+ the grade eight volleyball team i help coach won the zone championships last thursday.
+ i got an unreal reference letter from one of my sponsor teachers.
+ i have a job interview with maple leaf schools on april 17th-ish. that would mean committing to at least a year in china, but probably two. i was so so so gung-ho about this plan but now i have to give it a good think. these are exciting decisions though!
+ only 18 more teaching days left! this is actually a +/- because i'll be so glad to be done but i'll be sad to leave my school and my students. i've grown pretty attached.
+ i started playing the stock market (actually my dad plays it on my behalf) and i'm making money.
+ i went to edmonton and got to eat at chianti, see lots of my friends, visit my baba, and inspire jenna with my love of nailpolish and this one type of starbucks travel mug (alie knows about this mug, i think).
+ i took a risk with some facebook stalkery and it looks like it may have paid off.
+ i got into the explore program so i get to spend 5 weeks in nova scotia in may/june.
- i am meant to be running another half marathon in halifax but i have not trained even slightly and still haven't seen a physio yet about my knee. i feel like this will be a recurring pattern in my life. oh wait, it already is.
- marking. oh my gosh the marking. so much marking to do.
April 06, 2010
March 20, 2010
cupcakery
happy spring!
2010
six years of cupcake making spring bliss.
and today, for the very first time, i made homemade cupcakes. meaning to say. they didn't come out of a box. they don't have little flecks of color. and they actually have a flavour. how about that? also, for the first time, they are chocolate cupcakes. and also, for the first time, i tried a new icing recipe. not so happy with the results, i kinda messed it up a bit, but it's the thought that counts! also, for the first time, no pictures. look at me, mixing it up.
colorado was amazing.
i start teaching again on monday (poetry! ultimate!).
i'm going to edmonton for easter.
i'm figuring my life out, little by little.
oh, also, i drive the coolest car in the world. a picture of that will definitely come soon!
2010
six years of cupcake making spring bliss.
and today, for the very first time, i made homemade cupcakes. meaning to say. they didn't come out of a box. they don't have little flecks of color. and they actually have a flavour. how about that? also, for the first time, they are chocolate cupcakes. and also, for the first time, i tried a new icing recipe. not so happy with the results, i kinda messed it up a bit, but it's the thought that counts! also, for the first time, no pictures. look at me, mixing it up.
colorado was amazing.
i start teaching again on monday (poetry! ultimate!).
i'm going to edmonton for easter.
i'm figuring my life out, little by little.
oh, also, i drive the coolest car in the world. a picture of that will definitely come soon!
March 10, 2010
the next big thing
i've wanted to write here for a while now. tonight my soccer team celebrated our season ending 11-1 loss with a few pitchers so why not write now. write now right now. that is a drunk mind at work. though not drunk. just that little buzz, the one i feel first in my cheeks and then in my sense of humor. i still think i am allergic to alcohol. one drink and my face is hot and blotchy. although maybe that is just an excuse for being a lightweight. who knows?
here's what i wanted to say.
i want to write. i want to write a million things. poetry, first. i want to write poems. i don't care if people read them. really, i don't care. i just want the words to travel down from whatever cortex or lobe in my brain makes words and ideas and invests them with feeling and out my finger tips onto the keyboard or paper or the glass of the shower door. i want to write prose. i want to journal. i just want to put meaningful ideas into words. i want to express myself is what it comes down to. that's a starting point, i suppose, but it has to be more than want. it has to be need. it is getting to be. my fingers itch. i hold a pen in my hands and draw mindless circles, over and over until they fill the page. the words will come. i know it. i am committed to this.
i have been reading poetry all day every day. my next unit is poetry. i am hooked again. all of a sudden i am remembering the high school days when brianna would leave little paint swatches in the pages of poetry books at our school library and i would dig through the books, find these little bookmarks, and devour whatever poem was there. and then i'd keep going. e.e. cummings. Robert Frost. Michael Ondaatje. and so on and so forth until i read my library out of poems. or at least poems that i deemed worth reading. i've always been a critic. once i competed in a local speech competition. it was part of speech & debate club. i was in grade ten and i read birches by robert frost. it is still one of my all time favorite poems. i placed third and qualified for provincials. but the teachers went on strike and provincials were cancelled that year. my debate team was supposed to go too. then the next year our teacher sponsor dropped out and my speech & debate ambitions were squashed. so i started playing sports. when one door closes, i guess.
but this is mostly what i wanted to say.
i am happy. for the first time in i can't even say how long i am happy. it isn't just this fleeting, this too shall pass, feeling of happiness. it's a deep down, in my hands, onwards and upwards feeling of happiness. i don't know what to attribute it to, exactly. this feeling that for the first time in a long time i can see a future that is full of promise. and it's my own fault i didn't feel it sooner. my own fault for not believing in myself enough to a) trust in my original desire to be a teacher or b) trusting in my belief that i did not want to be a teacher and changing paths. but instead i stayed on a path that i firmly believed wasn't the right one. the path that wasn't meant for me. and suddenly i'm here. faced with a future that absolutely terrifies me because of it's uncertainty. but one that also fills me with the greatest sense of optimism that i've ever had. this is my life. i'm doing something that i love and i will continue to have opportunities to do this thing i love, as long as i make them. the last time i had this feeling, this sense that the whole world was laid out at my feet for me to do with as i please, was probably when i graduated high school and moved to victoria. after that it was all a plan. for 5 years, then 6. i enjoyed it, don't get me wrong. there were amazing times. from shotgun bitches and strobe lights to my first love and everything in between. but i was never as happy as i have felt lately. it just feels surreal. i'm used to this sense of "just 2 more years, just 3 more semesters, just my practicum". always waiting for the next big thing. and here it is.
so how about that?
here's what i wanted to say.
i want to write. i want to write a million things. poetry, first. i want to write poems. i don't care if people read them. really, i don't care. i just want the words to travel down from whatever cortex or lobe in my brain makes words and ideas and invests them with feeling and out my finger tips onto the keyboard or paper or the glass of the shower door. i want to write prose. i want to journal. i just want to put meaningful ideas into words. i want to express myself is what it comes down to. that's a starting point, i suppose, but it has to be more than want. it has to be need. it is getting to be. my fingers itch. i hold a pen in my hands and draw mindless circles, over and over until they fill the page. the words will come. i know it. i am committed to this.
i have been reading poetry all day every day. my next unit is poetry. i am hooked again. all of a sudden i am remembering the high school days when brianna would leave little paint swatches in the pages of poetry books at our school library and i would dig through the books, find these little bookmarks, and devour whatever poem was there. and then i'd keep going. e.e. cummings. Robert Frost. Michael Ondaatje. and so on and so forth until i read my library out of poems. or at least poems that i deemed worth reading. i've always been a critic. once i competed in a local speech competition. it was part of speech & debate club. i was in grade ten and i read birches by robert frost. it is still one of my all time favorite poems. i placed third and qualified for provincials. but the teachers went on strike and provincials were cancelled that year. my debate team was supposed to go too. then the next year our teacher sponsor dropped out and my speech & debate ambitions were squashed. so i started playing sports. when one door closes, i guess.
but this is mostly what i wanted to say.
i am happy. for the first time in i can't even say how long i am happy. it isn't just this fleeting, this too shall pass, feeling of happiness. it's a deep down, in my hands, onwards and upwards feeling of happiness. i don't know what to attribute it to, exactly. this feeling that for the first time in a long time i can see a future that is full of promise. and it's my own fault i didn't feel it sooner. my own fault for not believing in myself enough to a) trust in my original desire to be a teacher or b) trusting in my belief that i did not want to be a teacher and changing paths. but instead i stayed on a path that i firmly believed wasn't the right one. the path that wasn't meant for me. and suddenly i'm here. faced with a future that absolutely terrifies me because of it's uncertainty. but one that also fills me with the greatest sense of optimism that i've ever had. this is my life. i'm doing something that i love and i will continue to have opportunities to do this thing i love, as long as i make them. the last time i had this feeling, this sense that the whole world was laid out at my feet for me to do with as i please, was probably when i graduated high school and moved to victoria. after that it was all a plan. for 5 years, then 6. i enjoyed it, don't get me wrong. there were amazing times. from shotgun bitches and strobe lights to my first love and everything in between. but i was never as happy as i have felt lately. it just feels surreal. i'm used to this sense of "just 2 more years, just 3 more semesters, just my practicum". always waiting for the next big thing. and here it is.
so how about that?
February 21, 2010
gung-ho
so, i was all gung-ho about this idea i had. my 5-10 year plan. it involved years of teaching overseas, taking more courses, going to med school. all these huge aspirations. and then i started my practicum and, trust me this surprises no one more than it surprises me, it turns out i kinda like teaching. more than kinda like it. i am excited about it. i have energy. i want to make the best handouts and design the best lesson plans and channel all this newfound energy into inspiring my students. inspiring them to find the beauty in friar laurence's soliloquy, to master the set-shot, to be there on time.. and a gazillion other things we haven't got to yet. and bigger things than that, eventually, i hope. things beyond romeo & juliet, beyond bump-set-spike and beyond the classroom all together. i just feel inspired. like hey, this is what i am meant to be doing. i am good at this. people recognized it in me, but i never saw it in myself. and that is me, through and through, never satisfied with what i've got.
this is just not what i expected. it throws a serious wrench in the gears.
it makes me regret the last 3 years i spent simply getting through this degree. putting in my time. waiting for something better. because this is awesome. this is totally awesome. and now i don't know what i want to do.
this is a hypothetical situation that i have placed in front of myself.. what if they offered me a contract? a full time, 1.0, real deal contract. say it was a pe/english one. but i'd have to commit. i'd have to stay. no chinakenyaargentinanunavutindonesia next year. would i take it? i really don't know. today, right now, i think i would. i think i could. and that really changes everything.
this is just not what i expected. it throws a serious wrench in the gears.
it makes me regret the last 3 years i spent simply getting through this degree. putting in my time. waiting for something better. because this is awesome. this is totally awesome. and now i don't know what i want to do.
this is a hypothetical situation that i have placed in front of myself.. what if they offered me a contract? a full time, 1.0, real deal contract. say it was a pe/english one. but i'd have to commit. i'd have to stay. no chinakenyaargentinanunavutindonesia next year. would i take it? i really don't know. today, right now, i think i would. i think i could. and that really changes everything.
January 23, 2010
coffee
I want to get back in the habit of writing and these seems like as good a place to do it as any. However, I always feel like I need to prove myself here. No, not prove myself. Just that I need to have something to say. And these days I really don't. A couple of weeks ago I dropped a full cup of coffee down the stairs and on the second bounce the lid popped off and coffee flew all over the white carpet and the beige walls. I then proceeded to let out a string of curse words that lasted for a solid 45 seconds until my mom came running and told me not to use language like that. She probably would have said something too if my little sister wasn't around because it was a mess. It took about four days to finally get it all out, using a baking soda and water mixture multiple times. Then, about two days later, I was in the car putting the lid on my travel mug, but I had filled it too full and coffee started pouring out the sides of the mug and all over my pants and the seat of my car. Thankfully the pants were black so I didn't have to a) go home and change, or b) walk around all day looking like I had some crazy sort of accident, but the seat of my car has a big stain on it that I've just been avoiding. Then, a few days ago, I was sitting on my parent's white couch and I asked Taylor to pass me my mug of coffee from the kitchen and as she reached forward I reached back and my hand collided with the mug, spilling coffee all over the white couch. Actually, it only splashed a bit, but on a white couch it sure looks a lot. So we whisper panicked so as to not alert my mom, who was downstairs. We soaked it all up and then flipped the cushion over but if you look close you can still see it a bit. If my mom says anything we'll both just play dumb. Maybe this is a sign that I should stop drinking (so much) coffee but I refuse to let that be the case. I've just started being more careful.
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