say that it was absolutely 100% worth it. The church party Saturday night and the service and luncheon Sunday were equal parts heartbreaking and warmly nostalgic.
Here are the highlights:
* seeing all of my parent's friends on Saturday night. I might be the only person on the planet that actually enjoys being smothered by church ladies but I sure do. It was also nice getting to tell everybody about my stellar new life. Made it seem even more real.
* getting complimented about 500 times on my rockin' new hairdo. How's that for validation?
* two words: Southern. barbeque.
* hanging out at Shannon's Saturday night with her, Don, Juan Martin, his CPC friend Ashley, Austin Igleheart, and Merdo. There's something so distinct about being a part of this St. Luke's generation, I can't get past it. In fact - it's inspired an entire other blog entry - so expect that as soon as I have some free time.
* "The Church's One Foundation" & "Blest Be the Ties that Bind" - Lord, I love church music. Speaking of which:
* The offertory song: text arranged by D. P. himself. Music arranged by Sue Mitchell Wallace. Beautiful. And somehow appropriate.
* The kid's sermon: D.P. talks to the children about saying good bye. He chokes up when telling them how much he loves them and how proud he is of them and how they are the future of the church. The rest of us choked up too.
* The announcement that Sara Barnhart and Nathan Kratzert both passed the bar exams, while Betsy Martin passed all 5 of her ordination exams.
* D. P.'s sermon: he forewent the words of wisdom I've come to somewhat expect from him in favor of a few important announcements. Namely:
- Shout outs to Terry Nall, Jane Allen, and Mary Martin. Could they have been anymore deserved?
- The big one: D.P. calls an older black man named Cleveland to the front of the church. My mom tells me he used to be our church janitor. D.P. thanks Cleveland for his friendship and tells the congregation that he had gotten ordained some time ago. Then he tells Cleveland that he wants him to have his pastoral robes. There was an audible gasp from the congregation, and those who weren't already crying started to. I can't even write about it without tearing up. He takes off his faded robes - the ones he's worn for decades and hands them to Cleveland, who accepts them and gives him a hug. D.P. reminds us that this means he is officially out of the pastor business and finishes his final sermon in his tie and slacks.
* D.P. announces his future plans - to start a summer camp for young girls, to encourage them and help them have positive self images in spite of all the pressure society puts on them. This was unexpected but cool, and given that he raised three daughters it makes sense.
* Presentation of gifts to Lauren and Jennifer - also Kate and June but they weren't there. The girls get beautiful shaws made by the SLPC knitting group, but the most beautiful part was the presentation by Dorothy Kitchens. She goes on and on about how much the girls have meant to her and how she loved getting to know them as a youth advisor. Then she breaks down completely as she tells them that if her girls end up being half the women they are, she'll know she's done a good job as a parent. Betsy Martin gives them the shaws, also crying a lot.
* Some Columbia Seminary guy charges D.P. and makes sure to tell him that God gave him incredible gift for preaching and that he should find a way to put that to use in his new life, THANK YOU!
* D.P. gives his last benediction - go in peace.
* At the luncheon the church unveils thte cherry tree they're planting in D.P.'s honor.
* The bitty children sing a song and Jack McKenney (as in the kid I babysat for in high school who is now 11) comes up to me, points to the kids and says: "aren't they cute?" OMG
* I go up to give D.P. a hug goodbye and - surprising myself - I tell him to call me if he needs employees for his camp. He responds seriously, saying that my name had actually come up and that he most certainly would. I'd never considered it before, but who knows. Life is funny that way.
All in all - it was an incredible experience and I am so grateful that I got to be there. You know it's been a long time since I've held any delusions of perfection about D.P., but he has helped shaped my life in so many ways. Every kid needs their Dumbledore and he was mine - right down to his humanization in the later years of my teenagehood. I don't know everything, but I know I'm going to miss him. I'm really really going to miss him.
Other good things about being home:
Seeing my dad! It was sooooo good to see him, and we had drinks together at Taco Mac. And then we had some delicious crab legs at Red Lobster for lunch the next day. And I got to hang out with Ansley and M.E. for a bit. And I got to see the skyline of Atlanta. Oh my God. Beautiful. From the condo til downtown, it was just a sea of trees in a thousand different colors and rising up out of this sea like a fairy tale castle was the skyline of this magnificent city. Life abounds endlessly in every direction. Austin is fabulous - but I love Atlanta.
In other news - things with Joe continue to be good. He drew me!
See below:
How cool is that? I don't know why it's so flattering when someone does something artistic that's about you - but man - it really is. Joe is nice. :)
Okay - that's all!
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Rectified.
I'm sitting in my class right now, watching my kids goof off while they work--for the first time--on their college resumes. You should see them. They are so bright and vibrant and full of life and I want to give them the world. But the best part is, if I do my job right I won't have to. They'll take it for themselves. I may have decided that I don't want to spend the rest of my life teaching, but I am so incredibly happy to be doing this right now. I love these kids so much, even more than I thought I would.
And it's making me even more grateful for the people in my life that supported me when I was their age. The people that saw the potential in me the way I see it in my kids. It's so touching to think about now, seeing it from this side. I was so lucky to be so supported by such good people--my family, Shannon, Mrs. Britten, and many others.
Today was kind of an interesting day. I've been listening to Regina Spektor in my car and ate at Doc Green's for the first time since I left Atlanta, so I've been thinking a lot about home. But it's strange - I haven't been feeling homesick, I've just felt... home. It's nice.
I hung out with Joe last night and we had lunch together today. It's been really nice. More comfortable all the time. We're making plans. We're making plans and I'm (knock on wood) not freaking out or running away. It feels good. Really, really good.
But the main reason I wanted to write is because I've been meaning to write about something in here that my friend Amy and I have been talking about a lot this week. Which is that in certain ways - my life here feels like the rectification of my college experience. I had such lofty ideals of what college would be life before I left - that my roommate would be my new best friend, that I'd meet a whole lot of friends just like me, that I'd feel challenged and fulfilled at the same time. And for the most part, college didn't live up to that. It isn't that college wasn't great--it was--and I wish I had realized how great it was earlier than I did. But it didn't live up to the unrealistic expectations I had of it, and now it seems like CF is living up to them instead.
I do love my roommate, and I've found all these people that I have so much in common with that--really, for the first time--I feel like I've fully embraced the person that I am. It wasn't when I expected it - but it's far better. I love this life.
Back to my kids.
Paz!
And it's making me even more grateful for the people in my life that supported me when I was their age. The people that saw the potential in me the way I see it in my kids. It's so touching to think about now, seeing it from this side. I was so lucky to be so supported by such good people--my family, Shannon, Mrs. Britten, and many others.
Today was kind of an interesting day. I've been listening to Regina Spektor in my car and ate at Doc Green's for the first time since I left Atlanta, so I've been thinking a lot about home. But it's strange - I haven't been feeling homesick, I've just felt... home. It's nice.
I hung out with Joe last night and we had lunch together today. It's been really nice. More comfortable all the time. We're making plans. We're making plans and I'm (knock on wood) not freaking out or running away. It feels good. Really, really good.
But the main reason I wanted to write is because I've been meaning to write about something in here that my friend Amy and I have been talking about a lot this week. Which is that in certain ways - my life here feels like the rectification of my college experience. I had such lofty ideals of what college would be life before I left - that my roommate would be my new best friend, that I'd meet a whole lot of friends just like me, that I'd feel challenged and fulfilled at the same time. And for the most part, college didn't live up to that. It isn't that college wasn't great--it was--and I wish I had realized how great it was earlier than I did. But it didn't live up to the unrealistic expectations I had of it, and now it seems like CF is living up to them instead.
I do love my roommate, and I've found all these people that I have so much in common with that--really, for the first time--I feel like I've fully embraced the person that I am. It wasn't when I expected it - but it's far better. I love this life.
Back to my kids.
Paz!
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Friday, October 31, 2008
H-A-LL-O-W-EE-N spells Halloween
Happy Halloween to all! I'm currently writing to you in full Harry Potter garb - but not just any Harry Potter garb, mind you, angsty-emo Harry Potter garb! For more information on angsty-Harry please watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xD-Huwlg2kY
Yay! I do love Halloween - everybody is somebody else and everybody has candy! Kind of makes me wish I liked candy...
The thing that is eating my brain right now is that I'm so busy I can hardly breathe - much less write a decent blog entry. But I'm long overdue, so pardon the fact that this entry will probably be entirely ungrammatical stream of conciousness. I have been going strong with work for 3 solid weeks - working upwards of 50 hours including Saturdays. And tomorrow I have to wake up at 5:30 AM to go to College/Universidad 101 (our all day program for juniors and their parents). So my Halloween party hopping will be severely restricted this evening - but at least there's always tomorrow.
Needless to say, work has been beyond stressful these past few weeks, and there have been a couple of really rough moments. But at the end of each day I still feel like this is one of the best experiences I've ever had and there's nowhere else I'd rather be. My relationship with my class grows ever stronger, although I did have a disappointingly large drop in attendance this past week. :-(
Gosh, I can't believe I've only been here 2 and a half months. Life is so full and intense here I feel like time works completely differently - it feels like I've been in Austin for years. At times it feels like a gift - walking into this place and this life such a short time ago and already having a fulfilling job and a whole group of amazing friends and even a pseudo-family of sorts. But at other times it's overwhelming. Life here is SO intense and it's ALL CF. Thank God for my roommate Kevin - we may be different people but it's nice to have an outside influence. Even most of the people I've met outside of work I've still met *thru* people at work. And it's great - it is. I love these people, but between the endless hours of work, and work drama - and then never being able to escape it - I'm feeling a little burnt out. Next weekend I have nothing on my schedule and I intend to enjoy every second of it.
Still despite the stress and attendance issues, I'm still convinced that CF is an incredible program and a worthy cause - and my part in it will - I imagine - play a significant role in shaping the person I am - wherever my future my lead.
And once again, after only a few months here - "future" does seem to be the major topic of conversation these days. Everyone's either applying to grad schools or trying to decide whether they're doing a second year here and where they're going to live. And I find myself asking the same questions. When I first started at CF, I was so convinced that I wanted to stick with it and eventually get on staff. And then, when that desire died down a bit and I was assigned to juniors, it seemed a given that I would at least serve a second year as a coach and stay to see my kids graduate. But now, I'm not even sure about that.
It's not that I don't love CF - is that it's impossible to love with only part of myself. It takes everything - all my energy, all my time, and all my heart. And while I love it - it's not the only I love. And so long as I'm not planning on spending my life devoted to this cause - I'm not sure it's worth it to sacrifice everything else.
There are advantages. I'm planning on going to grad school in Fall 2010, and another year of AmeriCorps gives me another $5,000 scholarship, healthcare, and the optimum level of financial aid from any and every film school. Not to mention the value of sticking with my kids til the end - seeing them graduate and being there for them. And if all of my friends stick around - then it'll be hard to be the only one in Austin that isn't still at CF (more on that soon).
But I don't know if I can do another year of this. I'm averaging 51 hours a week, the management really doesn't have our back and treats us all like deliquent children. Add to that that I have no time to date, attend church, or make friends that aren't associated with CF. Not to mention - I don't have time to do any of the other things I care about - I hardly have time to read - let alone write or work on movies. So part of me feels like if I stick with CF - then I'm going to come out of it like having been stuck in a cave for 2 years. And if I'm going to spend 2-3 years of my life in grad school, I don't want to spend the one free year I have left feeling trapped. Another 10 month commitment is SO long.
But if I'm not doing CF, what do I do? Where do I go? I don't think I'm interested in moving some place new - I don't want to spend another year getting established somewhere. So that really leaves me with going back home (Atlanta or Charleston) or maybe going somewhere like NYC for a year. But NYC is a bit of reach - given my current financial state. And there's something to be said for spending a year back at home if I'm going to be forced to be so far away from my family for so long during school. But I worry that if I went home now - I'd never be able to leave again.
And what I'd really like to do next year is find a job where I don't have to work as many hours - and just make enough to pay my bills, and spend the rest of my time working on writing and film. If I can prove to myself before hand that I could be productive in those endeavors, it might just be worth it. But I couldn't afford to do that and live in NYC, Chaztown, or ATL. But I could do it here. I've already proven I could live on a small budget, and I think it'd be easy enough to make my budget a little larger.
Plus, I like it here. I mean - I miss my family and friends everyday. I do. And I miss the mountains, and the ocean and tall trees and old buildings and people that drink sweet tea. But I have this family here. And this feels like my city - it feels like our city. I feel like I'm a part of something here. And I feel like the person that I am here is a person that I want to be. No matter how much I grow and change and an individual, when I'm back in Atlanta I still feel like I can't get away from the less-confident, angsty teenager I was back in the day. I just want to fully come into the person I am now.
So it seems smartest to stay. And I'm pretty sure that if I went home - I wouldn't miss home anymore, but I would miss here. And here is a home for me in it's own right.
It's weird to be trying to figure all of this out now - but then - I feel like it's never too soon. Suffice to say that I still don't really have any idea.
I think my ideal would be - if I had money enough and time, I would continue living here. I'd finish my time at CF, and I'd spend my summer in NYC. And then maybe I'd come back for awhile and I'd work wherever, and then I'd travel for a bit. Spend some time back in Atlanta, Charleston and God - I'd love to go back to Europe for a few months. I could still volunteer at CF sometimes and be around for my kids. Of course I don't know how I'd make any of this happen, but maybe I could. It's always possible. And I could write the whole time and experience for one year at least - the life I've been dreaming about since I was four.
We shall see.
That's the update, I'll try to get some free time for another one soon!
PS. I want a pet squirrel!
Yay! I do love Halloween - everybody is somebody else and everybody has candy! Kind of makes me wish I liked candy...
The thing that is eating my brain right now is that I'm so busy I can hardly breathe - much less write a decent blog entry. But I'm long overdue, so pardon the fact that this entry will probably be entirely ungrammatical stream of conciousness. I have been going strong with work for 3 solid weeks - working upwards of 50 hours including Saturdays. And tomorrow I have to wake up at 5:30 AM to go to College/Universidad 101 (our all day program for juniors and their parents). So my Halloween party hopping will be severely restricted this evening - but at least there's always tomorrow.
Needless to say, work has been beyond stressful these past few weeks, and there have been a couple of really rough moments. But at the end of each day I still feel like this is one of the best experiences I've ever had and there's nowhere else I'd rather be. My relationship with my class grows ever stronger, although I did have a disappointingly large drop in attendance this past week. :-(
Gosh, I can't believe I've only been here 2 and a half months. Life is so full and intense here I feel like time works completely differently - it feels like I've been in Austin for years. At times it feels like a gift - walking into this place and this life such a short time ago and already having a fulfilling job and a whole group of amazing friends and even a pseudo-family of sorts. But at other times it's overwhelming. Life here is SO intense and it's ALL CF. Thank God for my roommate Kevin - we may be different people but it's nice to have an outside influence. Even most of the people I've met outside of work I've still met *thru* people at work. And it's great - it is. I love these people, but between the endless hours of work, and work drama - and then never being able to escape it - I'm feeling a little burnt out. Next weekend I have nothing on my schedule and I intend to enjoy every second of it.
Still despite the stress and attendance issues, I'm still convinced that CF is an incredible program and a worthy cause - and my part in it will - I imagine - play a significant role in shaping the person I am - wherever my future my lead.
And once again, after only a few months here - "future" does seem to be the major topic of conversation these days. Everyone's either applying to grad schools or trying to decide whether they're doing a second year here and where they're going to live. And I find myself asking the same questions. When I first started at CF, I was so convinced that I wanted to stick with it and eventually get on staff. And then, when that desire died down a bit and I was assigned to juniors, it seemed a given that I would at least serve a second year as a coach and stay to see my kids graduate. But now, I'm not even sure about that.
It's not that I don't love CF - is that it's impossible to love with only part of myself. It takes everything - all my energy, all my time, and all my heart. And while I love it - it's not the only I love. And so long as I'm not planning on spending my life devoted to this cause - I'm not sure it's worth it to sacrifice everything else.
There are advantages. I'm planning on going to grad school in Fall 2010, and another year of AmeriCorps gives me another $5,000 scholarship, healthcare, and the optimum level of financial aid from any and every film school. Not to mention the value of sticking with my kids til the end - seeing them graduate and being there for them. And if all of my friends stick around - then it'll be hard to be the only one in Austin that isn't still at CF (more on that soon).
But I don't know if I can do another year of this. I'm averaging 51 hours a week, the management really doesn't have our back and treats us all like deliquent children. Add to that that I have no time to date, attend church, or make friends that aren't associated with CF. Not to mention - I don't have time to do any of the other things I care about - I hardly have time to read - let alone write or work on movies. So part of me feels like if I stick with CF - then I'm going to come out of it like having been stuck in a cave for 2 years. And if I'm going to spend 2-3 years of my life in grad school, I don't want to spend the one free year I have left feeling trapped. Another 10 month commitment is SO long.
But if I'm not doing CF, what do I do? Where do I go? I don't think I'm interested in moving some place new - I don't want to spend another year getting established somewhere. So that really leaves me with going back home (Atlanta or Charleston) or maybe going somewhere like NYC for a year. But NYC is a bit of reach - given my current financial state. And there's something to be said for spending a year back at home if I'm going to be forced to be so far away from my family for so long during school. But I worry that if I went home now - I'd never be able to leave again.
And what I'd really like to do next year is find a job where I don't have to work as many hours - and just make enough to pay my bills, and spend the rest of my time working on writing and film. If I can prove to myself before hand that I could be productive in those endeavors, it might just be worth it. But I couldn't afford to do that and live in NYC, Chaztown, or ATL. But I could do it here. I've already proven I could live on a small budget, and I think it'd be easy enough to make my budget a little larger.
Plus, I like it here. I mean - I miss my family and friends everyday. I do. And I miss the mountains, and the ocean and tall trees and old buildings and people that drink sweet tea. But I have this family here. And this feels like my city - it feels like our city. I feel like I'm a part of something here. And I feel like the person that I am here is a person that I want to be. No matter how much I grow and change and an individual, when I'm back in Atlanta I still feel like I can't get away from the less-confident, angsty teenager I was back in the day. I just want to fully come into the person I am now.
So it seems smartest to stay. And I'm pretty sure that if I went home - I wouldn't miss home anymore, but I would miss here. And here is a home for me in it's own right.
It's weird to be trying to figure all of this out now - but then - I feel like it's never too soon. Suffice to say that I still don't really have any idea.
I think my ideal would be - if I had money enough and time, I would continue living here. I'd finish my time at CF, and I'd spend my summer in NYC. And then maybe I'd come back for awhile and I'd work wherever, and then I'd travel for a bit. Spend some time back in Atlanta, Charleston and God - I'd love to go back to Europe for a few months. I could still volunteer at CF sometimes and be around for my kids. Of course I don't know how I'd make any of this happen, but maybe I could. It's always possible. And I could write the whole time and experience for one year at least - the life I've been dreaming about since I was four.
We shall see.
That's the update, I'll try to get some free time for another one soon!
PS. I want a pet squirrel!
Monday, October 20, 2008
Making it Mine
Wow. It is definitely time for a blog update so I can leave that last entry in emo-land where it belongs.
This weekend was absolutely CRAZY and very much needed after the mucho stressful week I had at work last week. All I'll say about work is that there was a whole lot of disgruntled employeeness (not solely on my part) that I'm pretty sure stems from CF being at the threshold of becoming an established, standarized organization - rather than the grassroots, homegrown project it's been up to this point. It's always hard to be wrapped up in something as the cement starts to dry.
Let us say no more about that dismal topic - and instead focus on the ridiculousness that was my weekend. First of all and - perhaps - MOST importantly, Lila came! It was most excellent. Not only did it feel absolutely wonderful to finally be able to show someone this new life of mine, but it also added some significance to my earlier trip to visit Lila. Now we're not just two best friends living new lives relatively close to each other - now we're a part of each other's new lives too. And it helped a lot that she got along with my friends fabulously - and they thought she was wicked cool.
Lila arrived at around 8 on Friday night, which was nice because it forced me to clean my room for the first time in several weeks. She got here and we went on an intense search for Leinenkeugal Sunset Wheat, which led us across town where we randomly decided to purchase the Shiner Hefe instead. Bad choice, IMHO, but worth it for the experience.
We got back to the apt right as friends were showing up to pregame and Tim and I discovered that we were wearing matching outfits... awkward. A bunch of people came over, including Chris, Amy, Jane, Tim, Rocky, Christina, and my roommate John of course. Haha, after a little bit of Harry Potter watching and conversing at home, we headed downtown to check out Molotov on West 6th street. Molotov turned out to pretty lame, so we quickly decided to head back to our old standard - The Tiniest Bar in Texas. This bar is actually just a gravel lot with christmas lights and picnic tables and a shed with a limited selection of beverages. Basically, it is awesome. Fabiola and her boyfriend met up with us too. We hung out there for the rest of the night, laughing, sharing stories, and (thanks to Lila's wicked phone) listening to some Modern Skirts. Actually, listening to Save Me that night was the first time I've really missed Athens since I left, but any sadness was tempered by the awesome atmosphere and energy of that night. Unfortunately, Anna and Laura showed up right as we were leaving the bar, and Renato never managed to meet up with us. But it was still a pretty sweet night which culminated with an impromptu trip to Whattaburger for some Justaburger goodness. How very fabulous.
Lila and I slept in a little on Saturday, and woke up just in time to realize that we were supposed to be at the Texas Fair Trade Forum (where we were volunteering) an hour earlier than we thought. So we quickly got our stuff together and headed out with John. The Forum was pretty interesting, but since I'm entirely not an auditory learner a lot of what was said was lost on me. But also cool was the fact that I was appointed video taper - so now I have filmwork to add to my resume. Aha, sweet!
Post-Trade Forum, John, Lila, and I headed to downtown proper so I could show Lila my favorite part of the city... the city part. We went to the Capitol first so I could show her the star than you stand on and only you can hear your voice echo. We checked out the Senate and HoR rooms, and Lila pointed out the plethora of stars involved in the interior design - so my kind of place!
We walked down Congress a bit, then over to Central Presbyterian on 8th - which I'd forgotten was hosting an Interfaith Arts Festival that pretty much rocked. We went to 6th Street next and realized as we walked that we were very very hungry. So we ended up at this place called the Iron Cactus which was a little pricey for my taste but had some of the best spinach and artichoke dip I've ever had in my life. And we all got into this discussion on fair trade which was kind of awesome.
We left downtown and dropped John off at home and then head straight for Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, which I had yet to visit. It turned out to be literally right next to the UT campus which was only bad at the time because we were mobbed by drunken UT fans on their way to the Mizzou game. Nevertheless, Austin Sem. was BEAUTIFUL. Also on the main sign they had some of my favorite bible quotes of all time - emphasizing the ultimate commandment to LOVE. Yay!
Next I gave Lila a tour of our office which was pretty sweet, and then we headed home to finally chill for awhile. We got back and settled down to *finally* watch Maura Tierney's last episode of ER which originally aired on Thursday. It was amazing and also a nice flashback to my past life. There was this really cool scene where
[SPOILERS - IF YOU CARE ABOUT THE EPISODE THEN DON'T READ THE NEXT PARAGRAPH]
Abby is packing up her locker and she's prying off her name placard to take with her and Heleh walks in and asks her all sternly, "What do you think you're doing with that?" And Abby says it's a souvenir but Heleh tells her to follow her, and she takes back through the storage room and opens the door to this utility closet and there - against the cement wall - are the name placards of all the doctors and nurses who've left County General. They're ALL there! Del Amico and Boulet and Benton and Ross and Hathaway. "Some of them we had to put up for them," Heleh says and the camera focuses on Greene and Pratt. Abby asks about Carter's and Heleh tells her he refused - he said it was defacement of government property. Ha. And then Heleh tells Abby that she's the first to ever put up two. And Abby places her own and Luca's at the top of the wall. It was really an incredible scene, and even though I know they probably never even considered that idea until they sat down to break the episode, it felt like it could have been there all along - it was *such* and ER thing. And even though I'm descending into disgusting cheesiness I have to say that it really hit me. Because I've literally been watching this show for my entire life - and here are all the characters that I've cared about at one time or another - not gone or forgotten - but still firmly attached to memory and life somewhere in a hidden closet. Just like all the pieces of my life that have come and gone, all the people I've loved but no longer see or no longer know, all of it is still there - not gone forever, but lovingly placed on some wall of memory in my mind. If ever there were a time I needed to remember that, it's now.
[END SPOILERS]
Anywho, after we watched ER we headed over to Amy's for the shindig she threw in Lila's honor. It was another successful party at the commune where Lila got to spend some quality time with the people I've gotten closest to since moving here. I spent a good chunk of the party talking to Amy and two of Zach's friends - Adam and Alamo Joe (I call him this because of multiple Joes and the fact that he works at Alamo Drafthouse) - who we've also gotten to know. And then at one point I was sitting on Amy's front porch listening to Tim and Rocky playing music together (harmonica and guitar mostly) and it was just so nice - this perfect moment of contentment - and life felt so so right. And I realized - not for the first time - that I love it here.
This whole weekend was about realizing that, and also realizing how seamlessly Lila and I fit back into each other's lives. When she was here, it was like neither of us ever left. And there's something really comforting about that - it makes me feel like I have the freedom to go live this new life - without sacrificing the things I cared about most in my life before Texas.
Sunday I slept in again, and Lila left around 10:30 or 11. Eventually I met up with Amy and Anna (another CF friend) and we went downtown to meet up with Alamo Joe, Adam, and Zach to participate in this Zombie walk they had organized. Basically there were a few hundred people dressed up like the undead and we "shambled" and shuffled our way all over downtown and up to the steps of the Capitol for Zombie rights. I think that this was actually to advertise for this festival or something at the Alamo Drafthouse, but I'm not really sure. The point is that it was so much fun! Seriously, all these tourists were watching us and taking pictures and videos of us and we were growling at them and generally freaking people out. We made this one little girl cry, but that (and the sticky corn syrup blood) was the only real downside. I love that I'm the kind of person that terrorizes downtown Austin as a zombie. And that I'm friends with those kind of people too.
We had a happy hour afterwards at this bar downtown that gave us a whole keg of free, really good beer. As in Live Oak Hefe - but I stuck to water cause it was crazy hot.
After the happy hour, Amy, Anna and I went with Zach, Alamo Joe, and Adam to this restaurant called Star Seeds where they apparently eat abotu 10 times a week. It was a really really good time. They're all these movie buffs - especially Joe - and man - it's just nice to have cool people to talk to.
I was exhausted after all that, so I left as soon as we got back to Amy's house. I got home and Kimi was over (Kevin's friend who is also our friend now) and all my roommates were there and we watched Extreme Makeover Home Edition together and then Kev's friend Colin came over too and we all played the Wii all night and then we watched the Rays win the ALCS which was awesome.
You know - the only shadow on yesterday was that I spent a lot of it missing home. It's not that I want to go back for good, but I really really want to go home - just for a weekend. I want to see my parents, I want see D.P. one last time - I don't know - I just want to check back in. And I wish tickets weren't so expensive and/or I wasn't so poor so that I could.
But I was driving home last night from Amy's and I was thinking about how much fun I'd had that day and how great all the people I know here and it occured to me (once again) how Austin is absolutely the perfect place for me to be right now. I feel like it's this city of Lost Children (as in the Lost Boys from Peter Pan). We're just all these people who've run away from home and we don't want to grow up but it's happening anyway - so we're together in this fun carnival of a city holding tight to whatever remnant of childhood we can grasp (like zombie walks) and laughing and running around and living in the sunlight. And even when all I want to do is go home and see my family, it's still so much better than it could be because I know that I'm here with all these people who are away from their families too. It seems like almost no one in Austin is from here - we're all just making a home out of this place we've found.
So even though I still want to go home, it's nice to know that this place is becoming home too. I'm making it mine.
- L
ps. I really miss my nephew.
This weekend was absolutely CRAZY and very much needed after the mucho stressful week I had at work last week. All I'll say about work is that there was a whole lot of disgruntled employeeness (not solely on my part) that I'm pretty sure stems from CF being at the threshold of becoming an established, standarized organization - rather than the grassroots, homegrown project it's been up to this point. It's always hard to be wrapped up in something as the cement starts to dry.
Let us say no more about that dismal topic - and instead focus on the ridiculousness that was my weekend. First of all and - perhaps - MOST importantly, Lila came! It was most excellent. Not only did it feel absolutely wonderful to finally be able to show someone this new life of mine, but it also added some significance to my earlier trip to visit Lila. Now we're not just two best friends living new lives relatively close to each other - now we're a part of each other's new lives too. And it helped a lot that she got along with my friends fabulously - and they thought she was wicked cool.
Lila arrived at around 8 on Friday night, which was nice because it forced me to clean my room for the first time in several weeks. She got here and we went on an intense search for Leinenkeugal Sunset Wheat, which led us across town where we randomly decided to purchase the Shiner Hefe instead. Bad choice, IMHO, but worth it for the experience.
We got back to the apt right as friends were showing up to pregame and Tim and I discovered that we were wearing matching outfits... awkward. A bunch of people came over, including Chris, Amy, Jane, Tim, Rocky, Christina, and my roommate John of course. Haha, after a little bit of Harry Potter watching and conversing at home, we headed downtown to check out Molotov on West 6th street. Molotov turned out to pretty lame, so we quickly decided to head back to our old standard - The Tiniest Bar in Texas. This bar is actually just a gravel lot with christmas lights and picnic tables and a shed with a limited selection of beverages. Basically, it is awesome. Fabiola and her boyfriend met up with us too. We hung out there for the rest of the night, laughing, sharing stories, and (thanks to Lila's wicked phone) listening to some Modern Skirts. Actually, listening to Save Me that night was the first time I've really missed Athens since I left, but any sadness was tempered by the awesome atmosphere and energy of that night. Unfortunately, Anna and Laura showed up right as we were leaving the bar, and Renato never managed to meet up with us. But it was still a pretty sweet night which culminated with an impromptu trip to Whattaburger for some Justaburger goodness. How very fabulous.
Lila and I slept in a little on Saturday, and woke up just in time to realize that we were supposed to be at the Texas Fair Trade Forum (where we were volunteering) an hour earlier than we thought. So we quickly got our stuff together and headed out with John. The Forum was pretty interesting, but since I'm entirely not an auditory learner a lot of what was said was lost on me. But also cool was the fact that I was appointed video taper - so now I have filmwork to add to my resume. Aha, sweet!
Post-Trade Forum, John, Lila, and I headed to downtown proper so I could show Lila my favorite part of the city... the city part. We went to the Capitol first so I could show her the star than you stand on and only you can hear your voice echo. We checked out the Senate and HoR rooms, and Lila pointed out the plethora of stars involved in the interior design - so my kind of place!
We walked down Congress a bit, then over to Central Presbyterian on 8th - which I'd forgotten was hosting an Interfaith Arts Festival that pretty much rocked. We went to 6th Street next and realized as we walked that we were very very hungry. So we ended up at this place called the Iron Cactus which was a little pricey for my taste but had some of the best spinach and artichoke dip I've ever had in my life. And we all got into this discussion on fair trade which was kind of awesome.
We left downtown and dropped John off at home and then head straight for Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, which I had yet to visit. It turned out to be literally right next to the UT campus which was only bad at the time because we were mobbed by drunken UT fans on their way to the Mizzou game. Nevertheless, Austin Sem. was BEAUTIFUL. Also on the main sign they had some of my favorite bible quotes of all time - emphasizing the ultimate commandment to LOVE. Yay!
Next I gave Lila a tour of our office which was pretty sweet, and then we headed home to finally chill for awhile. We got back and settled down to *finally* watch Maura Tierney's last episode of ER which originally aired on Thursday. It was amazing and also a nice flashback to my past life. There was this really cool scene where
[SPOILERS - IF YOU CARE ABOUT THE EPISODE THEN DON'T READ THE NEXT PARAGRAPH]
Abby is packing up her locker and she's prying off her name placard to take with her and Heleh walks in and asks her all sternly, "What do you think you're doing with that?" And Abby says it's a souvenir but Heleh tells her to follow her, and she takes back through the storage room and opens the door to this utility closet and there - against the cement wall - are the name placards of all the doctors and nurses who've left County General. They're ALL there! Del Amico and Boulet and Benton and Ross and Hathaway. "Some of them we had to put up for them," Heleh says and the camera focuses on Greene and Pratt. Abby asks about Carter's and Heleh tells her he refused - he said it was defacement of government property. Ha. And then Heleh tells Abby that she's the first to ever put up two. And Abby places her own and Luca's at the top of the wall. It was really an incredible scene, and even though I know they probably never even considered that idea until they sat down to break the episode, it felt like it could have been there all along - it was *such* and ER thing. And even though I'm descending into disgusting cheesiness I have to say that it really hit me. Because I've literally been watching this show for my entire life - and here are all the characters that I've cared about at one time or another - not gone or forgotten - but still firmly attached to memory and life somewhere in a hidden closet. Just like all the pieces of my life that have come and gone, all the people I've loved but no longer see or no longer know, all of it is still there - not gone forever, but lovingly placed on some wall of memory in my mind. If ever there were a time I needed to remember that, it's now.
[END SPOILERS]
Anywho, after we watched ER we headed over to Amy's for the shindig she threw in Lila's honor. It was another successful party at the commune where Lila got to spend some quality time with the people I've gotten closest to since moving here. I spent a good chunk of the party talking to Amy and two of Zach's friends - Adam and Alamo Joe (I call him this because of multiple Joes and the fact that he works at Alamo Drafthouse) - who we've also gotten to know. And then at one point I was sitting on Amy's front porch listening to Tim and Rocky playing music together (harmonica and guitar mostly) and it was just so nice - this perfect moment of contentment - and life felt so so right. And I realized - not for the first time - that I love it here.
This whole weekend was about realizing that, and also realizing how seamlessly Lila and I fit back into each other's lives. When she was here, it was like neither of us ever left. And there's something really comforting about that - it makes me feel like I have the freedom to go live this new life - without sacrificing the things I cared about most in my life before Texas.
Sunday I slept in again, and Lila left around 10:30 or 11. Eventually I met up with Amy and Anna (another CF friend) and we went downtown to meet up with Alamo Joe, Adam, and Zach to participate in this Zombie walk they had organized. Basically there were a few hundred people dressed up like the undead and we "shambled" and shuffled our way all over downtown and up to the steps of the Capitol for Zombie rights. I think that this was actually to advertise for this festival or something at the Alamo Drafthouse, but I'm not really sure. The point is that it was so much fun! Seriously, all these tourists were watching us and taking pictures and videos of us and we were growling at them and generally freaking people out. We made this one little girl cry, but that (and the sticky corn syrup blood) was the only real downside. I love that I'm the kind of person that terrorizes downtown Austin as a zombie. And that I'm friends with those kind of people too.
We had a happy hour afterwards at this bar downtown that gave us a whole keg of free, really good beer. As in Live Oak Hefe - but I stuck to water cause it was crazy hot.
After the happy hour, Amy, Anna and I went with Zach, Alamo Joe, and Adam to this restaurant called Star Seeds where they apparently eat abotu 10 times a week. It was a really really good time. They're all these movie buffs - especially Joe - and man - it's just nice to have cool people to talk to.
I was exhausted after all that, so I left as soon as we got back to Amy's house. I got home and Kimi was over (Kevin's friend who is also our friend now) and all my roommates were there and we watched Extreme Makeover Home Edition together and then Kev's friend Colin came over too and we all played the Wii all night and then we watched the Rays win the ALCS which was awesome.
You know - the only shadow on yesterday was that I spent a lot of it missing home. It's not that I want to go back for good, but I really really want to go home - just for a weekend. I want to see my parents, I want see D.P. one last time - I don't know - I just want to check back in. And I wish tickets weren't so expensive and/or I wasn't so poor so that I could.
But I was driving home last night from Amy's and I was thinking about how much fun I'd had that day and how great all the people I know here and it occured to me (once again) how Austin is absolutely the perfect place for me to be right now. I feel like it's this city of Lost Children (as in the Lost Boys from Peter Pan). We're just all these people who've run away from home and we don't want to grow up but it's happening anyway - so we're together in this fun carnival of a city holding tight to whatever remnant of childhood we can grasp (like zombie walks) and laughing and running around and living in the sunlight. And even when all I want to do is go home and see my family, it's still so much better than it could be because I know that I'm here with all these people who are away from their families too. It seems like almost no one in Austin is from here - we're all just making a home out of this place we've found.
So even though I still want to go home, it's nice to know that this place is becoming home too. I'm making it mine.
- L
ps. I really miss my nephew.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Open the eyes of my heart, Lord
So I know that *technically* I already posted an update today, but it was a pretty crappy post and I have a lot more to say now - so I'm going to try it again. I went to the night service at University Pres tonight and *sigh* it just didn't feel right. Honestly, it reminded me a whole hell of a lot of the PSC at UGA, but I'm not a college student and that's not what I need right now. And to be fair - I wasn't crazy outgoing but they weren't particularly friendly either. The only people that went out of their way to talk to me were the minister (who spoke a total of about 3 sentences to me) and this one UT freshman from Mexico. And I didn't see a single person out of college. Not one.
Of course the real slap in the face was realizing that the PSC might have seemed like that to outsiders when I was there. I was part of the core of that place right from the getgo. I've never seen it from this side. And it's healthy in certain ways... to be made aware - but it also kind of sucks because that's not really what I'm looking for.
And Central Pres last week was super-friendly, but it didn't feel right either. I was the youngest and most single by what... 6 years? More? Where the heck are all the Presbyterian 22 year-olds in this world? Because they're certainly not in Austin, Texas. They have to be out there - somewhere - because they existed when I'm was 16... and 20... they have to exist now. They can't just disappear.
I'm frustrated. I get that I was a little slow in trying to get on the church bandwagon out here but I'm trying - and I'm not having a whole lot of luck. I don't even know where to look next. I feel like either too old, or too young, or too liberal, or too conservative for every place out here. And I'm constantly surrounded by these people who call themselves Christian but don't believe anything like what I do - and I just want to find people that understand where I'm coming from.
And I get that it's supposed to be hard, but here's the thing - it never has been. Not for me. For as far back as I can remember, I have been a part of a loving, caring, fiercely faithful church family at St. Luke's. And it hasn't always been perfect - not by a long shot - but it has always, always been mine. Growing up, I changed houses, and schools, and friends - and even my relationship with my parents changed - but St. Luke's was *always* there. A rock. And yeah - it's changed over the years, but I've changed with it. We grew together. St. Luke's - more than anywhere else in my entire life - was home.
And then I went to college and I put off finding a Faith community there for nearly 2 years because I was scared that nothing could live up to what I had in St. Luke's. And then I finally went to the Presbyterian Student Center, and 15 seconds after I walked in the door - I knew I was home. It was - truly - that easy. And when - years later - things got rough at the PSC, I could always go home to St. Luke's and find that center again.
But now... now I'm a thousand miles away. And the PSC has transformed into whatever it is without me, and St. Luke's is changing again - in bigger ways than I've ever seen - and here's the thing - I'm not there to change with it. I'm changing in my own way at here in Texas. St. Luke's and I are spinning in different directions and when I see it again, it won't be the home that I remember.
And I'm trying to deal with that, I am trying to take it in stride - but it's hard - because I don't have anything here to turn to. CoFo is great, and the people are great and I love them. But at the end of the day - it is still just a job. A place where I work as an employee. Not a family. Not a home.
I feel like I'm just freefalling out here. I need a place to call home. I remember what it was like for that year and a half at Georgia - before the PSC. When I thought my individual faith in God was enough to sustain me. When I wrote off the value of a Faith community in favor of my own resilience. I remember the emptiness and the struggle - and I remember my mother suggesting that perhaps that unhappiness, that hole inside me came from the sudden lack in a family of Faith. At first I didn't believe her. But there was that night in Guatemala all those years ago - that amazing eye-opening moment when I realized exactly what was missing. I don't want to go back to that. I don't want to feel it again.
I'm out here and I'm breaking my rules and terrifying myself and that's all fine and good but I need to find a home. I need to know where to look.
You know, you may think I'm crazy - but I've felt God speak to me three times in my life. The first time - I was struggling to figure out where I would go for college and I could not make up my mind. I prayed and prayed for guidance - and one night - I heard it. A gentle whisper but impossible to ignore. It said "be patient." I wasn't. I told my parents I wanted to go to UGA two days later. I have no idea what would have happened if I'd waited.
But my freshman year, I heard God again. I was wandering the parking lot outside of my dorm late one night, feeling alone and isolated and lost. And in all my typical dramaticness I looked up at the sky and I cried out, "If you care so much, why aren't you here? Why aren't you down here with me, making it better?" I felt it then, deep inside me. I felt His longing to do just that - to be down here walking with us - to embrace us with his own arms. I felt it and I knew it to be true.
And several years later, I lead a retreat for my PSC group, and we had our Sunday morning worship service on the edge of a beautiful lake. And as everyone walked away after it was over, I stayed - looking out at the water - seaching for God. And He was there and he said to me "Lo, I am with you always."
So you see, I know He is here with me. I know that He has blessed me with a lifetime of comfortable, steadfast Faith community. I know that I have been far luckier than most. But I also feel that loss all the more acutely now, and I don't know how to diminish it. I want to find a new church home, but I don't know how. And then I find myself asking - why bother? I'm not in this place for the long haul - 10 months at least - but 2 years at the longest. If this search is meant to be so laborious, why even put in the effort to look? Were I lucky enough to find a place - I'd leave it too in time.
Still I search. Open my eyes, that I may see.
Of course the real slap in the face was realizing that the PSC might have seemed like that to outsiders when I was there. I was part of the core of that place right from the getgo. I've never seen it from this side. And it's healthy in certain ways... to be made aware - but it also kind of sucks because that's not really what I'm looking for.
And Central Pres last week was super-friendly, but it didn't feel right either. I was the youngest and most single by what... 6 years? More? Where the heck are all the Presbyterian 22 year-olds in this world? Because they're certainly not in Austin, Texas. They have to be out there - somewhere - because they existed when I'm was 16... and 20... they have to exist now. They can't just disappear.
I'm frustrated. I get that I was a little slow in trying to get on the church bandwagon out here but I'm trying - and I'm not having a whole lot of luck. I don't even know where to look next. I feel like either too old, or too young, or too liberal, or too conservative for every place out here. And I'm constantly surrounded by these people who call themselves Christian but don't believe anything like what I do - and I just want to find people that understand where I'm coming from.
And I get that it's supposed to be hard, but here's the thing - it never has been. Not for me. For as far back as I can remember, I have been a part of a loving, caring, fiercely faithful church family at St. Luke's. And it hasn't always been perfect - not by a long shot - but it has always, always been mine. Growing up, I changed houses, and schools, and friends - and even my relationship with my parents changed - but St. Luke's was *always* there. A rock. And yeah - it's changed over the years, but I've changed with it. We grew together. St. Luke's - more than anywhere else in my entire life - was home.
And then I went to college and I put off finding a Faith community there for nearly 2 years because I was scared that nothing could live up to what I had in St. Luke's. And then I finally went to the Presbyterian Student Center, and 15 seconds after I walked in the door - I knew I was home. It was - truly - that easy. And when - years later - things got rough at the PSC, I could always go home to St. Luke's and find that center again.
But now... now I'm a thousand miles away. And the PSC has transformed into whatever it is without me, and St. Luke's is changing again - in bigger ways than I've ever seen - and here's the thing - I'm not there to change with it. I'm changing in my own way at here in Texas. St. Luke's and I are spinning in different directions and when I see it again, it won't be the home that I remember.
And I'm trying to deal with that, I am trying to take it in stride - but it's hard - because I don't have anything here to turn to. CoFo is great, and the people are great and I love them. But at the end of the day - it is still just a job. A place where I work as an employee. Not a family. Not a home.
I feel like I'm just freefalling out here. I need a place to call home. I remember what it was like for that year and a half at Georgia - before the PSC. When I thought my individual faith in God was enough to sustain me. When I wrote off the value of a Faith community in favor of my own resilience. I remember the emptiness and the struggle - and I remember my mother suggesting that perhaps that unhappiness, that hole inside me came from the sudden lack in a family of Faith. At first I didn't believe her. But there was that night in Guatemala all those years ago - that amazing eye-opening moment when I realized exactly what was missing. I don't want to go back to that. I don't want to feel it again.
I'm out here and I'm breaking my rules and terrifying myself and that's all fine and good but I need to find a home. I need to know where to look.
You know, you may think I'm crazy - but I've felt God speak to me three times in my life. The first time - I was struggling to figure out where I would go for college and I could not make up my mind. I prayed and prayed for guidance - and one night - I heard it. A gentle whisper but impossible to ignore. It said "be patient." I wasn't. I told my parents I wanted to go to UGA two days later. I have no idea what would have happened if I'd waited.
But my freshman year, I heard God again. I was wandering the parking lot outside of my dorm late one night, feeling alone and isolated and lost. And in all my typical dramaticness I looked up at the sky and I cried out, "If you care so much, why aren't you here? Why aren't you down here with me, making it better?" I felt it then, deep inside me. I felt His longing to do just that - to be down here walking with us - to embrace us with his own arms. I felt it and I knew it to be true.
And several years later, I lead a retreat for my PSC group, and we had our Sunday morning worship service on the edge of a beautiful lake. And as everyone walked away after it was over, I stayed - looking out at the water - seaching for God. And He was there and he said to me "Lo, I am with you always."
So you see, I know He is here with me. I know that He has blessed me with a lifetime of comfortable, steadfast Faith community. I know that I have been far luckier than most. But I also feel that loss all the more acutely now, and I don't know how to diminish it. I want to find a new church home, but I don't know how. And then I find myself asking - why bother? I'm not in this place for the long haul - 10 months at least - but 2 years at the longest. If this search is meant to be so laborious, why even put in the effort to look? Were I lucky enough to find a place - I'd leave it too in time.
Still I search. Open my eyes, that I may see.
A Place in Time, Beyond the Sun
Hey beautiful/lovelies,
Have I mentioned lately how much I LOVE Texas? Seriously, last night I went to the Miss Kyle pageant (Kyle is the town where my high school is) and it was REE-dic-u-lous! The theme was (of course) the Wild, Wild West, and all of the girls danced around in cowboy boots and daisy dukes. Holy. cow. To be honest, I think the other coaches and I all felt like first-class creepers, and I sent a silent prayer up that I never had to go down that beauty queen path. You know, most of the time I'm not particularly aware that I'm in Texas... but then I go to something like Miss Kyle and - yep - it's Texas.
In other news, it's been a heck of a week at work! The second week of junior classes and I suddenly went from feeling like I didn't have enough to do - to feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed. I stressed about it at first, but I guess I'm getting into a rhythm and eventually I'll just be used to it. I'm still loving my kids, but it's just becoming more and more clear to me that this... teaching - it isn't the path for me. At least not right now. Which makes me future - my immediate future anyway - very unclear. I mean I think this film thing is going to happen - I want it to happen. But film school is nearly 2 years off - and I'll be done with CF in 8 months (maybe) - so the question is - what happens then? What happens between CF and Film School?
I have been seriously thinking of doing a second year at CF, but I'm just not sure. It'd be great to stay with my kids and see them graduate - see them go off to college. And some of my closest friends here are thinking of doing a second year - not to mention my roommates. And this - this is good work that I'm doing - something meaningful. But it's not the only thing I can do. And it's not where I'm headed. Things at work can be... stressful. And I get that work will always be stressful, but it can be a different kind of stress. I'm not sure I can have the kind of job where I might be required to go against my personal morals just to keep getting my paycheck (especially when it's an $800/mo paycheck). I just envision myself being burnt out a year from now. I guess we'll see.
If I'm not staying at College Forward, then I don't know what I'll be doing - the possibilities are endless. I guess that's the appeal - but sooner or later, I have to choose something. I could see myself sticking around Austin for another year - it's a cool city, opportunities abound, and regardless of whether they do CF, most of the people I know will still be here. But - I don't know - if I could find a way to swing it, I could also see myself spending a year in New York or - hell - maybe even bumming around Europe. The bottom line is: I'm young and I won't be young forever - next year may be my last chance to do something... unexpected.
Well, whatever happens - it won't be for awhile. For now I'm here and I'm going to make the most it.
Life in Austin continues, and I'm checking out University Pres tonight. More updates soon.
Have I mentioned lately how much I LOVE Texas? Seriously, last night I went to the Miss Kyle pageant (Kyle is the town where my high school is) and it was REE-dic-u-lous! The theme was (of course) the Wild, Wild West, and all of the girls danced around in cowboy boots and daisy dukes. Holy. cow. To be honest, I think the other coaches and I all felt like first-class creepers, and I sent a silent prayer up that I never had to go down that beauty queen path. You know, most of the time I'm not particularly aware that I'm in Texas... but then I go to something like Miss Kyle and - yep - it's Texas.
In other news, it's been a heck of a week at work! The second week of junior classes and I suddenly went from feeling like I didn't have enough to do - to feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed. I stressed about it at first, but I guess I'm getting into a rhythm and eventually I'll just be used to it. I'm still loving my kids, but it's just becoming more and more clear to me that this... teaching - it isn't the path for me. At least not right now. Which makes me future - my immediate future anyway - very unclear. I mean I think this film thing is going to happen - I want it to happen. But film school is nearly 2 years off - and I'll be done with CF in 8 months (maybe) - so the question is - what happens then? What happens between CF and Film School?
I have been seriously thinking of doing a second year at CF, but I'm just not sure. It'd be great to stay with my kids and see them graduate - see them go off to college. And some of my closest friends here are thinking of doing a second year - not to mention my roommates. And this - this is good work that I'm doing - something meaningful. But it's not the only thing I can do. And it's not where I'm headed. Things at work can be... stressful. And I get that work will always be stressful, but it can be a different kind of stress. I'm not sure I can have the kind of job where I might be required to go against my personal morals just to keep getting my paycheck (especially when it's an $800/mo paycheck). I just envision myself being burnt out a year from now. I guess we'll see.
If I'm not staying at College Forward, then I don't know what I'll be doing - the possibilities are endless. I guess that's the appeal - but sooner or later, I have to choose something. I could see myself sticking around Austin for another year - it's a cool city, opportunities abound, and regardless of whether they do CF, most of the people I know will still be here. But - I don't know - if I could find a way to swing it, I could also see myself spending a year in New York or - hell - maybe even bumming around Europe. The bottom line is: I'm young and I won't be young forever - next year may be my last chance to do something... unexpected.
Well, whatever happens - it won't be for awhile. For now I'm here and I'm going to make the most it.
Life in Austin continues, and I'm checking out University Pres tonight. More updates soon.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
The Kids are Alright
Well I'm long overdue for an update in this thing. Since the last time I wrote, I have gone to San Antonio to visit Lila, met the new Zach (aka. our recently hired supervisor), had my first official Junior class, got officially sworn in as an AmeriCorps member and [finally] visited a church.
I don't know if I can really pound out a long enough entry to give justice to all the things that have happened - so you might have to settle for an abbreviated version. But on the upside - I'm working on my Life of Layton movie and will hopefully be ready to upload it in a few weeks.
Meanwhile...
SAN ANTONIO
I spent last weekend visiting my BFF - Lila - in San Antonio. Not only was it nice to see a familiar face, but it was also cool to see a part of Texas that isn't Austin and to have something new to explore. I think San Antonio is a fair bit bigger than Austin, and I've gotten so used to Austin's size that I was a little overwhelmed. S.A.'s real claim to fame is the Alamo and the Riverwalk. It was a little touristy I guess, but I'm a total sucker for that stuff so I liked it. We also got to check out Jake's Place - the LIG GNS on the Riverwalk. Probably one of the best things about going to visit Lila was getting to see what another AmeriCorps program is like. It's amazing how different our two programs are. We both deal with issues in education, but my program is this grassroots organization that's very small and local and just kind of all over the place. City Year San Antonio is based out of a national organization (City Year) so it's a lot more streamlined and put together. There's more of a focus on method and the group mentality - with chants and matching uniforms. It was definitely a valuable experience to spend some time with that org., but it also made me realize how much CoFo was the right fit for me. So even though I had a great time, it was nice to get back home to Austin and College Forward.
THE NEW ZACH
The new Zach is named Kristen, and she moved to Austin last December after spending 5 years working with NPOs in Los Angeles. I haven't had too much time to talk with her yet, but she seems pretty awesome. We did bond briefly over L.A. on Friday at our AmeriCorps swearing in. I think we'll all miss Zach, but props to Melody for finding us such a rock solid replacement.
MY FIRST OFFICIAL JUNIOR CLASS!
This is the big one. What we've all been waiting for - the start of our own classes. I think even the senior coaches were excited to have new faces on board and to have their own classes fully to themselves. I was super stoked for my first class - and not nearly as nervous as I expected to be. The main focus of my first class was introducing myself to my kids and getting to know them - as well as dividing them up into the teams they'll be in all year. I decided to do teams both to break down the class into manageable groups and also because I feel like a team mentality can really motivate people.
By the time the early class was supposed to start, Fabiola and I had over 50 juniors to contend with, so we split the class in half and each took one. For the record, 26 is still a lot of kids for one classroom! My first class was neither as bad as I'd feared nor as good as I'd hoped. The kids were pretty talkative, and I had to talk over them a lot and ask them to be quiet. But they're fun and happy and they have a lot of personality. They seemed pretty into the team thing - so hopefully that'll work out. I think they haven't quite made up their minds about me yet. I'm sort of a whole new breed - not quite a teacher and not quite a peer. I look forward to sort establishing my role with them - but I think it's going to be a great year.
My late class was much smaller - I ended up with about 14 kids. Somehow I ended up with all the loud, rambunctious boys and Fabi ended up with all the quiet girls so I think I'm going to have my hands full. My I swear - I love every single one of them. They just keep things fun and exciting and to be honest - I think they're really happy to be there and I think they really like me. It's nice having a smaller group to work with, but I don't want to be biased towards one class over the other. I know I'll love all the kids in my early class too - it just might take me longer to get to know them.
Tuesday I'm starting journals with my kids - sa-weet!
SWEARING IN
Friday we had our swearing in ceremony, which was a little lame but mostly awesome. The ceremony was a little chaotic, but there was something very satisfying about making our term of service official. And it was powerful to see all the AmeriCorps members in Austin together in one place. Change is happening - not just at CF but all over - and it's amazing. It's amazing to be a part of it.
CHURCH
I finally went. I almost didn't - I went out last night and stayed out later than I planned - so I woke up this morning and all I wanted to do was sleep. But I dragged myself out of the bed and into the shower and found myself at Central Pres downtown only 5 minutes late. The church is (I think) the oldest PC USA church in town (obviously predating the existence of PC USA) and it's this pretty old building. The inside of the sanctuary is beautiful - very warm and cozy. It was sunny and hot outside, but somehow it was easy to imagine - from inside - that it was a crisp, gray autumn day outside. To be clear - I see that as a good thing.
The sermon was pretty good - this is definitely an outreach focused church - both international and local. After the service I was bombarded by people welcoming me and introducing themselves - it was such a friendly environment and it felt so nice to be around that again. The pastor himself came up to say hello - he's this friendly old man with crinkly eyes. And then this girl, Laura, invited me to go to this young adult thing tonight. So I went to that too and met a whole bunch more people. They were all very nice and I could definitely see myself getting involved with that. The only real downsides were that it was mostly girls and I was by far the youngest. I think I'm also going to check on University Pres because they might have more folks my age.
But things are going well - stay tuned for more news!
I don't know if I can really pound out a long enough entry to give justice to all the things that have happened - so you might have to settle for an abbreviated version. But on the upside - I'm working on my Life of Layton movie and will hopefully be ready to upload it in a few weeks.
Meanwhile...
SAN ANTONIO
I spent last weekend visiting my BFF - Lila - in San Antonio. Not only was it nice to see a familiar face, but it was also cool to see a part of Texas that isn't Austin and to have something new to explore. I think San Antonio is a fair bit bigger than Austin, and I've gotten so used to Austin's size that I was a little overwhelmed. S.A.'s real claim to fame is the Alamo and the Riverwalk. It was a little touristy I guess, but I'm a total sucker for that stuff so I liked it. We also got to check out Jake's Place - the LIG GNS on the Riverwalk. Probably one of the best things about going to visit Lila was getting to see what another AmeriCorps program is like. It's amazing how different our two programs are. We both deal with issues in education, but my program is this grassroots organization that's very small and local and just kind of all over the place. City Year San Antonio is based out of a national organization (City Year) so it's a lot more streamlined and put together. There's more of a focus on method and the group mentality - with chants and matching uniforms. It was definitely a valuable experience to spend some time with that org., but it also made me realize how much CoFo was the right fit for me. So even though I had a great time, it was nice to get back home to Austin and College Forward.
THE NEW ZACH
The new Zach is named Kristen, and she moved to Austin last December after spending 5 years working with NPOs in Los Angeles. I haven't had too much time to talk with her yet, but she seems pretty awesome. We did bond briefly over L.A. on Friday at our AmeriCorps swearing in. I think we'll all miss Zach, but props to Melody for finding us such a rock solid replacement.
MY FIRST OFFICIAL JUNIOR CLASS!
This is the big one. What we've all been waiting for - the start of our own classes. I think even the senior coaches were excited to have new faces on board and to have their own classes fully to themselves. I was super stoked for my first class - and not nearly as nervous as I expected to be. The main focus of my first class was introducing myself to my kids and getting to know them - as well as dividing them up into the teams they'll be in all year. I decided to do teams both to break down the class into manageable groups and also because I feel like a team mentality can really motivate people.
By the time the early class was supposed to start, Fabiola and I had over 50 juniors to contend with, so we split the class in half and each took one. For the record, 26 is still a lot of kids for one classroom! My first class was neither as bad as I'd feared nor as good as I'd hoped. The kids were pretty talkative, and I had to talk over them a lot and ask them to be quiet. But they're fun and happy and they have a lot of personality. They seemed pretty into the team thing - so hopefully that'll work out. I think they haven't quite made up their minds about me yet. I'm sort of a whole new breed - not quite a teacher and not quite a peer. I look forward to sort establishing my role with them - but I think it's going to be a great year.
My late class was much smaller - I ended up with about 14 kids. Somehow I ended up with all the loud, rambunctious boys and Fabi ended up with all the quiet girls so I think I'm going to have my hands full. My I swear - I love every single one of them. They just keep things fun and exciting and to be honest - I think they're really happy to be there and I think they really like me. It's nice having a smaller group to work with, but I don't want to be biased towards one class over the other. I know I'll love all the kids in my early class too - it just might take me longer to get to know them.
Tuesday I'm starting journals with my kids - sa-weet!
SWEARING IN
Friday we had our swearing in ceremony, which was a little lame but mostly awesome. The ceremony was a little chaotic, but there was something very satisfying about making our term of service official. And it was powerful to see all the AmeriCorps members in Austin together in one place. Change is happening - not just at CF but all over - and it's amazing. It's amazing to be a part of it.
CHURCH
I finally went. I almost didn't - I went out last night and stayed out later than I planned - so I woke up this morning and all I wanted to do was sleep. But I dragged myself out of the bed and into the shower and found myself at Central Pres downtown only 5 minutes late. The church is (I think) the oldest PC USA church in town (obviously predating the existence of PC USA) and it's this pretty old building. The inside of the sanctuary is beautiful - very warm and cozy. It was sunny and hot outside, but somehow it was easy to imagine - from inside - that it was a crisp, gray autumn day outside. To be clear - I see that as a good thing.
The sermon was pretty good - this is definitely an outreach focused church - both international and local. After the service I was bombarded by people welcoming me and introducing themselves - it was such a friendly environment and it felt so nice to be around that again. The pastor himself came up to say hello - he's this friendly old man with crinkly eyes. And then this girl, Laura, invited me to go to this young adult thing tonight. So I went to that too and met a whole bunch more people. They were all very nice and I could definitely see myself getting involved with that. The only real downsides were that it was mostly girls and I was by far the youngest. I think I'm also going to check on University Pres because they might have more folks my age.
But things are going well - stay tuned for more news!
Friday, September 26, 2008
Heart in my Hands
Hey gang,
I figured it was about time for another update - particularly since I'll have plenty more to write about after this weekend. Don't want to give myself too much ground to cover at once.
To clarify, I am going to San Antonio this weekend to visit Lila and I am super stoked for several reasons. First and foremost - seeing Lila will be most excellent. She'll be the first familiar face I've seen since moving here and of course it helps that she's one of my favorite people in the whole world! Add to that that I'll be able to watch some rockin' Georgia football with a fellow UGA fan (more on this excitement later). Plus, now that I've sort of done the whole touristy thing here in Austin, it'll be nice to poke around a new city and take cheesy pictures (try video!). And I get to earn Americorps hours! And another nice side benefit will be coming "home" to Austin for the first time - I think that'll be the real test of how I'm settling into this place. Overall, it should be an awesome weekend and I expect to get very little sleep!
Meanwhile, I would like to take a moment to just point out OREGON STATE'S RIDICULOUS WIN OVER USC LAST NIGHT! Seriously, did you people see that game?! Holy. cow. All I know is USC might as well just hide in the lockeroom for the rest of the season because their shot at the Natty Champ is as good as over. Man, our chance is so real this year I can almost taste it! And let me just say that if by some horrific chance we don't make it all the way - it sure as heck better not be because we lost to the most podunk backwards university in the South. There is only one school I hate and that is Alabama my friends. So we better pull it out this weekend - and if it takes our black jerseys to do it - so be it. That's all I've got to say about that.
In other news (ironically stated), I'm currently trying to avoid watching the news because every time I do I start to freak out. I get that it's all sensationalism, but there's no pretending that our economy isn't having a hard time right now. And I have to either find a job or go to grad school in the midst of that mess. So what I want to know is - is it worse to take out loans and go to grad school now, or try to find a stable job in the midst of a tenuous job market? I guess it doesn't really matter, because I think the grad school thing will happen regardless. It's just a question of whether it should happen next year, the year after, or some ambiguous time after that.
Speaking of grad schools, I've been reading more and more about film school and I thinking that's the way I'm headed pretty much for sure. I mean things can always change - and with me they certainly do change often - but for now, I feel confident about it. I've realized recently that there are always going to be a million things I wish I was doing (just this morning I wished for the first time ever that I was in D.C. doing the whole political thing), but the point is - what is the thing that I would regret not doing the most. I think I know.
Unfortunately, knowing that I want to go to film school hardly narrows my path at all. Because, there are all these schools (although I'm narrowing that list down pretty effectively) and all these different types of film, and all these different jobs within film - and you have to go to different schools and do different things for each of them. There's a part of me that knows I should go industry - cause that's the way I'm wired - but then there's the part of me that just wants to be able to write and direct my own way. And there's this whole other side of me that just wants to take my camera and travel the world in search of the real stories: aka. documentary. And then there's deciding between screenwriting, directing, producing, or some other thing that I've yet to discover. How am I supposed to choose when I love it all?
Alright - that's enough crisising for right now - back to work. By the way, I get my juniors next week! Hell yeah!
I figured it was about time for another update - particularly since I'll have plenty more to write about after this weekend. Don't want to give myself too much ground to cover at once.
To clarify, I am going to San Antonio this weekend to visit Lila and I am super stoked for several reasons. First and foremost - seeing Lila will be most excellent. She'll be the first familiar face I've seen since moving here and of course it helps that she's one of my favorite people in the whole world! Add to that that I'll be able to watch some rockin' Georgia football with a fellow UGA fan (more on this excitement later). Plus, now that I've sort of done the whole touristy thing here in Austin, it'll be nice to poke around a new city and take cheesy pictures (try video!). And I get to earn Americorps hours! And another nice side benefit will be coming "home" to Austin for the first time - I think that'll be the real test of how I'm settling into this place. Overall, it should be an awesome weekend and I expect to get very little sleep!
Meanwhile, I would like to take a moment to just point out OREGON STATE'S RIDICULOUS WIN OVER USC LAST NIGHT! Seriously, did you people see that game?! Holy. cow. All I know is USC might as well just hide in the lockeroom for the rest of the season because their shot at the Natty Champ is as good as over. Man, our chance is so real this year I can almost taste it! And let me just say that if by some horrific chance we don't make it all the way - it sure as heck better not be because we lost to the most podunk backwards university in the South. There is only one school I hate and that is Alabama my friends. So we better pull it out this weekend - and if it takes our black jerseys to do it - so be it. That's all I've got to say about that.
In other news (ironically stated), I'm currently trying to avoid watching the news because every time I do I start to freak out. I get that it's all sensationalism, but there's no pretending that our economy isn't having a hard time right now. And I have to either find a job or go to grad school in the midst of that mess. So what I want to know is - is it worse to take out loans and go to grad school now, or try to find a stable job in the midst of a tenuous job market? I guess it doesn't really matter, because I think the grad school thing will happen regardless. It's just a question of whether it should happen next year, the year after, or some ambiguous time after that.
Speaking of grad schools, I've been reading more and more about film school and I thinking that's the way I'm headed pretty much for sure. I mean things can always change - and with me they certainly do change often - but for now, I feel confident about it. I've realized recently that there are always going to be a million things I wish I was doing (just this morning I wished for the first time ever that I was in D.C. doing the whole political thing), but the point is - what is the thing that I would regret not doing the most. I think I know.
Unfortunately, knowing that I want to go to film school hardly narrows my path at all. Because, there are all these schools (although I'm narrowing that list down pretty effectively) and all these different types of film, and all these different jobs within film - and you have to go to different schools and do different things for each of them. There's a part of me that knows I should go industry - cause that's the way I'm wired - but then there's the part of me that just wants to be able to write and direct my own way. And there's this whole other side of me that just wants to take my camera and travel the world in search of the real stories: aka. documentary. And then there's deciding between screenwriting, directing, producing, or some other thing that I've yet to discover. How am I supposed to choose when I love it all?
Alright - that's enough crisising for right now - back to work. By the way, I get my juniors next week! Hell yeah!
Monday, September 22, 2008
Eternal Sunshine (not so great, actually)
That's really my only complaint right now - but I really had to voice it. It never rains here. Not ever. Two weeks ago a massive hurricane completely annihilated the Texas coast and here in Austin we did not see one single drop of rain. My first week here I found myself in a t-shirt shop downtown and laughed about a t-shirt which read "yay, serotonin" and had the chemical compound drawn on it. I liked the idea at the time - but now I feel like I have serotonin sprouting out of my ears! Trust me when I say I know it could be worse - better sun than rain I suppose - but girl's gotta have some gray every once in a while! It's just making me a little nervous at the prospect of 3 years in sunny SoCal. Whatevs.
Other than that, I can't really complain. This was the single most unproductive weekend I have had since I got here. I did not clean my room, do laundry, or write a single sentence. I did not even watch a single full episode of any television show. On the other hand, I did watch The Notebook with my roommates, donate my plasma for dollars, go see Tropic Thunder (for free!!), attend a s'mores party, and stumble into a pecan festival downtown. I failed at making it to church on Sunday morning for the 5th week in a row, but I did go see Central Pres. downtown yesterday and fell a little bit in love - so maybe I will end up there someday.
Last night I tried to watch the emmys with my roommates, but the show was so awkward and horrible that we eventually muted it and played boys v. girls Cranium - in which we postively decimated the boys. It was pretty much awesome.
This week is application review for the junior classes (read: my class) and it's crazy! My high school got 85 applications and we're expecting a few late ones as well. So far we've accepted 57 applicants and we have pretty much all the others waiting for a committee review. I'd say I'm going to have my hands full! But can I just please tell you how excited I am? I'm reading these kids applications and I'm already falling in love with them. I can't wait to actually get started and I hope I turn out to be as badass coach like I think I will. Sa-weet!
I also sent off for this book called Film School Confidential which should be arriving shortly and which I will then pleasantly devour. Meanwhile, I managed to get my hands on a video camera for ridiculously cheap thanks to this random girl I found on facebook who happened to be an americorps volunteer last year AND had a video camera she was trying to get rid of. Which leads me to my BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!
BIG ANNOUNCEMENT:
In light of my having a new camera and potentially applying to film schools and also in light of the fact that 99% of you have not ever been to Austin/seen my life here - I have decided to make a video of my life here in Texas - complete with a tour of my apartment, office and downtown and face to face interviews with my posse. It'll be almost like being here! So get excited! Yay!
Okay, that's pretty much it. I'm leaving shortly for Whataburger to get their $1 justaburger. Sweet.
Love ya!
Other than that, I can't really complain. This was the single most unproductive weekend I have had since I got here. I did not clean my room, do laundry, or write a single sentence. I did not even watch a single full episode of any television show. On the other hand, I did watch The Notebook with my roommates, donate my plasma for dollars, go see Tropic Thunder (for free!!), attend a s'mores party, and stumble into a pecan festival downtown. I failed at making it to church on Sunday morning for the 5th week in a row, but I did go see Central Pres. downtown yesterday and fell a little bit in love - so maybe I will end up there someday.
Last night I tried to watch the emmys with my roommates, but the show was so awkward and horrible that we eventually muted it and played boys v. girls Cranium - in which we postively decimated the boys. It was pretty much awesome.
This week is application review for the junior classes (read: my class) and it's crazy! My high school got 85 applications and we're expecting a few late ones as well. So far we've accepted 57 applicants and we have pretty much all the others waiting for a committee review. I'd say I'm going to have my hands full! But can I just please tell you how excited I am? I'm reading these kids applications and I'm already falling in love with them. I can't wait to actually get started and I hope I turn out to be as badass coach like I think I will. Sa-weet!
I also sent off for this book called Film School Confidential which should be arriving shortly and which I will then pleasantly devour. Meanwhile, I managed to get my hands on a video camera for ridiculously cheap thanks to this random girl I found on facebook who happened to be an americorps volunteer last year AND had a video camera she was trying to get rid of. Which leads me to my BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!
BIG ANNOUNCEMENT:
In light of my having a new camera and potentially applying to film schools and also in light of the fact that 99% of you have not ever been to Austin/seen my life here - I have decided to make a video of my life here in Texas - complete with a tour of my apartment, office and downtown and face to face interviews with my posse. It'll be almost like being here! So get excited! Yay!
Okay, that's pretty much it. I'm leaving shortly for Whataburger to get their $1 justaburger. Sweet.
Love ya!
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Seeing is Believing
Happy Supernatural Day, guys! Okay, I realize that means pretty much nothing to y'all, but tonight is the 4th season premiere of Supernatural and I am so stoked. My roommates caught up with the past season DVDs and now we're all rarin' to go.
Meanwhile, have you ever been in a place or situation where you felt that things oddly and completely unexplainably catered to you? That's probably not quite the right way to put it, but I'm having a hard time articulating this morning. All I'm saying is, aside from moving here and meeting every film-related friend I could ever hope for, several other strange and exciting coincidences (or not?) have occurred. For one thing, it's dawning on me that there might be more short-haired girls in this city than anything other outside of New York. Seriously, everywhere I go I see cool feminine looking girls with wicked short hair cuts. And I guess that does make me feel a little like a poser, but I know deep down that what it's actually doing for me is preventing me from freaking out about my hair as I would anywhere else. Instead, I'm having the realization that this is how my hair has wanted to look for a long time. AND I'm pretty much back to my natural color - how awesome is that!?
Okay, that meandered a little off the path, but basically things about this city just make it seem like such the perfect place for me to be right now (though I don't always see it). There are so many Presby churches that I like, that I literally can't decide which one to go to. And 3 days a week I get to drive past downtown on my way to and from my high school, and everytime I realize how much I love the city. The tall buildings, the Frost Tower, the river. Sometimes I think that if I could morph myself into a city, it would most certainly (right now, at least) be this one. My only complaint? Not enough cowboys. Gotta work on that one.
Another thing that will sound vain or self-obsessed or something - but I have to mention because of my mom - is that I think this town has been very good for my sense of style. Maybe not just the town so much as my crowd and my work environment, but I don't think I've worn my standard jeans two days in a row once since I've been here. And I usually only wear them 2 or 3 days a week - and 2 of those days I have to wear pants for my job. And on top of that, more and more I'm finding cooler ways to spice things up even on the days I am wearing pants - skinny jeans, khakis, cool shoes and necklaces and this really B.A. hoodie. And other days I'm actually having fun finding cool skirtyish outfits to wear. I don't know, I'm probably overdramatizing, but it feels like maybe I'm finally coming into myself a little bit - at least my style.
Here's another thing that this awesome place has brought me in the last few weeks/24 hours. First of all, one of the girls I've become particular friends with at work is Jessica (not my roommate). She's originally from the Bay area I think, but she went to school in San Diego and was super-involved with this grassroots nonprofit called Invisible Children pretty much from when it started. Now I don't know if you know what IC is, (if you want to know, I'll tell you - heck I'll probably tell you anyways) but it's huge on college campuses and was huge at UGA. But somehow, despite my love for both nonprofit work and Africa, I managed to avoid ever getting involved with it during school. But then I came to Texas and I met Jessica, and I found out IC was founded by 3 guys in SoCal around our age. Two of them were film students at USC and they took a camera and went to Sudan in search of a story, and they uncovered this horrible atrocity going on with children in Northern Uganda and they made this very freshman, but incredibly moving documentary about it. They came back, they showed it, and it started something that became huge.
SO yesterday Jessica brought me a copy of the DVD, and last night I finally got to watch it. Holy. Cow. I feel so trite or cliche saying it changed my life, but seriously. Not only was it significant for me because of the reality it uncovered, but also because of who did the uncovering, and how. It was just these kids - my generation - with a passion for film and people. These kids are me. At this one point at the beginning of the film one of the 3 guys - Laren - is trying to articulate why they're making a movie. And he says [something like] media is the way we understand the world. It helps define our perspective and it gives us a means to communicate. I'm not doing a good job of quoting him, but basically he voiced what I've been trying to articulate for years about why I love film. And I realized: This is what I want to do. This is the answer. Not going to Africa - necessarily. Not even making documentaries and starting NPOs necessarily. But I want help bring understanding to this world and I want to do it through the lens. It's so obvious that I feel like it's been right there all the time just waiting for me to notice. The answer to all things (for me at least). Storytelling, and helping people, and film.
Because here's the thing. Once you've seen something like Invisible Children - you can't unsee it. It's there and it's touched you and now this issue that you once felt so removed from has a face. Jacob's face, and Tony's face and Jolly's face. And it becomes a part of you and you realize that it's not their world and our world. One world. One. And there are million different ways to bring this about - to fight for this message - but it seems like mine just might be film. (too bad I got rid of my camera - that was a mistake)
So it's nice to have a little clarity in an unclear time. And I encourage all of you to take 1 hour of your life and watch Invisible Children. And if you want a copy of the movie let me know and I'll see what I can do. And if you don't want a copy or you don't want to know about it, but you're either in my family and or one of my best friends - rest assured. You will see this movie. I will show it to you. Lol.
Okay - well I've got work in half an hour, and I'm rockin' out to Teenage Wasteland and I've sort of lost my train of thought. So I'm going to go.
Peace (not just a word).
Meanwhile, have you ever been in a place or situation where you felt that things oddly and completely unexplainably catered to you? That's probably not quite the right way to put it, but I'm having a hard time articulating this morning. All I'm saying is, aside from moving here and meeting every film-related friend I could ever hope for, several other strange and exciting coincidences (or not?) have occurred. For one thing, it's dawning on me that there might be more short-haired girls in this city than anything other outside of New York. Seriously, everywhere I go I see cool feminine looking girls with wicked short hair cuts. And I guess that does make me feel a little like a poser, but I know deep down that what it's actually doing for me is preventing me from freaking out about my hair as I would anywhere else. Instead, I'm having the realization that this is how my hair has wanted to look for a long time. AND I'm pretty much back to my natural color - how awesome is that!?
Okay, that meandered a little off the path, but basically things about this city just make it seem like such the perfect place for me to be right now (though I don't always see it). There are so many Presby churches that I like, that I literally can't decide which one to go to. And 3 days a week I get to drive past downtown on my way to and from my high school, and everytime I realize how much I love the city. The tall buildings, the Frost Tower, the river. Sometimes I think that if I could morph myself into a city, it would most certainly (right now, at least) be this one. My only complaint? Not enough cowboys. Gotta work on that one.
Another thing that will sound vain or self-obsessed or something - but I have to mention because of my mom - is that I think this town has been very good for my sense of style. Maybe not just the town so much as my crowd and my work environment, but I don't think I've worn my standard jeans two days in a row once since I've been here. And I usually only wear them 2 or 3 days a week - and 2 of those days I have to wear pants for my job. And on top of that, more and more I'm finding cooler ways to spice things up even on the days I am wearing pants - skinny jeans, khakis, cool shoes and necklaces and this really B.A. hoodie. And other days I'm actually having fun finding cool skirtyish outfits to wear. I don't know, I'm probably overdramatizing, but it feels like maybe I'm finally coming into myself a little bit - at least my style.
Here's another thing that this awesome place has brought me in the last few weeks/24 hours. First of all, one of the girls I've become particular friends with at work is Jessica (not my roommate). She's originally from the Bay area I think, but she went to school in San Diego and was super-involved with this grassroots nonprofit called Invisible Children pretty much from when it started. Now I don't know if you know what IC is, (if you want to know, I'll tell you - heck I'll probably tell you anyways) but it's huge on college campuses and was huge at UGA. But somehow, despite my love for both nonprofit work and Africa, I managed to avoid ever getting involved with it during school. But then I came to Texas and I met Jessica, and I found out IC was founded by 3 guys in SoCal around our age. Two of them were film students at USC and they took a camera and went to Sudan in search of a story, and they uncovered this horrible atrocity going on with children in Northern Uganda and they made this very freshman, but incredibly moving documentary about it. They came back, they showed it, and it started something that became huge.
SO yesterday Jessica brought me a copy of the DVD, and last night I finally got to watch it. Holy. Cow. I feel so trite or cliche saying it changed my life, but seriously. Not only was it significant for me because of the reality it uncovered, but also because of who did the uncovering, and how. It was just these kids - my generation - with a passion for film and people. These kids are me. At this one point at the beginning of the film one of the 3 guys - Laren - is trying to articulate why they're making a movie. And he says [something like] media is the way we understand the world. It helps define our perspective and it gives us a means to communicate. I'm not doing a good job of quoting him, but basically he voiced what I've been trying to articulate for years about why I love film. And I realized: This is what I want to do. This is the answer. Not going to Africa - necessarily. Not even making documentaries and starting NPOs necessarily. But I want help bring understanding to this world and I want to do it through the lens. It's so obvious that I feel like it's been right there all the time just waiting for me to notice. The answer to all things (for me at least). Storytelling, and helping people, and film.
Because here's the thing. Once you've seen something like Invisible Children - you can't unsee it. It's there and it's touched you and now this issue that you once felt so removed from has a face. Jacob's face, and Tony's face and Jolly's face. And it becomes a part of you and you realize that it's not their world and our world. One world. One. And there are million different ways to bring this about - to fight for this message - but it seems like mine just might be film. (too bad I got rid of my camera - that was a mistake)
So it's nice to have a little clarity in an unclear time. And I encourage all of you to take 1 hour of your life and watch Invisible Children. And if you want a copy of the movie let me know and I'll see what I can do. And if you don't want a copy or you don't want to know about it, but you're either in my family and or one of my best friends - rest assured. You will see this movie. I will show it to you. Lol.
Okay - well I've got work in half an hour, and I'm rockin' out to Teenage Wasteland and I've sort of lost my train of thought. So I'm going to go.
Peace (not just a word).
Monday, September 15, 2008
Sweeter than a Bowl of Wheaties
I'm watching Season 3 of Snatch (our affectionate nickname for Supernatural) with my roommies and we're only 4 days away from a brand new season!
Anyways, it's been a heck of a week - a real rollercoaster ride. It was recruitment week at work - which is when we go to all the high schools and try to get juniors to apply to our program. This is one of the most important times of the year, and it means that we work about a million hours. Seriously - I literally worked 56 hours last week - it was wild! Four 12 hour days and one 8 hour day.
On Monday we showed up to work only to discover that we had developed a reputation for being the rebels - I guess that's what happens when the cops show up to your potluck. And then at our staff meeting we found out that one of our most beloved supervisors - Zach - is resigning! It was a HUGE bummer because we all love him and he sort of epitomizes what CF is about. And he knows more than pretty much else and on top of that he has these wicked mutton chops and crazy 50's glasses. So it was quite a blow to find out we only get 2 weeks left with him and it got creepy quiet in the meeting after he made his announcement. I didn't want to leave the meeting early and miss all the response afterwards, but I had to duck out to go to my food stamps meeting.
And that's the good news, I was approved for food stamps! Yay! I'll be getting $176 a month and it goes straight onto this debit card type deal - it'll be a huge help. I thought it was going to take forever and be this huge ordeal but it was so easy. As soon as she found out I was AmeriCorps she just pushed it through.
Then I got home and found out that my senior pastor back home is leaving the church way earlier than I thought - which was another huge blow and kind of made me lose my mind for a bit. Quite a way to start the week, huh?
Tuesday was our recruitment at our high school, and my group basically elected me main emcee. It was sort of terrifying because I was up in front of these 200 16 year olds and I was just winging it, trying to make an impression. This lead me to realize two things. First: I am old. And second: I am no longer cool. Still, the program went pretty well and got me super amped up for having my own class. I even had one kid come up and ask me if we'd be able to help him go to school for writing. I was like - heck yes - I can do that! It was sweet.
Tuesday night at class there were more staff there than kids, so I ended up getitng into this random philosophical debate with one of my fellow coaches for forever.
Wednesday I had my first one on one with my supervisor and it went - well - weirdly. But you know, it's all good. Wednesday night we had parent night at our high school which also went really well. We had a great turnout - which was so encouraging to see.
Thursday was supposed to be just a normal class day, but our school moved up their homecoming game because it was supposed to be Friday night and they were worried because of the hurricane. So we cancelled our late class and went to the game. We were totally creamed, but it was a lot of fun to be there and all our kids were waving to us. Another cool thing was that all the major people at the school are our students: the homecoming queen, the head of the dance team, one of the cheerleading captains, one of the main football players, and the guy running the flag after every score (of which there was one) - it just made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. These are such great kids and it feels so good to know we're making a difference for them.
Friday was the only normal day of the week and we were all so wiped from the rest of the week that we just sort of goofed all the whole day - except when we had this 3 and a half hour meeting with our executive director. In keeping with my friday plan of doing nothing I laid low on friday night - Jess and I made a walmart run (which was - btw - packed with evacuees) and I grabbed Remember the Titans and we went back and watched it with Kevin. Man I love that movie - it feels so much like home. At some point it hit me that it was my grandfather's birthday and that made me sad.
Saturday I woke up to find an email from my past self in my inbox - reminding me to call my grandfather and wish him a happy birthday :( and to call my bro and ask about the baby. I did some more nothin', and watched UGA pull it out in the end against USC (then of course I called Josh to gloat). Then I went with Kevin to American Eagle to score some free movie tickets. Then I called everyone I knew and told them to do the same thing and we all went to see Burn After Reading (the new Coen Brothers movie with Brad Pitt and George Clooney). It was friggin' hilarious and it felt so good to just do something familiar like that.
Today I slept late and have since spent most of the day just hanging out and watchin' season 3 of Snatch with the roomies.
I think what this past week boils down to is that I'm really starting to settle in here. This is my life. And I kind of like it. :D
ps. sorry I'm slacking on the blog posts, will try to do better! Lots of love!
Anyways, it's been a heck of a week - a real rollercoaster ride. It was recruitment week at work - which is when we go to all the high schools and try to get juniors to apply to our program. This is one of the most important times of the year, and it means that we work about a million hours. Seriously - I literally worked 56 hours last week - it was wild! Four 12 hour days and one 8 hour day.
On Monday we showed up to work only to discover that we had developed a reputation for being the rebels - I guess that's what happens when the cops show up to your potluck. And then at our staff meeting we found out that one of our most beloved supervisors - Zach - is resigning! It was a HUGE bummer because we all love him and he sort of epitomizes what CF is about. And he knows more than pretty much else and on top of that he has these wicked mutton chops and crazy 50's glasses. So it was quite a blow to find out we only get 2 weeks left with him and it got creepy quiet in the meeting after he made his announcement. I didn't want to leave the meeting early and miss all the response afterwards, but I had to duck out to go to my food stamps meeting.
And that's the good news, I was approved for food stamps! Yay! I'll be getting $176 a month and it goes straight onto this debit card type deal - it'll be a huge help. I thought it was going to take forever and be this huge ordeal but it was so easy. As soon as she found out I was AmeriCorps she just pushed it through.
Then I got home and found out that my senior pastor back home is leaving the church way earlier than I thought - which was another huge blow and kind of made me lose my mind for a bit. Quite a way to start the week, huh?
Tuesday was our recruitment at our high school, and my group basically elected me main emcee. It was sort of terrifying because I was up in front of these 200 16 year olds and I was just winging it, trying to make an impression. This lead me to realize two things. First: I am old. And second: I am no longer cool. Still, the program went pretty well and got me super amped up for having my own class. I even had one kid come up and ask me if we'd be able to help him go to school for writing. I was like - heck yes - I can do that! It was sweet.
Tuesday night at class there were more staff there than kids, so I ended up getitng into this random philosophical debate with one of my fellow coaches for forever.
Wednesday I had my first one on one with my supervisor and it went - well - weirdly. But you know, it's all good. Wednesday night we had parent night at our high school which also went really well. We had a great turnout - which was so encouraging to see.
Thursday was supposed to be just a normal class day, but our school moved up their homecoming game because it was supposed to be Friday night and they were worried because of the hurricane. So we cancelled our late class and went to the game. We were totally creamed, but it was a lot of fun to be there and all our kids were waving to us. Another cool thing was that all the major people at the school are our students: the homecoming queen, the head of the dance team, one of the cheerleading captains, one of the main football players, and the guy running the flag after every score (of which there was one) - it just made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. These are such great kids and it feels so good to know we're making a difference for them.
Friday was the only normal day of the week and we were all so wiped from the rest of the week that we just sort of goofed all the whole day - except when we had this 3 and a half hour meeting with our executive director. In keeping with my friday plan of doing nothing I laid low on friday night - Jess and I made a walmart run (which was - btw - packed with evacuees) and I grabbed Remember the Titans and we went back and watched it with Kevin. Man I love that movie - it feels so much like home. At some point it hit me that it was my grandfather's birthday and that made me sad.
Saturday I woke up to find an email from my past self in my inbox - reminding me to call my grandfather and wish him a happy birthday :( and to call my bro and ask about the baby. I did some more nothin', and watched UGA pull it out in the end against USC (then of course I called Josh to gloat). Then I went with Kevin to American Eagle to score some free movie tickets. Then I called everyone I knew and told them to do the same thing and we all went to see Burn After Reading (the new Coen Brothers movie with Brad Pitt and George Clooney). It was friggin' hilarious and it felt so good to just do something familiar like that.
Today I slept late and have since spent most of the day just hanging out and watchin' season 3 of Snatch with the roomies.
I think what this past week boils down to is that I'm really starting to settle in here. This is my life. And I kind of like it. :D
ps. sorry I'm slacking on the blog posts, will try to do better! Lots of love!
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Life as I know it
I'm slowing down on my blogging, and I think that's probably a good thing - it just means I'm too busy living to write it all down. As a follow up to my post from last week - things have sort of settled back down, just like I knew they would. My brain was basically on overdrive all of last week, and each day it manifested it's overwhelmedness in a different way. So it sort of threw things into chaos for a few days and I refinding my center.
I cut all my hair off yesterday, as evidenced by the pictures in my previous entry. At first I really hated it and sort of freaked out in my car as soon as I left the salon. But since then I've done a lot of staring in the mirror and I've decided I pretty much feel like a badass (sorry for the language, 'rents, but there's really no other way to describe it). I don't know, it just sort of feels metaphorically significant in the way that I tend to make everything metaphorically significant. This time in my life is all about doing the things I'm normally afraid to do.
Btw - yesterday I became my mother. I realize that the context most people use that phrase in is negative, but it my case it's kind of the opposite because my mother is pretty much awesome. In particular she is an awesome event-thrower. Like every year she throws this Christmas party and it's kind of a big deal. Last night I hosted a potluck at my house and everyone on the planet showed up. Okay, maybe not quite - but it was unexpectedly huge and totally awesome.
Basically almost everyone from work came including the executive director and they all brought their posses. There was music and beer and good food and everything was fabulous and suddenly my roommates and I were pretty much the cool kids on the block. It was a good way to make myself feel at home here. Of course, then at 10:30 a cop showed up to tell us to be quiet because some stupid neighbor had called them instead of politely knocking on our door and asking us if we could quiet down. Whatevs. It was a great opportunity to hang out with some of the people at work that I haven't gotten to know yet. It's a pretty sweet gaggle of people.
Nevertheless, I'm pretty sure we are NEVER throwing a party at our place again. Guess we'll have to find a satellite location.
This week is going to be nuts at work: I have my food stamps appointment tomorrow at 3, and then an open house at my school tomorrow night. Recruitment at my school on Tuesday (I'm the main emcee and I am SOOO nervous!), then parent night at the school on Wednesday. Not to mention we're helping out with other schools recruitments too. Still, I'm glad we'll be busy - I like having that momentum.
On top of all of that, I've been giving more and more thought to the idea of going to film school in a couple of years. After my initial freaking out because being here and doing CF didn't make me stop thinking about filmmaking, I had a couple conversation which made me start thinking that maybe it's significant that I'm still thinking about it even when I'm right smack in the middle of option number 2. So let's just say that I'm giving it som serious consideration and I'm pretty stoked about it.
Still can't imagine being that far from home for that long though. I wonder if it ever stops being hard.
I cut all my hair off yesterday, as evidenced by the pictures in my previous entry. At first I really hated it and sort of freaked out in my car as soon as I left the salon. But since then I've done a lot of staring in the mirror and I've decided I pretty much feel like a badass (sorry for the language, 'rents, but there's really no other way to describe it). I don't know, it just sort of feels metaphorically significant in the way that I tend to make everything metaphorically significant. This time in my life is all about doing the things I'm normally afraid to do.
Btw - yesterday I became my mother. I realize that the context most people use that phrase in is negative, but it my case it's kind of the opposite because my mother is pretty much awesome. In particular she is an awesome event-thrower. Like every year she throws this Christmas party and it's kind of a big deal. Last night I hosted a potluck at my house and everyone on the planet showed up. Okay, maybe not quite - but it was unexpectedly huge and totally awesome.
Basically almost everyone from work came including the executive director and they all brought their posses. There was music and beer and good food and everything was fabulous and suddenly my roommates and I were pretty much the cool kids on the block. It was a good way to make myself feel at home here. Of course, then at 10:30 a cop showed up to tell us to be quiet because some stupid neighbor had called them instead of politely knocking on our door and asking us if we could quiet down. Whatevs. It was a great opportunity to hang out with some of the people at work that I haven't gotten to know yet. It's a pretty sweet gaggle of people.
Nevertheless, I'm pretty sure we are NEVER throwing a party at our place again. Guess we'll have to find a satellite location.
This week is going to be nuts at work: I have my food stamps appointment tomorrow at 3, and then an open house at my school tomorrow night. Recruitment at my school on Tuesday (I'm the main emcee and I am SOOO nervous!), then parent night at the school on Wednesday. Not to mention we're helping out with other schools recruitments too. Still, I'm glad we'll be busy - I like having that momentum.
On top of all of that, I've been giving more and more thought to the idea of going to film school in a couple of years. After my initial freaking out because being here and doing CF didn't make me stop thinking about filmmaking, I had a couple conversation which made me start thinking that maybe it's significant that I'm still thinking about it even when I'm right smack in the middle of option number 2. So let's just say that I'm giving it som serious consideration and I'm pretty stoked about it.
Still can't imagine being that far from home for that long though. I wonder if it ever stops being hard.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Sing it from the hair
Okay, more to come later, but I'm about to have a zillion people over to my house for a potluck (this aspect of myself never ceases to surprise me) so I'll keep it short. Here are some mac-produced pics of my new haircut. It's a little short, but it's growing on me (hahaha).
Check it:
Check it:
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Falling In/Out/Down
I came home from my first night of teaching to an empty, very hot apartment - so I bolted for the Tbird to write a much needed blog update. Not so much because new things have happened etc. but because new things are being felt. (I thought a change of emotional scenery would be nice)
My first teaching class was both better and worse than I thought it would be. Better, because the kids are so fun and so peppy and just - teenager-ish - and I actually like that. Worse because there doesn't seem to actually be a whole lot of structure expected in our class (by either students or CF staff) and that sort of makes me feel like I'm trying to build a parachute in midair... or something.
It was a good experience overall, which unfortunately could've been far better if I hadn't been in such a funk today. Things have been wavering for a few days, and sort of settled into a little gray storm cloud when I woke up this morning. Not say I was in a particularly bad mood - things are just weird here. And I thought about avoiding mentioning it in here all but I decided to go ahead for two reasons. For one - it's cathartic. And two - I've pretty much only written about how amazing this place is and how happy I am, and I think it's important to give an accurate picture.
Today I was not particularly happy here. But it's not that I'm homesick, persay. I've been thinking a lot about home and missing it some, but I don't really want to be there. And I don't exactly want to be here, but I don't not want to be here. And I don't really want to be anywhere else (at least not more than I want to be here).
The problem with the present is that it just feels like something is missing. And of course, I realize that something *is* missing - that there about a million things missing from my life right now because I'm starting this new life here and it's only 2 weeks old. But I'd still like for things to feel just a little more normal. I know it's going to take some time and I have every intention of just riding it out.
The other problem though, is that I seem to be focusing far more attention on - not my present - but my future. I've been obsessing over where I see myself in a year, or two years, or five - whether it should be here or California, or Georgia or Europe or what. And whether I should be teaching or writing or filmmaking or acting or nonprofiting or saving the world or what.
And granted, I came here (read: left home) to figure all that stuff out. To sort of clear my head and get a fresh, unaffected perspective. But of course I never expected to get here and suddenly have all the answers I was seeking. But I find myself impatiently wishing for them anyways. I guess a part of me thought that I would get here and suddenly I would know that this was where I was supposed to make my home (or not) and that teaching or nonprofit work was what I was supposed to do (or not) and all my overwhelming and diametrically opposed dreams would just sort of disapate to reveal my path. And that sort of happened, for about a week. But then life became life again and of course things are never that clear cut - least of all for me.
So on the one hand, what I really want is to learn how to just be present and stop worrying and obsessing about the future. Because this *is* where I want to be right now - and my need to know whether I'll always want to be here is severely disruptive. I don't need to know everything about the future right now, I just need to chill out and not let this experience pass me by. It deserves to be enjoyed and the future will happen in its own time. But having said that, I cannot figure out how to make myself be present. How the heck do I do that?
And aside from all that, I am still worried. And I can try to find a way to not think about it right now and just accept that things will happen in their own time, but what if they don't. I know how bad I am at just making decisions, at accepting choices that I've made, at allowing myself to be limited. What if I never find a path that I'm truly content with and spend the rest of my life just flitting from one place and one life to the next without every truly knowing and loving anything or anyone? And what if I stop wondering, stop questioning, stop considering the possibilities and end up in some life that isn't right for me? It's not impossible, it happens all the time.
How do I shut off my brain and learn to just be content? And how do I find out who I am and where I'm supposed to be.
I'm the sort of person who needs a purpose. One purpose - not none or 20.
Anywho, I know things will settle back down. But that's the weather report for right now. Maybe internet tomorrow?
*paz*
My first teaching class was both better and worse than I thought it would be. Better, because the kids are so fun and so peppy and just - teenager-ish - and I actually like that. Worse because there doesn't seem to actually be a whole lot of structure expected in our class (by either students or CF staff) and that sort of makes me feel like I'm trying to build a parachute in midair... or something.
It was a good experience overall, which unfortunately could've been far better if I hadn't been in such a funk today. Things have been wavering for a few days, and sort of settled into a little gray storm cloud when I woke up this morning. Not say I was in a particularly bad mood - things are just weird here. And I thought about avoiding mentioning it in here all but I decided to go ahead for two reasons. For one - it's cathartic. And two - I've pretty much only written about how amazing this place is and how happy I am, and I think it's important to give an accurate picture.
Today I was not particularly happy here. But it's not that I'm homesick, persay. I've been thinking a lot about home and missing it some, but I don't really want to be there. And I don't exactly want to be here, but I don't not want to be here. And I don't really want to be anywhere else (at least not more than I want to be here).
The problem with the present is that it just feels like something is missing. And of course, I realize that something *is* missing - that there about a million things missing from my life right now because I'm starting this new life here and it's only 2 weeks old. But I'd still like for things to feel just a little more normal. I know it's going to take some time and I have every intention of just riding it out.
The other problem though, is that I seem to be focusing far more attention on - not my present - but my future. I've been obsessing over where I see myself in a year, or two years, or five - whether it should be here or California, or Georgia or Europe or what. And whether I should be teaching or writing or filmmaking or acting or nonprofiting or saving the world or what.
And granted, I came here (read: left home) to figure all that stuff out. To sort of clear my head and get a fresh, unaffected perspective. But of course I never expected to get here and suddenly have all the answers I was seeking. But I find myself impatiently wishing for them anyways. I guess a part of me thought that I would get here and suddenly I would know that this was where I was supposed to make my home (or not) and that teaching or nonprofit work was what I was supposed to do (or not) and all my overwhelming and diametrically opposed dreams would just sort of disapate to reveal my path. And that sort of happened, for about a week. But then life became life again and of course things are never that clear cut - least of all for me.
So on the one hand, what I really want is to learn how to just be present and stop worrying and obsessing about the future. Because this *is* where I want to be right now - and my need to know whether I'll always want to be here is severely disruptive. I don't need to know everything about the future right now, I just need to chill out and not let this experience pass me by. It deserves to be enjoyed and the future will happen in its own time. But having said that, I cannot figure out how to make myself be present. How the heck do I do that?
And aside from all that, I am still worried. And I can try to find a way to not think about it right now and just accept that things will happen in their own time, but what if they don't. I know how bad I am at just making decisions, at accepting choices that I've made, at allowing myself to be limited. What if I never find a path that I'm truly content with and spend the rest of my life just flitting from one place and one life to the next without every truly knowing and loving anything or anyone? And what if I stop wondering, stop questioning, stop considering the possibilities and end up in some life that isn't right for me? It's not impossible, it happens all the time.
How do I shut off my brain and learn to just be content? And how do I find out who I am and where I'm supposed to be.
I'm the sort of person who needs a purpose. One purpose - not none or 20.
Anywho, I know things will settle back down. But that's the weather report for right now. Maybe internet tomorrow?
*paz*
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Into It.
Hey Beautiful People,
As you might have surmised by my lack of updating (or perhaps you heard me complaining endlessly) we still do not have internet at our apartment. It's a very long, annoying story and whenever I think about it my face turns bright read and my eyes get kind of crazy. So I'll refrain from recounting it for you. But for now, the next intended date of internet access appears to be this coming Wednesday - so we'll see what happens.
As for what else is going on in my life: I've just finished my second week at College Forward and I pretty much love it. This week started out as Onsite Training - which was basically the most redundant thing ever because it was pretty much exactly the same as our formal training last week - only in the office. We did get to meet a new addition to our coach team - a girl named Stephanie who was just hired last week, but jumped right in and seems pretty cool. After the first couple of days of the week I think they realized we were bored, so they switched things up a little.
On Tuesday we finally got our Food Stamps forms and we quickly figured out just how hard it's going to be to get our hands on these coveted little cards. It's a royal pain and the system works against you, but it's definitely worth fighting for because everything here is a bit more expensive than I'd expected. Even food costs more! (Thus the beauty of our lovely little Food Stamps) A girl in the office told us that her and her roommates electricity bill for last month was $300 for a 2 bedroom apt. That's crazy!! We've basically decided to never have the AC on if we can help it. We all know we can make it work, it's just a challenge. I do love a challenge.
Actually, when all the food stamp stuff was going on on Tuesday, along with some other stressful work-related things I was really spazzing out a little about how uncertain everything is right now. But then I suddenly remembered why it became so important to me to strike out on my own after college - why I got myself into this situation in the first place. I've always liked to believe that I'm a spontaneous, adventurous, risk-taking top. But I'm not - at all. I like to know what to expect at all times, I stick with what's comfortable. And I don't take unknown risks. But I want to. Because there are things I want in my life that I can get to by playing it safe. I think if I can learn to be free like that - to take life as it comes - I'll really be a much more satisfied person. Maybe not, but I guess that's what I'm here to find out. It's just funny because I remember thinking about this time 3 months ago and knowing that I'd be freaking out about all the uncertainty - and now here I am doing the freaking out. It really helps to remind myself what it's all for. I'm doing the things I was always afraid to do - it's a growth process - I think a little spazzing out is warranted. Anywho - after I had this whole realization, things have really been pretty great.
Wednesday we finally got our hands on the curriculum - the senior class one at least - which made us all feel heaps better. And Wednesday afternoon we claimed our desks and actually started doing our jobs. Planning classes, calling students, doing research. It feels so great to finally be doing things. It actually freaks me out a little how much I'm enjoying working at desk from 9 to 6 everyday. I hate think I might actually be cut out for this whole office job thing - it's got to be the work I'm doing.
On Thursday, my school team and I all rode out and finally got to see our school. Renato showed us around and one of the CF kids saw us in our t-shirts a yelled out to us. Between him and the kids I've talked to on the phone - I'm getting really excited about the classes - mostly because they're excited. They're excited about us - HOW COOL IS THAT?!
On Friday I brought my Brazilian hammock into work because the one they had had fallen apart. So now I'm the cool kid in the office (as if I wasn't already :-P). I also got to have lunch with the founder and executive director of College Forward which was really cool. She's quite a character - a real fireball. But talking to her really helped me understand her mentality and how she got to where she is. She basically said that you have to do the things you want to do when you want to do them - before you have time to overthink and talk yourself out of it. Clearly that's a problem for me - but I'm excited to work on it. It was just cool talking to her because she's really made something happen for herself. And she didn't know anything about nonprofit management or education before she started CF. In fact, she still claims to not really care about those things - she just cares about the kids. She said her greatest tool was and is her passion - that when you're passionate about something other people want to help you because they want to get in on that passion. It might be harder to believe if I didn't see the product of her passion right before my eyes. I'm a believer, and whereever my passion leads me - I think it will be a great place.
So it was a really good week at work, and next week will be even better with the start of classes.
As for outside of work, my roommates and I spent almost every night this week watching episodes of Supernatural on DVD. The crazy thing is - it wasn't even my idea. I showed them the pilot last weekend, and then they all just wanted to watch more. They're hooked. And John and Jess have been talking about it work and so a couple of our other friends have come over to watch it too. It's kind of weirding me out actually - I'm not used to having that. But I'd say it's definitely a good thing. And Kevin, Jess and I started watching the 4400 on DVD yesterday and now we're hooked on that too.
Last night we went out on 6th street with a whole big group including me, Jess, John, Kevin, Jessica Chan, Amy and her roommates, Tim, Chris and his roommates, and this new coach Rocky (hired on Friday) and his roommate Aaron. We actually started a dance party at this one bar - it was so much fun! It's great having so many new people to hang out with and get to know - I love it.
Tonight we're going to this party that Joe's throwing at his house which will hopefully be really fun. And next weekend I have an appointment at Iris Salon to get my haircut. I think I'm going to dye it again too. It just feels right in this new place as I'm becoming new. You guys all know how I am about my hair. So we'll see what happens with that.
I'm having a little trouble with my car which I was really freaking about at first - but I'm still under warranty which is actually making it pretty easy - which is awesome.
Things are settling. I can feel myself growing roots here. It's only been 2 weeks, but in some sense - it's already home.
I feel so blessed.
*paz*
T. Lew
ps. I hope you guys know that I miss you all like crazy and I wish I could see your beautiful warm faces every day. But we've all got to spread our wings sometime right? I love y'all.
Check out this poem:
As you might have surmised by my lack of updating (or perhaps you heard me complaining endlessly) we still do not have internet at our apartment. It's a very long, annoying story and whenever I think about it my face turns bright read and my eyes get kind of crazy. So I'll refrain from recounting it for you. But for now, the next intended date of internet access appears to be this coming Wednesday - so we'll see what happens.
As for what else is going on in my life: I've just finished my second week at College Forward and I pretty much love it. This week started out as Onsite Training - which was basically the most redundant thing ever because it was pretty much exactly the same as our formal training last week - only in the office. We did get to meet a new addition to our coach team - a girl named Stephanie who was just hired last week, but jumped right in and seems pretty cool. After the first couple of days of the week I think they realized we were bored, so they switched things up a little.
On Tuesday we finally got our Food Stamps forms and we quickly figured out just how hard it's going to be to get our hands on these coveted little cards. It's a royal pain and the system works against you, but it's definitely worth fighting for because everything here is a bit more expensive than I'd expected. Even food costs more! (Thus the beauty of our lovely little Food Stamps) A girl in the office told us that her and her roommates electricity bill for last month was $300 for a 2 bedroom apt. That's crazy!! We've basically decided to never have the AC on if we can help it. We all know we can make it work, it's just a challenge. I do love a challenge.
Actually, when all the food stamp stuff was going on on Tuesday, along with some other stressful work-related things I was really spazzing out a little about how uncertain everything is right now. But then I suddenly remembered why it became so important to me to strike out on my own after college - why I got myself into this situation in the first place. I've always liked to believe that I'm a spontaneous, adventurous, risk-taking top. But I'm not - at all. I like to know what to expect at all times, I stick with what's comfortable. And I don't take unknown risks. But I want to. Because there are things I want in my life that I can get to by playing it safe. I think if I can learn to be free like that - to take life as it comes - I'll really be a much more satisfied person. Maybe not, but I guess that's what I'm here to find out. It's just funny because I remember thinking about this time 3 months ago and knowing that I'd be freaking out about all the uncertainty - and now here I am doing the freaking out. It really helps to remind myself what it's all for. I'm doing the things I was always afraid to do - it's a growth process - I think a little spazzing out is warranted. Anywho - after I had this whole realization, things have really been pretty great.
Wednesday we finally got our hands on the curriculum - the senior class one at least - which made us all feel heaps better. And Wednesday afternoon we claimed our desks and actually started doing our jobs. Planning classes, calling students, doing research. It feels so great to finally be doing things. It actually freaks me out a little how much I'm enjoying working at desk from 9 to 6 everyday. I hate think I might actually be cut out for this whole office job thing - it's got to be the work I'm doing.
On Thursday, my school team and I all rode out and finally got to see our school. Renato showed us around and one of the CF kids saw us in our t-shirts a yelled out to us. Between him and the kids I've talked to on the phone - I'm getting really excited about the classes - mostly because they're excited. They're excited about us - HOW COOL IS THAT?!
On Friday I brought my Brazilian hammock into work because the one they had had fallen apart. So now I'm the cool kid in the office (as if I wasn't already :-P). I also got to have lunch with the founder and executive director of College Forward which was really cool. She's quite a character - a real fireball. But talking to her really helped me understand her mentality and how she got to where she is. She basically said that you have to do the things you want to do when you want to do them - before you have time to overthink and talk yourself out of it. Clearly that's a problem for me - but I'm excited to work on it. It was just cool talking to her because she's really made something happen for herself. And she didn't know anything about nonprofit management or education before she started CF. In fact, she still claims to not really care about those things - she just cares about the kids. She said her greatest tool was and is her passion - that when you're passionate about something other people want to help you because they want to get in on that passion. It might be harder to believe if I didn't see the product of her passion right before my eyes. I'm a believer, and whereever my passion leads me - I think it will be a great place.
So it was a really good week at work, and next week will be even better with the start of classes.
As for outside of work, my roommates and I spent almost every night this week watching episodes of Supernatural on DVD. The crazy thing is - it wasn't even my idea. I showed them the pilot last weekend, and then they all just wanted to watch more. They're hooked. And John and Jess have been talking about it work and so a couple of our other friends have come over to watch it too. It's kind of weirding me out actually - I'm not used to having that. But I'd say it's definitely a good thing. And Kevin, Jess and I started watching the 4400 on DVD yesterday and now we're hooked on that too.
Last night we went out on 6th street with a whole big group including me, Jess, John, Kevin, Jessica Chan, Amy and her roommates, Tim, Chris and his roommates, and this new coach Rocky (hired on Friday) and his roommate Aaron. We actually started a dance party at this one bar - it was so much fun! It's great having so many new people to hang out with and get to know - I love it.
Tonight we're going to this party that Joe's throwing at his house which will hopefully be really fun. And next weekend I have an appointment at Iris Salon to get my haircut. I think I'm going to dye it again too. It just feels right in this new place as I'm becoming new. You guys all know how I am about my hair. So we'll see what happens with that.
I'm having a little trouble with my car which I was really freaking about at first - but I'm still under warranty which is actually making it pretty easy - which is awesome.
Things are settling. I can feel myself growing roots here. It's only been 2 weeks, but in some sense - it's already home.
I feel so blessed.
*paz*
T. Lew
ps. I hope you guys know that I miss you all like crazy and I wish I could see your beautiful warm faces every day. But we've all got to spread our wings sometime right? I love y'all.
Check out this poem:
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
e.e. cummings
Monday, August 25, 2008
Just a quickie
Hey, I don't have much time so I'll make this quick. Basically, we're still not going to have internet in our apartment for another week, so I'm stuck hitting up the coffee shop for free wi-fi every day or so. This means limited blog updates, but you guys are probably okay with that.
I'll try to type up an entry tonight away from the internet and then post it tomorrow. Then I can talk about my weekend, and this second week of training at CF and our crazy scavenger hunt adventures! Woohoo!
On the short list:
Hung out with Tim, Amy and John (fellow coaches) on Saturday night on 6th Street (sweet!)
Had a Supernatural marathon with the roomies last night - they actually like it!
Finally met the founder and executive director of CF today - she's pretty much awesome!
I think I'm getting my haircut again in 2 weeks and it will look something like this:
Yay!
More tomorrow!
<3
I'll try to type up an entry tonight away from the internet and then post it tomorrow. Then I can talk about my weekend, and this second week of training at CF and our crazy scavenger hunt adventures! Woohoo!
On the short list:
Hung out with Tim, Amy and John (fellow coaches) on Saturday night on 6th Street (sweet!)
Had a Supernatural marathon with the roomies last night - they actually like it!
Finally met the founder and executive director of CF today - she's pretty much awesome!
I think I'm getting my haircut again in 2 weeks and it will look something like this:
Yay!More tomorrow!
<3
Friday, August 22, 2008
The End of the Beginning
My first week of training is over - woo. (;-P) It's been an incredibly exhausting week, but I'm actually pretty grateful for how intense it's been. For one thing, it's really created an environment in which we could all sort of bond together in a short period of time. And it's also given us some sort of idea just how intense things can (and probably will) get this year.
We've spent a fair amount of time in the last few days doing various kinds of self -assessment, including the meyers-briggs (E/INFP), a leadership style catalog, and a conflict approach survey - and what's amazing to me (if not entirely surprising) how much we all have in common. Of course we all have our differences - I was the only person who tested as a "bargainer" in terms of conflict approach, but a huge number of us tested really high for collaboration skills. And in leadership styles, the vast majority of us scored really high as relators (people who feel a need to establish connections with others) and stimulators (people who get others motivated). It's funny to me when the staff are surprised by the similarities though - particularly in how action oriented we all are. I mean we are all here aren't we? Coach Potatoes don't really *do* AmeriCorps.
Joe did a presentation yesterday on CF's plan for expansion, and apparently they're intending to open up in another Texas city next year. The good news for me is that that means new jobs both in Austin and elsewhere within CF. It was really cool to hear about, and afterwards I had the chance to talk to Emily (Associate Director/VIP) and told her that I was very interested in learning about all the other aspects of CF and that I was potentially interested in staying on (just expressing vague interest, so don't anyone freak out) and she asked if I'd move to San Antonio. Haha, I told her I'd think about it - but I'm not sure. Austin really feels like my place. Who knows. Yet another thing it is WAY too early to be worried about.
ANYWAYS - THE IMPORTANT STUFF! Today was the day we were all officially given our school assignments for the year! I will be coaching a Junior class and I get my own class! I was a little worried about the dynamics I'd have with the other coaches at my school at first - but I quickly realized that everything will work out and now I'm super excited. I think we'll have a great team. John and Jessica are both Junior coaches too, but at different schools. This is great cause we can help each other out, but not be together every second of every day. And I liked both of my possible supervisors so it was a win-win, but I find it really easy to respect and communicate with my supervisor, Renato, and we already have a nice rapport going, so I'm excited about that.
This afternoon we all got to leave early to work with our school teams to do a scavenger hunt. Again the dork in me is loving it! Haha, it's really great to have some time with just my fellow school coaches.
Anyways, that's about it for now, but I'll write more soon!
*paz*
We've spent a fair amount of time in the last few days doing various kinds of self -assessment, including the meyers-briggs (E/INFP), a leadership style catalog, and a conflict approach survey - and what's amazing to me (if not entirely surprising) how much we all have in common. Of course we all have our differences - I was the only person who tested as a "bargainer" in terms of conflict approach, but a huge number of us tested really high for collaboration skills. And in leadership styles, the vast majority of us scored really high as relators (people who feel a need to establish connections with others) and stimulators (people who get others motivated). It's funny to me when the staff are surprised by the similarities though - particularly in how action oriented we all are. I mean we are all here aren't we? Coach Potatoes don't really *do* AmeriCorps.
Joe did a presentation yesterday on CF's plan for expansion, and apparently they're intending to open up in another Texas city next year. The good news for me is that that means new jobs both in Austin and elsewhere within CF. It was really cool to hear about, and afterwards I had the chance to talk to Emily (Associate Director/VIP) and told her that I was very interested in learning about all the other aspects of CF and that I was potentially interested in staying on (just expressing vague interest, so don't anyone freak out) and she asked if I'd move to San Antonio. Haha, I told her I'd think about it - but I'm not sure. Austin really feels like my place. Who knows. Yet another thing it is WAY too early to be worried about.
ANYWAYS - THE IMPORTANT STUFF! Today was the day we were all officially given our school assignments for the year! I will be coaching a Junior class and I get my own class! I was a little worried about the dynamics I'd have with the other coaches at my school at first - but I quickly realized that everything will work out and now I'm super excited. I think we'll have a great team. John and Jessica are both Junior coaches too, but at different schools. This is great cause we can help each other out, but not be together every second of every day. And I liked both of my possible supervisors so it was a win-win, but I find it really easy to respect and communicate with my supervisor, Renato, and we already have a nice rapport going, so I'm excited about that.
This afternoon we all got to leave early to work with our school teams to do a scavenger hunt. Again the dork in me is loving it! Haha, it's really great to have some time with just my fellow school coaches.
Anyways, that's about it for now, but I'll write more soon!
*paz*
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
The Long and Long of it...
Okay, well I was supposed to have access to some kind of internet by Monday, but that has not proven to be the case - so I'm back at the good ole' Thunderbird Cafe at 9:30 on Wednesday evening trying to update all you good people on how things are out here. So much has happened since Sunday that it's a bit of a daunting task, and I still have some unpacking to do tonight - but I'll try my best.
We're slightly more than halfway through our week of formal training (we have less formal training next week) and it's been a heck of a ride so far. We pretty much have training (I'm talking dense info overload lectures) from 8:30 in the morning til 6 at night. We even work through lunch! BUT - the staff is really doing a good job of making it as bearable as possible and it really helps that we all *want* to be there.
Let's see, Monday we started at 8:15 with breakfast and rousing game of "It's true that I have" which is essentially a game where you stand in the middle of a circle and say something that's true about you - and everyone else who it applies to has to move to another place in the circle and you try to get to a spot fast enough so that someone else is stuck in the middle. It's a fun icebreaker which I've played many times before - it's a new game with every new group. We've been doing different icebreakers every morning, which I actually love because I'm a dork like that.
Anyways, Monday was mostly about the history of College Forward and it's accomplishments, as well as going through our AmeriCorps contract (actually, this might have been yesterday - it's sort of all running together). Yesterday we talked more about understanding the circumstances of our students and being culturally sensitive - etc. And we wrote a letter to ourselves that they'll send to us after we've left the program. I think my letter was a little overly sentimental (surprise surprise) but it'll still be interesting to read one day. We also had some former College Forward students come in and give us feedback and advice - and it made me so excited to get into my classroom, but also terrified.
That dichotomy actually seems to be the theme of my week, thus far. It's hard because we're learning more and more about what we're expected to accomplish, but I've yet to really be told how we're expected to accomplish it. I could be in front of a room full of students in less than two weeks, and right now I don't know the first thing about how to teach them. It's just a little overwhelming. And you know I hate failure, I'm a total perfectionist, and I know that this is going to be a learning process. It all just kind of scares me - that I'm not going to be as good at this as I'm hoping to be, or as they're expecting me to be.
On the other hand, I can't begin to describe how amazing it feels to be facing an entire year of devoting myself to something I'm passionate about. Getting to work myself raw - for a cause I believe in. And being surrounded by people who are throwing themselves into it with just as much passion. It's so uplifting to be around the other coaches, who are excited and scared like me - and who share this passion which has brought us all here. And it's so inspiring to be around the staff, people who are a little older than me who have found a way to have a life that's built around the things they really care about it. This job can be ridiculously hard, but they love coming to work everyday. I hope I can learn from them - how to have a life like that after this year.
In fact, although I'm refusing to make any decisions about my future this early, it only took about half a day for me to realize that it's going to be much harder for me to walk away from this little organization than I ever thought. I'm already starting to feel a since of ownership - feeling my heartstrings entwining themselves in the fabric of this cause. My roommates and I have already talking about the possibility of serving a second year - and Jess and I confided in each other the secret desire we've both had from the getgo - to be hired as staff for College Forward. I don't know what the future will bring, but I do know that - as scared as I am - I feel like I fit here - truly fit. Indeed, it occurred to me the very first day - that my extremity of energy, emotion, and passion that has made me a little out of place for most of my life - it all channels perfectly into this situation. You actually need that much of all of those things to make it in this world. It's like I was made for it. Maybe I was.
Meanwhile, the one other big worry that's getting to me right now came up today. Most of today was about professionalism - and consisted over going over every policy about co-worker interaction and student-coach interaction, and confidentially expectations - etc. First of all, we went through this huge list of possible scenarios for working with our students today - and they were all derived from actual past situations. It was really terrifying - nothing dangerous - but just some very sticky situations. This - however - doesn't make me as nervous as it could because I'm a huge advocate for just going to my supervisor for helping in handling any situation in which I feel way over my head. And they seem to support that too.
My big thing is the in-office dynamic between myself and my co-workers. This divides itself into two important types of relationships - friendships and romance. Basically, what I've gathered thus far about all this (although we're not officially discussing it til tomorrow) is that coaches are encouraged to be friends, while the letter of the law says that we can't be friends with any of the permanent staff. And romantic relationships appear to be off-limits. This is entirely unexpected, but where it gets complicated is that fact that they don't really seem to follow their own laws to the letter. For instance, last night a few of us coaches went and played trivia at a bar with the staff. Amy (one of the other coaches) and I stayed after the rest of the newbies left and played another round with the rest of the staff. We had a drink, told jokes, and generally acted perfectly casual with each other. They were obviously fine with it last night, but it's hard to know now where that line is.
I've always had difficultly with understanding my relationships with authority figures - and it's even harder now that I'm an adult and authority figures are - essentially - my peers in terms of age. I really really like these people, and while I have no problem respecting their authority at all - I have a harder time with the knowledge that there's a limit to how friendly I can be with them. I'm just not used to putting restrictions on how I know people. I'm not worried about doing it with my students, because I'm the one with the authority and I'm prepared for it. I'm more aware of the line because I set it. But with the staff, these are the people that I'm going to be spending pretty much ALL of my time with for the next year - maybe longer. So it's kind of lonely to think that there will be this barrier between us. But I have the other coaches - especially Jess and John who are quickly becoming real friends.
Of course the other issue is romantic relationships. Of course I absolutely understand the need for rules like that in a workplace - especially at such a small organization. The dynamics between 2 people absolutely affect the group as whole. So in theory I have no problem. In actuality - I'm just wondering how I'm even going to meet other date-able people when so much of my time is going to be dedicated to College Forward. On top of that - how do I stop myself from becoming interested in someone? Especially when we work together so closely. I know that people do it all the time - but *I've* never had to do it and I've never been particularly good at denying myself any potential relationship.
Still, I can't help but see the value in it. And regardless of whether I agree or not, it seems to be the policy (we'll see tomorrow) and I'm not going to jeopardize my position within CF over something like that. I just keep reminding myself of what's most important to me and why I'm really here.
And I'm trying to help myself get over all my stress about relationship dynamics in the workplace (who is surprised that what I'm concerning myself with most is the human relationships? lol) by focusing on something a former CF AmeriCorps member told us today. He just emphasized that CF is more than just a tight-knit organization - it's a family. And that comforts me. Because you can be super close to your family, you can love them and get along with them and bond with them. It's simply a different sort of relationship than you have with friends. There are just some things you wouldn't do with your parents and somethings you wouldn't talk about with them (and vice versa), but in the end those things don't really matter.
And truthfully, starting this new life in this new place - I'm thinking an extra family might be a really nice thing to have. :-)
I wanted to tell you more about specific people, but the coffee shop closes in 10 minutes and this is already way too long.
But that will come soon, along with more adventures!
Love y'all,
T. Lew
We're slightly more than halfway through our week of formal training (we have less formal training next week) and it's been a heck of a ride so far. We pretty much have training (I'm talking dense info overload lectures) from 8:30 in the morning til 6 at night. We even work through lunch! BUT - the staff is really doing a good job of making it as bearable as possible and it really helps that we all *want* to be there.
Let's see, Monday we started at 8:15 with breakfast and rousing game of "It's true that I have" which is essentially a game where you stand in the middle of a circle and say something that's true about you - and everyone else who it applies to has to move to another place in the circle and you try to get to a spot fast enough so that someone else is stuck in the middle. It's a fun icebreaker which I've played many times before - it's a new game with every new group. We've been doing different icebreakers every morning, which I actually love because I'm a dork like that.
Anyways, Monday was mostly about the history of College Forward and it's accomplishments, as well as going through our AmeriCorps contract (actually, this might have been yesterday - it's sort of all running together). Yesterday we talked more about understanding the circumstances of our students and being culturally sensitive - etc. And we wrote a letter to ourselves that they'll send to us after we've left the program. I think my letter was a little overly sentimental (surprise surprise) but it'll still be interesting to read one day. We also had some former College Forward students come in and give us feedback and advice - and it made me so excited to get into my classroom, but also terrified.
That dichotomy actually seems to be the theme of my week, thus far. It's hard because we're learning more and more about what we're expected to accomplish, but I've yet to really be told how we're expected to accomplish it. I could be in front of a room full of students in less than two weeks, and right now I don't know the first thing about how to teach them. It's just a little overwhelming. And you know I hate failure, I'm a total perfectionist, and I know that this is going to be a learning process. It all just kind of scares me - that I'm not going to be as good at this as I'm hoping to be, or as they're expecting me to be.
On the other hand, I can't begin to describe how amazing it feels to be facing an entire year of devoting myself to something I'm passionate about. Getting to work myself raw - for a cause I believe in. And being surrounded by people who are throwing themselves into it with just as much passion. It's so uplifting to be around the other coaches, who are excited and scared like me - and who share this passion which has brought us all here. And it's so inspiring to be around the staff, people who are a little older than me who have found a way to have a life that's built around the things they really care about it. This job can be ridiculously hard, but they love coming to work everyday. I hope I can learn from them - how to have a life like that after this year.
In fact, although I'm refusing to make any decisions about my future this early, it only took about half a day for me to realize that it's going to be much harder for me to walk away from this little organization than I ever thought. I'm already starting to feel a since of ownership - feeling my heartstrings entwining themselves in the fabric of this cause. My roommates and I have already talking about the possibility of serving a second year - and Jess and I confided in each other the secret desire we've both had from the getgo - to be hired as staff for College Forward. I don't know what the future will bring, but I do know that - as scared as I am - I feel like I fit here - truly fit. Indeed, it occurred to me the very first day - that my extremity of energy, emotion, and passion that has made me a little out of place for most of my life - it all channels perfectly into this situation. You actually need that much of all of those things to make it in this world. It's like I was made for it. Maybe I was.
Meanwhile, the one other big worry that's getting to me right now came up today. Most of today was about professionalism - and consisted over going over every policy about co-worker interaction and student-coach interaction, and confidentially expectations - etc. First of all, we went through this huge list of possible scenarios for working with our students today - and they were all derived from actual past situations. It was really terrifying - nothing dangerous - but just some very sticky situations. This - however - doesn't make me as nervous as it could because I'm a huge advocate for just going to my supervisor for helping in handling any situation in which I feel way over my head. And they seem to support that too.
My big thing is the in-office dynamic between myself and my co-workers. This divides itself into two important types of relationships - friendships and romance. Basically, what I've gathered thus far about all this (although we're not officially discussing it til tomorrow) is that coaches are encouraged to be friends, while the letter of the law says that we can't be friends with any of the permanent staff. And romantic relationships appear to be off-limits. This is entirely unexpected, but where it gets complicated is that fact that they don't really seem to follow their own laws to the letter. For instance, last night a few of us coaches went and played trivia at a bar with the staff. Amy (one of the other coaches) and I stayed after the rest of the newbies left and played another round with the rest of the staff. We had a drink, told jokes, and generally acted perfectly casual with each other. They were obviously fine with it last night, but it's hard to know now where that line is.
I've always had difficultly with understanding my relationships with authority figures - and it's even harder now that I'm an adult and authority figures are - essentially - my peers in terms of age. I really really like these people, and while I have no problem respecting their authority at all - I have a harder time with the knowledge that there's a limit to how friendly I can be with them. I'm just not used to putting restrictions on how I know people. I'm not worried about doing it with my students, because I'm the one with the authority and I'm prepared for it. I'm more aware of the line because I set it. But with the staff, these are the people that I'm going to be spending pretty much ALL of my time with for the next year - maybe longer. So it's kind of lonely to think that there will be this barrier between us. But I have the other coaches - especially Jess and John who are quickly becoming real friends.
Of course the other issue is romantic relationships. Of course I absolutely understand the need for rules like that in a workplace - especially at such a small organization. The dynamics between 2 people absolutely affect the group as whole. So in theory I have no problem. In actuality - I'm just wondering how I'm even going to meet other date-able people when so much of my time is going to be dedicated to College Forward. On top of that - how do I stop myself from becoming interested in someone? Especially when we work together so closely. I know that people do it all the time - but *I've* never had to do it and I've never been particularly good at denying myself any potential relationship.
Still, I can't help but see the value in it. And regardless of whether I agree or not, it seems to be the policy (we'll see tomorrow) and I'm not going to jeopardize my position within CF over something like that. I just keep reminding myself of what's most important to me and why I'm really here.
And I'm trying to help myself get over all my stress about relationship dynamics in the workplace (who is surprised that what I'm concerning myself with most is the human relationships? lol) by focusing on something a former CF AmeriCorps member told us today. He just emphasized that CF is more than just a tight-knit organization - it's a family. And that comforts me. Because you can be super close to your family, you can love them and get along with them and bond with them. It's simply a different sort of relationship than you have with friends. There are just some things you wouldn't do with your parents and somethings you wouldn't talk about with them (and vice versa), but in the end those things don't really matter.
And truthfully, starting this new life in this new place - I'm thinking an extra family might be a really nice thing to have. :-)
I wanted to tell you more about specific people, but the coffee shop closes in 10 minutes and this is already way too long.
But that will come soon, along with more adventures!
Love y'all,
T. Lew
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