Utterly Amazed and Thankful

The weather has been so weird today.  First it was sunny, then it rained hard, then the sun came out again, then it rained, then it was sunny, then it poured, and now it's overcast.   Kind of like me.

Ok that's being a little to melodramatic (and personal) for this Web 2.0 setting, but really, this week has had quite a few unexpected ups and downs.

If I haven't told you yet, I got hired to teach 6th grade Humanities!  It's at the school in Moscow where I substitute taught last year and I'll be working from the start of the school year through about November.  I am incredibly thankful for the opportunity I've been given.  That last sentence feels like a complete understatement.  To be trusted and believed in is such an amazing feeling.  On Thursday I was introduced as "highly qualified."  The other teachers have been so kind and wonderful to me, too.  We start classes on Tuesday and I am completely overjoyed.

At the same time, I only got here on Monday, was hired on Wednesday, and started work Thursday.  My classroom is a mess, I'm frantically learning the Humanities curriculum, planning an elective from scratch, and I don't even have a class list yet.  I'm still jet-lagging every afternoon.  And my heart is breaking a little over the people who won't be in Moscow this year. 

I'm also really hoping there won't be a first-year-of-teaching 15....  Some people might come home from a long day of work and feel like running and exercise is the best way to relieve stress, but not me.  There has been probably like one time when this was the case.  More often, I'll be found on the couch, wrapped in a blanket and wearing comfy pants, eating chips, and watching whichever Take Home Chef or whatever TLC show is on.  Today it was strong coffee and dark chocolate. I'm thinking of joining the pilates class in the staff health and wellness program.  Keep me accountable, k?

Tonight I'll begin lesson planning and tomorrow I'll work on my room.  I live 2 minutes from the school- hugely thankful for that.  This is an experience that will drive me to my knees again and again.  I'm nervous, but I feel so prepared.  I had such a great education- in education- at Taylor and my student teaching placements.  I know this is what I want to do and I'm working in an incredibly supportive community.  One more thing- today I found out that another teacher in my section, one of the new hires, graduated from a small Christian college in Indiana!  What are the odds?!

(by the end of writing this it is sunny again).

O divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek 
To be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved, as to love.


~St Francis of Assisi