Rumblings...

I am posting soon. I just keep forgetting not to spend hours working on other stuff. :-)

I am certainly not drifting right now. Each day is packed with a punch. It is just a lovely realization.

Meaningless stuff that makes me smile.

Pretty fantastic lines:

"I've been spilling my guts all weekend, and I don't know a thing about you."

"I'm allergic to fabric softener. I majored in Comparative Literature at Brown University. I hate anchovies, and I think I'd miss you even if we never met."

Out of my hands...

Overnight to New York, New York. Check.

Sometimes, I wish I could put a double in my classroom while I am teaching so that I could focus on helping students grow in all the other aspects of their lives. And sometimes, I wish it were the other way around.

No matter, it's in the mail. (Well, it will be in the morning. Silly Veteran's Day...that isn't supposed to be offensive.)

No, but seriously...

Okay, three pages? Are they serious? SIX QUESTIONS in THREE PAGES? Do they know who they are dealing with here? I could use three pages for ONE question, let alone six.

I don't know how to answer them either.

What do I expect in visiting an emerging country? What does that even mean?
How will I deal with Western privilege?

etc. etc.

I thought the application had to be POSTMARKED by the 15th. No, it has has to arrive by then. Oh cripes.

You sound like you are on the verge of death...

Have you seen the movie Love Actually? I am not going to spend my time on here writing about the validity of the messages in that movie, but I am going to talk about the beginning. It starts in the airport. It talks about watching all of the stories unfold and how "love actually is all around." Well, that introduction is beautiful to me. It reminds me of how much I love watching people. Let me explain.

I do not have a great track record when it comes to accomplishing anything once I come home for the evening. I am just not motivated, or I spend so much time planning or working on grad school (or on Facebook...) that I don't get any grading finished. Tonight, I actually got my butt into my car and drove to Borders to try to be productive. What was I thinking, really? There is not much in this world that distracts me more than a giant store filled with books and a cafe filled with interesting people to watch. However, I did finally grade the S2 tests, which is a grand feat.

I love the idea of writing. I love the prospect of publishing a book someday, but my own writing never lives up to my own expectations of what is good. Creating a story is not something I am innately good at doing, and my eloquence is usually lost with an abundance of prefacing. (Such as now.) I know what is good, but I don't know how to produce it most of the time. Tonight was the first time I ventured into Borders since the release of Harry Potter. (Even then, I was erely laughing in the parking lot.) I can't go there very often because I get lost in all the words. I could sit in that store for hours on end and not regret it at all, but that is the problem. Maybe when I am finished with grad school, I will get a part-time job there. I could be that fun, passionate employee who knows about books and reads to small children. I digress. There is something about book stores that makes me fall more in love with words, and so, as I was grading tests while sitting in the cafe, I couldn't help but jot down notes for what could be a great story one day.

There were three tables that captured my attention. One was a table of old men, obviously familiar with each other, but I am not sure how. One was a man tutoring two guys in math. And, the last was a small family of three, a dad, a mom, and a young baby girl dressed in a white knitted sweater and white pants with gold ruffles at the bottom.

The math tutor just made me want to try my hand at math again. It has been awhile; maybe I would be better at it this time around. That guy could be my tutor. He was a REALLY good teacher.

The Old Men's Club was obviously the funniest of the three. They were there to hang out with each other, it seems, but two of them were playing a fierce round of Chess. While the two in the middle were playing, the other four chatted. Let me share a few of the moments I overheard. I couldn't stop laughing to myself, especially as I was across the cafe and could clear these words clearly.

"Where did you learn how to play chess? In prison?"

Man talking to other man in hooded sweatshirt: "Why don't you take that stupid thing off your face?"

"So, are we going to have a new mayor?"
"I don't know. I voted for him today."
In astonishment: "You voted for Bart?"
"No, the other guy."

"Howard, why do you have such a terrible message on your voicemail?"

Howard: "What do you mean?"

"It sounds like you are on the verge of death."

It made me wonder what my guy friends will be like when they are in their seventies. Will they gather at Borders and play Chess? Will they still be involved in Fantasy Football leagues and go bowling together on Tuesday nights? Will they rant about the good ol' days and hit on the young girl that works at the cash register? Will they be around after their wives have passed wondering if love will ever come knocking again? I wonder.

And, then, as my mind tumbled away from the retirees and back into irony and plot, I heard a calm voice reading Dr. Suess. I could recognize Hop on Pop anywhere. I looked over, and there was a young dad reading to his infant daughter while holding her in his arms. He was whispering the words very gently, gingerly resting his chin on the top of her head, holding the little cardboard book in front of her eyes. His soft tone and his endearing smile made me melt. First of all, the moment was simply adorable. Secondly, I got this strange sense of pride when I saw that he was trying to give his daughter the gift of reading long before she recognizes what that means, and I was proud of that little family. I know that is cliche and stupid, but it made me look around the rest of the room and wonder what each person's favorite book was, whether or not their parents read to them as children...

So anyway...maybe someday, I will tell that story in the form of a story, rather than a rambling gathering of observations, but this is my medium for now.

It was a good night.

This is all just a bit of silliness, really.

So, I had to do a load of laundry before setting off to Turkey Run for our "Camping-in-Frigid-November" adventure. Layers, people, layers.

I had to run the dryer through twice (as usual) in order for all of my clothes to finish drying, and when that was finished, I went out to get said clothes. I happened to dry a lot of socks in this load, which can make for a very interesting experience. I think I tried at least six or seven times to pick up all the laundry at once before I was finally successful at carrying the pile the three feet into my apartment. I must have looked pretty silly as I stooped to get the clothes, dropped something, stooped down again, dropped something else, etc.

I started giggling to myself because there are times when I wish that I was being watched by a hidden camera like The Truman Show. You know the moments; they show up at unexpected times, and they are so real and ridiculous that they scream excellent television. But, no one is watching usually. (Thankfully, I guess. If someone were watching me while I was picking up my laundry, I would probably be creeped out...) So, I laugh, in spite of myself, because truly, life is just silly, and sometimes, no matter how many socks you drop, you just have to smile.

And then Moses heard a voice...

So...talk about answer to prayer, eh?

I felt like I needed to get involved on a deeper level in Uganda. I felt like I was possibly being called to do something with government. I was scared to give up my beautiful home at Perry.

And then, BAM...

Maybe you should join the Teacher Exchange in Uganda this summer?
Oh, okay.

After spending a few days in a whirlwind of thought and excessive worrying, I have made my decision. I am applying. What does this mean? No Morris Fork. No camp (although it is a remote possibility). LOTS of money. Postponing my graduation from graduate school. And putting my mom through a cycle of worry like none she has battled before.

But, none of that really seems like a big deal to me. I have absolute complete peace about it. I am working on the application, and if this is God's will, then I know it will happen. I started to worry about analyze what the IC people want me to say, what they are expecting, etc. I stopped doing that. I will answer honestly. I will not pretend to be anything I am not. If it is meant to be, it will be. I am sure of that.

Want to know what I could be doing? Okay, I will let you know...in brief...

Week 1: Teachers travel to Uganda, arriving at the airport in Entebbe—a city located one
hour from the capital city of Kampala. Because the North and South exist in such
dichotomous educational conditions, an important part of the assessment process will
begin in Kampala. U.S. educators will tour a secondary campus in Kampala prior to
heading to Gulu. The initiative will not be framed as a comparative experience, but
beginning the program this way will offer perspective for teachers as they gradually
begin to understand the education standards within the country and how those differ in
the various regions. Once in Gulu, educators will spend their time becoming more
familiar with the city and the culture, as well as attending workshops led by Invisible
Children staff.

Featured Workshops for U.S. and Ugandan Program Participants
1. Cultural Exploration
2. Language Training
3. Historical Foundations of Ugandan Schools
4. Education in War Time

Week 2: The workshop series will continue, and teachers will receive their school
placements. Teachers will create residency groups; each residency group will be placed at
a school for the duration of the trip. Groups will be comprised of one or more teachers for
each of the following disciplines: English, science, mathematics, and social studies. Each
teacher will be paired with a Ugandan instructor in the same field. The in-school
experiences during the week will focus on observation, relationship building (with
teaching partners and students), and dialogue with the school community. All
participating educators will have an opportunity to roundtable with one another at the end
of this week, affording each schools’ teachers the opportunity to ask questions of one
another, cast vision for the remaining weeks, dialogue about specific needs/desires, write
an initial self-assessment, and create a method of evaluation and documentation that will
benefit all parties once the initiative has concluded.

Weeks 3-6: The third week marks the continuation of the team teaching that will take
place the remainder of the trip. Teachers will work with one another and the student body
on the given curriculum, exploring student-centered methodologies, while remaining
focused on the material needed for the exams in August and November. Throughout the
experience, educators will engage in support groups with one another. This collaboration
enables teachers and administrators at different schools to brainstorm, develop strategies,
relate work to the texts, create lessons together, and crystallize concepts. All participants
will also attend Invisible Children’s second International Teaching and Learning
Conference in Gulu, Uganda.

Yea...and I get to go rafting and on a safari. Bonus.

My mind explodes when I think about it, literally. I can hardly fathom this possibility. Tomorrow, when I get up to teach at FCA (oops...that wasn't supposed to happen, but maybe it was...) I think I might cry. I am bursting. BURSTING.