All work, all the time.

I kind of feel that way, especially working days like this, when I leave the house at 7:50 and don't come home until 9:30. And when I'm not at work I'm thinking about work! Which means this whole teaching/working with kids thing is pretty serious. I want to give a good, solid rundown of the school I'm working at and the after school program I help with twice a week...I'd like to recount what I'm doing with my kids and what I'm getting out of all this (which is a fucking lot, let me tell you!) but I'm just too tired. But as I drove home today after dropping off two of my kids, I thought, this is the best kind of tired. I'm learning so much and my brain feels so full its busting all its seams. It's challenging for sure. Even though I've only been working at Humbodlt for a few days, it is already painfully clear how messed up No Child Left Behind is. I look around the high school I work at and feel frustrated with the "teach to the test" mentality forced on teachers, and the lack of fun, meaningful work the students get. Then again, it makes me invent crazy lesson plans and classroom activities in my head. The ideas seemed to spill out of me today as I wrote them down after school. God, it's so bizarre. I swing back and forth so much in just a day. Even after feeling so charged and elated, tonight I also felt the first pangs of rejection when I realized one of the two kids I had so much fun playing and joking with on Monday was acting kinda frosty towards me. I pondered and fretted about it the whole way home, wondering if I had tried to be too friendly too fast, or said something weird on the drive home. And then back again...on the other side of the pendulum I had a nice, quiet tutoring session with a Hmong High school student who made me smile inwardly as we tried to figure out the square root of 11 and talked about being shy in class. Kids are such peculiar creatures. But they make me bend my mind in directions it doesn't usually go. Maybe that's why I'm so physically and mentally drained...I can feel excited and challenged and contemplative and playful all in one day, and all those spins and circles keep me thinking and stretching my brain in ten different directions. So yes, I'm tired. But I feel really 'on', like someone plugged me into a socket. It's really is the best kind of tired. And sometimes I even find myself thinking: I could get used to this.

Has it really only been three days?

First day...

So, here I am, with my first day as an Americorps worker under my belt. Although I made it for the last day of training on Friday, today was my first full day on the job, and it was a very long, hectic day. I'm exhausted and have to get up in a few hours, but on my drive home tonight I decided I want to keep track of this experience, tired as I may be at the end of the day.

Quick reflections:

- Nervousness about working at Humboldt High - no one seems to realize I need some help here! I'm totally unprepared! I didn't even get to see the lunchroom! I just got thrown into a class and bamn! Whoa.
- Taking a 1/2 hour to help a student get her locker open...was not the best way to start my time at Humboldt
- Realizing that I may need to be proactive when it comes to Humboldt - i.e. asking questions and talking seriously with teachers about how I can best help them, since it doesn't seem like anyone is planning on doing it for me
- Feeling socially awkward with my 6th per. 7th grade ELL class - am I that bad?!?
- Need to acquire more "biz-cas" (business casual) attire, as my wardrobe is sorely lacking...sneakers? tank tops? These will not do, no sir.
- Lack of air conditioning in a crowded high school = one sweaty me; compare and contrast with the overpowering gusts of icey wind at the baker rec center (where the jane addams school is located)

Whew. I'm off to bed. At least tomorrow I'm off by 2:30.

I AM EMPLOYED

Praise the heavens, throw confetti in the fucking air, kiss your lucky rabbit's foot, this girl is gainfully employed.

Entering september

It's strange to think that I've been in Minneapolis for almost a year now - I arrived here on September 13th of last year, after a three day drive from Massachusetts. It's funny...I had been living through the summer as I always do - as if it will never end, and then a few weeks of late august cold have blown September in again. When the air began to turn I started to feel that same crisp in the air, that wide-open-sky-ness and sense of lonesome possibility I think I felt when I first moved here. It was strange to feel that way again - maybe a sense of hopefulness or a sense of movement that I didn't think I'd feel it again for a long time. But then again, I guess the fall does have a way of sweeping in and pushing changes no matter where I happen to be. I think that's why it's my favorite season. I've been keen to notice the circular patterns of things since the leaves started to change, and I'm trying to find some sort of reason and rhyme to this gweird (that's good + weird for all of you not in the the know) year...but instead of finding meaning, I find only the beginning of another cycle that sometimes looks the same as the last.

Anyway, it seems appropriate that I should pick up this blog again, and try to record some of the goings-ons and happenings and brain laps I've been doing.

Some of the things on my mind:

- the move into my new house in S. Minneapolis, with new roommates and orange walls
- the possibility of working for Americorps, very last minute, and ah, STRESS!
- reaching out to friends more, in other words communication, communication, communication!
- I hate to say it but...winter(!?!)
- Mark's departure, bringing mixed feelings
- the State Fair! I feel like a true Minnesotan


That's all for now. More soon!