Tidbits

A few interesting anecdotes from this week:

* I am always in a hurry when I leave the house, but Wednesday, I was in an absolute tizzy. I got to school though, and was just calming down when my cell phone rang. A friend of a friend passed our home on her way to work and saw the garage door open. I had forgotten to close it, and we were both already in town. The woman who called said that her husband would close it when he went by, and so it was seemingly not a big deal, and I didn't even bother Jason with it. Fast forward an hour~ Jason calls to tell me that one of our neighbors saw someone in a red van pull into our driveway and disappear into the house, so the neighbor called the sheriff and then Jason. So I had to quickly relate my mistake with the garage door and my friend of a friend, and we had little fires to put out for sure! Jason called the sheriff and told them that they did NOT need to be on the lookout for a red van. Then he called our neighbor to explain. I called the friend of a friend, and told her that, due to a nosy neighbor, the sheriff may or may not question her husband. Mess!

* That same day, I told my 5th period class that a Fried Ice Cream blast from Sonic would put me in a better mood that afternoon when I planned to make their tests up. I said it in passing and completely forgot about it. After school, here came one of my boys, blast in hand. I just don't want to forget that that happened, because it made my day.

* Then there's Thursday morning, otherwise known as insanity personified. I needed to make a test for my 6th and 7th period classes, and thought Detention Hall duty would be the perfect time to do that. I go in at 6:45, and watch kids sit there. I usually get a ton of stuff done. My plan was to spend the first 15 minutes buying airline tickets for Christmas break, then put the test together. I found some reasonable tickets, entered all the information, and clicked "confirm". The screen that followed told me there was an error with my order, and that my order was not complete. This happened three times, and forty minutes later, I finally got a confirmation screen. The confirmation screen said that my confirmation number would be in my email, and so I opened up my email. There were FOUR email confirmations for EIGHT different tickets. I kid you not. I did some internal panicking, and as soon as DHall was dismissed, I called Jason and begged him to try to fix it. Of course he got on the phone right away. I still hadn't made my tests, I thought our account was about to be charged four times, and I had 21 kids waiting for me in my room. I just kept telling myself, "You can get it all done during 2nd period conference." Jason emailed me halfway through first period to tell me that the tickets were (probably) going to be okay, so that calmed me down. 2nd period rolled around, and I was just sitting down to make my test when my intercom beeped: "Mrs. White, can you please sit in on a 504 conference?" 504 conferences are hard to explain, but all you need to know is this: "sit in on" is a literal term. They just need a teacher in there to represent the student (or something). So I sat and listened for 45 minutes, and still had no test. I had just enough time in my 30-minute lunch to get the test made, and it turned out to be not so bad.

Needless to say, I am glad Friday is here. I have a cold, so I plan to spend the weekend holed up in the house grading essays and blowing my nose. I may go to Piggott for a baby shower Sunday, depending on how bad this cold gets. It's supposed to rain all weekend, so it's the perfect opportunity to stay in and catch up on grading. Hope all is well with everybody!

Weird Story

This little tidbit may strike some as weird, but it's my blog, so I can show my true colors if I like.

In 2000, when Jason and I were dating, we discovered a song together. Well, it felt like we did. It was a song on a new CD by a popular band, but it was a little-known track on the album and is little-known to this day, and we both loved the song the first time we heard it. The song has a girl's name in it, and that is all the details you get, blog reader, because we like to keep things private. Anyhow, we were leaving In 'n' Out one night after a date, and we were headed back to my house. This song, which we had listened to just a few times, came on and we began to talk about it. At some point in the conversation I said that I loved the name in the song, and Jason told me he loved it too. And so, back in 2000, we decided that if we ever got married, we would have a girl and name her this name.

*Disclaimer: We are NOT pregnant! Not even close!*

This memory came to mind because this song came over my iPod today, and I realized that every time I hear this song, I am warmed by the fact that the song has both a memory and a future. I have never been one of those girls who "wants a baby SO BAD!", but when I hear this song, I do get a peacefully excited feeling about the hypothetical baby who will have this name. And she will probably hate her name and hate the song, but it was chosen for her at least ten years before she will come to be, and, like me, I know she will think that is pretty cool.

Labor Day: The Oxymoronical Tease

Everything about my morning smacks of the summer mornings I just said a woeful goodbye to. I slept until 7:30 (unheard of!), I watched the Today Show, I ate breakfast at the kitchen table, then stayed there while I read my book and finished my coffee. It feels like summer, it looks like summer, but it's not. It's Labor Day. Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate the three-day weekend. It's just so close to summer that it seems slightly cruel.

I am probably not alone in that I will be using today as a catch-up day. I did laundry on Saturday, went grocery shopping on Sunday, and thankfully, I have today to tidy the house, grade papers, and do my own homework. I still have class tonight (Harding thinks it's above National holidays), but I have the whole day to make the rest of the week easier. We will be gone this coming weekend, so I'd like to maintain the order as much as possible. We'll see.

Both of us started our classes at Harding this past week, and it was not awful, but it was an adjustment. We have decided that we need to be really organized, really understanding, and really patient if we're going to do this (and we are). I hate to leave dishes just sitting in the sink, but homework takes precedence over housework, so they there stayed. I usually plan a few meals and then improvise the rest, but now I have to plan what meal I will make on what day for about three weeks. I actually kind of enjoyed doing that though. This is our life now, and we are going to enjoy and be thankful for the chaos!

And so ends the worlds most boring blog entry.

Things will Slow Down... two years from now.

I enjoy blogging. I really do. And that is why it is at the bottom of my to-do list.

I HAVE TO PRIORITIZE PEOPLE! Between teaching, grad school, church, Beta Club, and other time consuming yet obligatory (but not bad, necessarily) activities, the hobbies I have been indulging in daily the past three months (reading, writing, blogging, sleeping) get relegated to the back burner. Trust me, folks, my blog isn't the only thing taking a hit here: the enormous zit on my chin will tell you (it's been telling people all day, actually) that skin care is not something I am going to have excess time for either. I will try to post weekly, but I make no guarantees. However, if anyone would like to provide me with a free housekeeper and/or personal chef, then I may be able to bump it up to two posts a week.

All that aside, it was a good week. I have good group this year (as far as I can tell), and I was pleased with their first-of-the-year essays. I have been praying that God will guide me in my teaching, and that I can instill in them a love of poetry, literature, writing, and standardized testing.

I am a little nervous about the coming week, as it is the first week that I will be both teacher and student. Jason also begins classes this week. We appreciate your prayers!

Ten Things Tuesday

This is a little different version of TTT, but the meaning is the same. Here are ten things that have made me smile recently:

1. Niece Lucy says "supper". I grew up in California, where we said "dinner". Hearing Lucy say "supper" socked it to me once again that my nieces have a Southern accent. It's way cute though!

2. My husband surprised me with living room furniture! You read that right-- living room furniture. We've been looking for a while, and I found a set I loved, but Jason wanted to keep looking. I had kind of forgotten about it, and I was hurrying in from WalMart Friday afternoon, and it was sitting in the living room! I was more surprised than when he proposed! It's beautiful and I love it!

3. Jason and I shared a friend ice cream blast from Sonic. Oh my goodness, YUM! The things they call "cinnamon crunchies" are actually just Cinnamon Toast Crunch pieces, and so it tastes like cereal ice cream, which are two of my favorite yet forbidden things.

4. The kids down the street found and are taking care of this TINY calico kitten. I don't love cats, but this one is a sweetie!

5. Bailey, the 65-pound Labrador, cowered and bellied up to the aforementioned tiny kitten.

6. We had a beautiful evening, and Bailey and I went for a very peaceful walk.

7. I am entertaining an idea (inspired by a book of course) that I really like.

8. The baby boom continues at church! So happy for Ryan and Joanna!

9. During our classroom preparation time, I ended up teaching some technologically-challenged teachers how to text. Oh fun!

10. I finally got around to seeing Juno, and I LOVED it! I watched it twice.

I've been in in-service a while now, but the kids start back on Monday. I am praying for my kids and the year ahead. Here we go!

Ten Things Tuesday-- The Daily Edition

There are certain things I use on a daily basis that I don't want to take for granted.

1. Coffee~ Oh, how I love coffee. I consider myself a coffee snob, and I am very picky about what goes into my mug. Jason grinds fresh beans every morning at home, and if we get coffee out someplace, I get a triple (three shots of espresso) vanilla latte. I will steal this saying from a mug one of my students got me: I teach, therefore I need coffee.

2. Carmex~ I always have a tube within reach. I'm addicted. I don't even own lipstick.

3. my '98 Corolla~ My car may not be fancy, but it's reliable and gets great gas mileage. It even has all four hubcaps on right now!

4. Sonic Ice Water~ Many, many people have made fun of me for this one, but I can justify it! If you know me, you know I only drink coffee, unsweet tea, and water. I go to Sonic everyday and get a large ice water for $.44 ($.22 cents if it's happy hour!). That's half the cost of a bottle of water for about twice as much water. Plus, they load the cup with ice, so I refill my cup a time or two during the day. There, justified.

5. my Bible~ I am kind of an all-over reader, and it seems that no matter where I turn to on any given day, I am in the right spot. God is so sneaky that way! I am amazed at Him every day!

6. the computer~ I prefer the computer to the TV.

7. Yoplait Light yogurt~ my favorite flavors are lemon and banana.

8. my phone~ I used it to communicate and to organize. It's a must-have.

9. hand soap~ silly, I know, but I wash my hands A LOT, so I am thankful for soap.

10. Post-It Notes~ I carry a small journal around, but more often than not, I end up jotting down thoughts and lists on Post-its.

My Calm Place

At yoga class, we're frequently instructed to got to our "calm place". I used to dread these words, because I couldn't think of my calm place. I would say to myself, "I'm at yoga. This is my calm place!" Then I would start thinking about how unhealthy it was to not have a calm place, and wondering what everyone else's calm place was, and things would just go downhill from there. The instructor must have noticed my internal panic one day, because she came over and told me, "Think of a place where you have nothing but warm feelings for. A place that glows like a candle in your memory." And there it was. My calm place.

Jason and I moved into the West Married Apartments at Harding about 2 weeks after our wedding. I think the actual date was somewhere around August 9th. It was HOT, and it was just the two of us moving into our second-floor place. I can remember how happy we were, setting it all up, arranging our things into our place. It wasn't new, or fancy, but it was our first place, and recalling our time there is like taking a long bubble bath: warm, deep, and so tranquil it almost hurts.

We lived there for two years, and so I know we fought there. I even remember throwing a hair clip at Jason one time. But I don't remember any of those fights. I remember staring out the balcony window, watching for him to come home. I remember the look on his face the first time he broke one of our plates. I remember the pet turtle we kept on the balcony. Sundays after church, we'd crawl into bed to take marathon naps, the deep naps of two married college students who each worked 40 hours a week. When I got off work on Saturdays, I would come home to a sparkling clean apartment and a delicious meal. For a time one summer, we ran together every night. I went all out with Christmas decorations, and even though I know now how hideous it looked, I thought it was beautiful then. Dancing in the living room, laughing as we did the dishes... it was such a place of joy for us.

The joy of that old apartment extended to our friends and family as well. I remember our friends, always in and out, eating, playing DDR, playing Cranium. Talking/crying with Lydia on the couch. Walking across the street to spend the evening with my best girlfriends. Taking Matt and Lydia's pictures there the night they got engaged. We had Ashley and Michael over for dinner, and I remember that not going so well. Throwing Lydia's shower. We kept Baker, Teen's dog, a time or two there. We also had Lucy there for a day. I know right where we were sitting when Kevin called and told us Lucy was going to be a big sister. I threw our first, and so far only, Christmas dinner party there. I can remember both sets of our parents and their first visits to our apartment. My family gathered there the day I graduated, and I love to recall all of us there, drinking coffee and taking pictures.

I recall standing on the balcony one day, watching Jason walk home on foot. I looked in the opposite direction, and saw a guy on what looked like Jason's normal mode of transportation, his bike. I watched them head for each other, and I looked on as Jason grabbed the bike and threw the thief off of it. He was so brave, and I was so proud to belong to him. I still am.

So that has become my calm place, and now that I have found it, I go there often. Not that I don't have other happy places (my parents house, my grandparents Munsee house), but my calm, warm, tranquil place will forever be West Marrieds A16. I travel there when I can't fall asleep, or when I am feeling overwhelmed. I think a part of me is always there; our life there seeped into the walls, and the memories, anecdotes, and stories belong to the apartment as much as they belong to us. Other people lived there before us, and just one couple since, but that will always be our apartment.