Category Archives: School

Where Does the Time Go?

Posted on 8 April 2011 | Leave a comment

At the risk of sounding like a little old lady, I find myself wondering, sometimes aloud, where the time has gone. And here she crops up again when I say, it seems like just yesterday when I started teaching here at Burris, and now the school year has about two months left. A little less than two months. The time has simply flown past.

In a fashion true to myself, I have already begun planning in my head for next year. I know that grammar is going to be a once a week activity, probably Mondays, and then everything we write that week will incorporate that grammatical lesson. I know that I am going to choose two novels for each grade level, one memoir, which the students will choose from a list I will provide, and one straight up nonfiction book. There will also be a poetry unit and a comic unit. That’s six long units in which we will address different questions, different levels of thinking, and different styles of writing. This should make for a more cohesive school year and more beneficial writing/reading connections.

On a personal level, I feel as if my life right now is the most settled it’s been since maybe early high school. I feel calm and at a strange peace. I have many things I want, but I know this life is fleeting, and there are so many more important things than my personal desires or creature comforts. I think this Lent I’ve had a chance to reflect on not only food, but also my spiritual journey. I need to make it right between God and myself and other creatures. It’s not a personal relationship.

It’s not a waterfall of honey as we sang like a bunch of lemmings in church a couple of Sundays ago. Well, I say we loosely. I couldn’t sing it all because I kept thinking, “Dip me in honey and throw me to the lesbians,” and I probably shouldn’t sing that to Jesus. So, everyone else sang about how Jesus love is like a waterfall of honey, which aside from sounding very sexual also doesn’t sound very appealing. It’d be a bit too sticky for my liking.

But, it’s not about that. It’s about how this whole big world connects. It’s about you and me and how we have that same eternal God part. It’s about us looking into each other and seeing each other and recognizing that divine presence in all creatures. God made all of us, and we need to recognize that intrinsic worth in each other. No matter what that other person has done. No matter who that other person is. No matter. We are all part of that same incredible creation.

I recognize the way I am interconnected with all creatures when I run. The route I run the most travels along the White River, bending and weaving as the river does. Along the path, there are inevitably some ducks and geese milling about quacking and honking. Sometimes the geese hiss and spread their wings, but I talk sweetly to them and explain to them that I love animals so much I don’t eat them or exploit them. Because the geese are relatively tame, though I like to think it has something to do with my reasoning with them, they back away and bob on down to the river. My day is always made better by my interactions with these animals in much the same way that it is also made better by sharing my life with my dogs and my cats. I can get so mad at Celie for being rambunctious,  but she just smiles and licks my hand or leg, as if to say, I know you aren’t really mad, are you?

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Posted in Grace, Religion, Running, School, Teaching

How did it get to be the middle of January already?!

Posted on 16 January 2011 | 2 comments

Time keeps flying past, and I wonder constantly where God wants me. Today’s sermon was helpful, because Matt spoke about how we need to be open to be used and involved where we are. I struggle with this sometimes because I don’t really want to be where I am, for the most part. For the most part, I want to be anywhere but here in East Central Indiana. I like teaching and I love my students, but I always have this restless spirit that says to me (possibly it’s some sort of Tempter), whisperingly in my ear, “You could be so much more. Why are you settling for only this?” I have to slough that off, though, because I feel for a change that I am doing the best thing I could be doing right now. Since I’ve already posted my rant about the Methodist Church and their stupidly conservative policy about GLBT pastors, I won’t go on about that. However, short of being a pastor, my calling in life is to teach. And I love — there is no sarcasm in that — middle school students! I feel like I am right where I should be with that aspect of my life.

There are other areas where I feel restless. I feel restless in my inability to stay on top of grades, because this makes me want to stop teaching. I feel restless in my relationship with God, because I feel like I can never know enough, read enough, be enough. I feel restless in desire to be an activist for liberation (people, animals, the poor), because I don’t see a future in which we are all free; though I do have hope. I feel restless because of my debt, which traps me, because I feel as if my debt holds me back from doing so many things I am called to do. I feel restless because I own a house. That’s huge to me, owning a house. If you had asked me ten years ago if I thought I would ever be so grounded, I would have answered a resounding, NO! But if you ask me today if I enjoy my life, I would say, YES, but I do suffer from a heapin’ helpin’ of wanderlust. I can’t help it. I simply have a need to roam. At least having the ability to go on road trips is helpful.

If I wasn’t so grounded, so stable, I wouldn’t be able to experience things like these:

Delicious Homemade Vegan Pizza

Cat Boyfriends Pudge and Kermit

Beautiful Woman and Her Annoying Cat

All of these things are the perks of being settled. I suppose it’s okay to be stuck somewhere with all these beautiful and amazing comforts, or blessings, surrounding me.


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Posted in Family, Food, Grace, Religion, School, Teaching

A New Year. New Goals.

Posted on 2 January 2011 | Leave a comment

2011. For it’s ability to bring hope and fresh passion to an otherwise apathetic and decaying culture, I embrace the celebration of the new year. I understand that we might experience failures in the new year; we are a fallen people. This is no longer Eden. However, the festivity of New Year’s Eve and the solemnity with which people make vows, create resolutions, and set goals that theoretically will make them better people makes me know that each new year brings restored passion and compassion. There’s hope in the air. People have faith that this year will somehow be better than last. And, we give forgiveness for those failures we’ve previously experienced. Presumably, our goal is to make ourselves better this year. Here are my goals for this year. They’re not much different than last, but they attempt to take what I have been trying to do and to do it better.

  1. Read. Both the bible and other books. Hopefully a little bit of each, each day. Watch less television, even though I already don’t watch much. It’s amazing to me how productive I can be when I don’t watch the television. I will however watch Bones and Big Love.
  2. Run. Every day except Sunday. My goal is to run three miles a day on Monday through Thursday. On Friday, I’ll run two miles, and on Saturdays at least six miles. I also plan to add some other types of exercise. I want to finish two marathons: my own Ivanhoe’s Marathon and the Towpath Marathon.
  3. Eat. Only food I can recognize as food. I want to remain vegan, but I want to narrow this down a bit more and eat only whole foods, such as beans, rice, vegetables, and the like. Cut out processed foods and sugars.
  4. Dissertate. Two chapters. I want to finish two chapters of my dissertation this summer, and I have set forth a plan to make this happen.
  5. Teach. To the best of my abilities. Love each student. Be firm with each student. Guide each student to his or her highest potential. Be more diligent in grading.
  6. Attitude. Change it. I need to work on being more relaxed and carefree. I need to talk less and listen more. I need to remember that I don’t always have to be right. Loving people is more important than anything else. My stress level is through the roof, and I need to remember that the only person I have to please is God. What this means and where this will take me, I don’t know, but I am open to doing whatever it is I am supposed to do. I would just like to know what that is!

I am also working on an art/writing project. Once I get it going and hammer it out, I will post a link to the ongoing project. I am pretty excited about it.

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Posted in Dissertation, Fat, Food, Goals, Gym, Reading, Relationships, Religion, Running, School, Teaching, Vegetarian or Vegan

Egg Nog Waffles. Hookah Initiation. Joseph.

Posted on 22 December 2010 | Leave a comment

Let’s begin with Joseph. For some reason, whenever I hear of a meditation on Joseph of the Christmas story variety, I get a little pissed. In my mind, I wonder what else could possibly be said about a man who had so little to do withe actual Christmas story. As Sojourner Truth points outs about Jesus, “Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him” (Ain’t I a Woman). For as little as Joseph appears to play a role in Christmas, the gospel of Matthew does spend the better portion of the first chapter giving Joseph’s lineage. I assume that means that even though Jesus isn’t technically Joseph’s son, Joseph is still important in the life of Jesus and in the eschatological timeline of the Christian church.

Despite my reluctance to recognize Joseph as someone worthy of lengthy discussions at Christmastime, and despite my desire to scream, “Can’t just one Christian holiday be about how God used a WOMAN?!?”, I have to admit that God sometimes goes to extreme measures to get me off my high horse. This time, though, a simple article did the trick. And, what’s even better is I found this short meditation by accident, via Twitter. Frank Viola writes in Remember Joseph: Rethinking Righteousness, “Today, I’d like to give Joseph his due. By my lights, Joseph was one of the most righteous men who ever lived.” That’s a pretty powerful statement. More righteous than Noah? More righteous than Job? More righteous than (fill in any person who is described in Jewish Scripture as blameless or righteous)? Really.

Viola continues by explaining Joseph’s righteousness like this, “I’m sure Joseph’s blood boiled when he heard that the woman who was betrothed to him in marriage was pregnant . . . and not by him. But because he was a righteous man, he showed mercy. He treated her as if he were in her own shoes and was guilty of what he had assumed she did.” Um, yeah. How many of us would’ve done what Joseph did? How many of us would stand beside someone who was in Mary’s shoes? Think about it really hard. Would you? Would I? Could we do it without patting ourselves on our backs or privately commenting that we are just doing it because that’s what a good Christian would do? Can we live as Viola describes Joseph? He writes “It is to react like Jesus, living void of self-righteousness.” This is the part of this meditation I loved. Viola reminds us to be vigilant in our dealings with others, because our own character is really what God is testing and proving. This holiday season can I behave this way? Can I live void of self-righteousness?

*

I initiated my hookah today. I used molasses tobacco, and spent about half an hour listening to Christmas music, contemplating life, and smoking shisha. I love being Greek, and I need to go to Greece sometime in order to experience where I come from. THe only drawback to going there is that I’m afraid I won’t want to come back!

*

I took the dogs for about a two-mile walk this morning, and when I got home I realized the reason I love breaks and summer is the ability to live slowly. I got up at 7:30 AM. walked the dogs around 8 AM, and made breakfast around 9 AM. This is the way my life is supposed to go. Slow, easy mornings. Now it’s noon and I have already exercised, made food from scratch, done laundry, relaxed, socialized via Twitter and Facebook, and written more than I have on any day since school started. Come to me summer, and don’t fail me Winter Break! On break, it’s all about the victuals.

Delicious vegan Egg Nog Waffles (substitute ground flax seed and water for the eggs) I made for breakfast! Yummy.

And the delicious dish I am calling Penne and Faux Sho Cheese that I made for lunch.

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Posted in Christmas, Feminism, Food, Relationships, Religion, School, Teaching, Vegetarian or Vegan, Writing

I’m already thinking about summer. Sigh.

Posted on 20 December 2010 | Leave a comment

I am trying to plan how my summer is going to go. I think I have decided it will go a little like this:

  1. Get up early, like 5:30 AM early. It’s too hot to run much later, and it’ll be light shortly after 5 AM.
  2. Run 3-5 miles, depending on the day, to get ready for the Towpath Marathon in Peninsula, OH.
  3. Walk the dogs on their summer route.
  4. Eat breakfast and brew some coffee.
  5. Spend from 9 AM until 1030 AM reading good literature, and from 1030 AM to 12 PM on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday writing for pleasure, creative nonfiction and poetry. I might even try to eek out a couple of pieces of fiction while I’m at it. On Thursday and Friday, I will work on house projects, like painting, refinishing the floors, and painting the house.
  6. Eat a good lunch from 12 PM to 1PM.
  7. On Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday from 1 PM to 5 PM, I will work on my dissertation. On Thursday and Friday, I will make appointments and spend time with friends and family.
  8. At 5PM walk the dogs.
  9. Saturday will be for long runs (of six or more miles), and Sunday for long bike rides, church, and grocery shopping with that lady I live with.

My goal is to limit the amount of time I spend figuring out what I am supposed to be doing and to spend more time actually doing it. I also want to increase the amount of time I spend considering literature and writing about it. I have found that when I have my student read more before they write, they tend to write better and more effectively Their writing is smarter and more eloquent when they’ve been reading writing that’s difficult for them.

Another goal I have is to eat healthy, whole food, which is the same goal I keep setting for myself. I find myself gravitating toward the unhealthy. In fact, yesterday, I wanted to eat some fish, and instead of ordering the salmon salad I love so much, I got fish and chips. Unhealthy choice #7, 365, 289. I am sure that even baklava is more healthy for me. At least I can name all the ingredients in it. I couldn’t begin to tell you what might have been in my fish and chips. And, I could feel it later.

On that same note, I think I am going to incorporate meat back into my diet (very rarely) because I have been feeling a little protein deprived. I simply can’t get enough protein while also trying to to lose weight, and I need to lose weight to run the marathon. It’s a never-ending cycle. I am too fat. It’s hard to run. I lose weight. It gets easier. I gain weight. I get fat. I need to break the cycle! I feel like Susan Powter. Wasn’t that her catch phrase? Maybe not. At any rate, I simply HAVE to figure out a way to lose weight.

EDIT: I can’t eat meat. I ate fish yesterday, and I just feel guilty today. I just need to figure out how to get more protein and fewer calories. I am sure sticking to eating whole foods would help!

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Posted in Biking, Fat, Goals, Running, School, Summer, Writing