I had an eventful day.

I found out that there were problems with my grant and that it was going to be pulled until January 15th, which means I'm half-unemployed until then.  :(

John and I were up by my school when we passed by some homeless people begging from cars.  They're pretty common in Austin--I like to think it's because the town is friendly to homeless people.  Boy was I wrong.

It was 32 degrees outside, which is REEEELY cold to us Texans.  The wind was blowing pretty hard and had a bite to it.  This woman had plastic in her nose, like in a hospital. Her face was an unhealthy shade of red, like the wind was tearing her face to pieces.  She was a senior citizen.  It was a pretty painful sight.  Sometimes John and I will give dollars to these people, but this time we were looking for larger bills, because it was pretty clear that this woman did not need to be on the street.

"Get out of the cold!" We told her as she took our money.  "It's too cold for you to be out here!" 

"I have to pay my rent!" she cried, tear-faced, as the light changed and we pulled away.

My bipolar has been acting up lately--my moods swing widely and it's hard to trust my own emotions, but I was outraged that a person with medical problems should have to beg for money in the freezing cold just to make rent. 

So John and I sat in the lobby of a nice, warm bank and made phone calls, trying to contact some people who might know some people who might know who could help.  We got ahold of an organization that we knew through AmeriCorps, and they referred me to four different numbers: A Caritas organization, two churches, and a county organization.

I called the county first.  They said that they could definitely help her make rent, if she was renting a permenent address and not a hotel room. I hadn't thought of that.  They said that if she needed rent for a home, then we should bring her to such-and-such address to fill out a form and they will approve funds to give to her landlord.  They said that if she was collecting money for a hotel room, she should call the Salvation Army shelter.

So I drove down, got out of the car--GEEZ it was cold!--and told her what I had done.  "The county says you can apply for money and they will pay your landlord," I told her, holding out the slip of paper with phone numbers on it.  "Even if I live at a motel?" she asked. 

"Well, they said that if you're homeless, you could go to the Salvation Army."

"The Salvation Army won't take me," she said, "because I have this."  She gestured at her oxygen tank, connected to the tubes in her nose. 

I didn't know what to say, so I just told her, "I'm not done yet--I'll be back!"  and went back to my warm car to try some other numbers.

First I called Salvation Army.  The woman on the other end was abrasive and disapproving.  I told her the situation, and said, "She says that she was turned away at the Salvation Army because she was on oxygen.  Is that true?" 

"Well, we would turn her away because we're full!" the woman said impetuously.  "But also, we are not a hospital.  To stay here, you have to be able to get around on your own.  You have to be able to get out of bed by yourself, you have to be able to go to the bathroom by yourself, because our staff is not trained to do that."  Her message was understandable, but her tone was defensive and mean.

"Well, she's talking about spending the night in a motel, so it doesn't sound like she needs any assistance," I replied.  From my car, I watched the woman cross over to try her luck on the other side of the street. 

"Maybe," the woman said, "But we also have to turn some people away because we just can't have them here." 

"What do you mean?" I said.

"Well, if they've caused problems in the past, or if we've had to call the police on them, then we can't have them here." 

"Oh," I said, confused.  Had I said something to imply that this bent, withered senior citizen on oxygen was some kind of danger to others? 

"Yeah," the woman said, as if she had scored some kind of point. 

I asked for referrals to other organizations, got a few numbers.  Some only offered long-term assistance, others were full, still others just didn't answer their phones.  One man,  who seemed much kinder than the other woman I talked to, said, "Yeah, it's tough to find placements for people on oxygen. There's definitely a need for that." 

John and I were considering our options--should we buy the woman a hotel room?  Was there any organization that would take her?  When John came across a shelter that would take her for the night. 

So we went to go get her, but she said she actually had a place to stay until the end of the week, and she had a male companion with her--a gentleman in a wheelchair.  So we gave her the phone numbers we had collected and wished her luck. 

I've been down and funky about that all day.  John is all, "We're heroes," but I don't feel that way.  I just feel bummed that the world is the way it is--that a woman on oxygen should have to beg in the cold, that a woman working at a homeless shelter should-probably through no fault of her own but just through the tax weighed on her from doing that kind of work--should become so mean and spiteful.

I hate to admit it, but thoughts like that crossed my mind, too.  Maybe the oxygen thing isn't real--maybe it's a trick to get more money.  Maybe she really is a bad person--why else would no one love her or help take care of her?  Maybe there's some secret reason that would justify me walking away from this difficult problem so that I can feel better.  Because it SUCKED to know that she needed help but that all these organizations won't help her; it was frustrating.  So I can understand why the woman at the shelter might be the way she is.

But the one thing that kept me from letting those thoughts win me over was the image of her red-red cheeks and tearful eyes, her tube-stuffed nose and her desperate cry, "I have to make rent!" 

Jesus, nobody should be out in this cold. 

I have my kindergarteners twice a week.  Alex has had social problems since the beginning.  He has trouble with self-control and self-awareness.  He follows his own personal impulses at the expense of others.  For example, every time we line up, Alex will be sqabbling and pushing with someone because he decided to compete for their spot in line.  He had a hard time getting people to play with him, because he would demand that they play the game he wants to play, and play by his rules.  He would approach kids involved in an activity and insist that they begin to play a game of HIS choosing.  He wouldn't hesitate to stand up, shout, push or grab to get the MOST attention from the teacher and to be the FIRST to get supplies.

Today I sat down with his grandmother and showed her that I had given Alex a Starbuck, an in-class reward meaning he was one of the best-behaved in the class today.  She asked what he had done to earn it.  I told her that he had played well with his friends on the playground--he hadn't gotten in any fights or sqaubbles, had made peace with his place in line and was starting to be included in a group of friends. 

His grandmother told me that at the beginning of the year, all his teachers had been complaining about his behavior.  She said that he would come home with reports that nobody likes him and that people were mean to him.  Shaid that all of that has changed since he's been participating in our program--that his teachers say he's doing better and he no longer says he's having a hard time in school.  She can really see a difference!

Also, I have a new student named Piper.  Piper is pretty well-behaved and well-adjusted; she is the daughter of the art teacher at the school.  But it's obvious that Piper is new to the class--she does not share as well as the rest of the kids, she does not wait patiently for her turn like the rest of them do, and she does less well in group participation exercises. 

To me, this means that all the other kindergarteners have been learning something that Piper hasn't gotten to benefit from....yet. 

It makes me very happy to feel like I'm making an impact, making kids' lives better. 

We rushed my boyfriend to the hospital on Saturday.  In the emergency room, they insisted on giving him an IV.  Trying his best to maintain his composure, he explained that he was afraid of needles, and attempted to negotiate another way of getting the bloodwork done and getting fluids into him.  The nurse was sympathetic to his phobia but unyeilding in her demands--it had to be an IV.

So, as he surrendered his right hand and turned gripped my arm with is left, we sang every loud, enthusiastic rock song we could remember.  We hit several from Rock Band, as well as Rock You Like A Hurricane and Go, Go Godzilla.  It was pretty tough for him, and pretty painful, but we got the job done, and the nurse said she had never been so entertained while giving an IV. 

My boyfriend has a kidney stone and he's on medication to manage the pain.  The hospital experience was good, the nurses and the doctor were great, and now we just have to wait for this thing to run its course. 

I don't remember any of my childhood Halloweens, which is surprising to discover considering that it's my favorite hoiday. 

The closest I can come is a memory from early adolescence.  I think it must have been the first Halloween that I didn't go out trick-or-treating.  I was "too old." 

Instead, I stayed home, handed out candy and watched Nickelodeon's "Are You Afraid of the Dark?" 

And that's apt, because even today, one of my favorite things about Halloween is great horror movies on TV.  And also, the fun of creating a costume, but that phase came later  )

When I first started teaching afterschool, I was completely in over my head.  I had no idea what to do, how to do it, what the objectives were or how to reach them.

I am SO PROUD of myself now.  I have excellent control of my class--I developed classroom management skills on the fly and now my afterschool coordinator thinks I"m one of the top teachers.

But what really makes me proud is that I've been very, very successful in creating and adapting awesome, interesting and creative lessons.  Many of my best lesson ideas don't come out of the books that litter the office, although they are extremely helpful in pointing me in the right direction and giving me a jumping off point. 

I surveyed my kids and they definitely want to study dinosaurs.  To segue into that, and in honor of Halloween, I"m doing a series of lessons on bones.  For my younger classes, I printed out and laminated pictures of different animal skeletons, and let them match the skeleton to the animal.  Having them work in groups and race to be the first table to get all the matches correct gives them some practice getting along, teamwork, social skills, sharing materials, etc etc etc. 

My older kids get an introduction to the scientific method.  We learn that bones are round because round cylinders hold much more weight than any other cylindrical shape.  Table 1 makes a triangle cylinder, Table 2 makes a square cylinder, and Table 3 makes a circular cylinder.  Each student guesses which cylinder they think will hold the most weight.  Then they start piling books on top of the cylinders (which also helps them develop balance).  We make a chart to record how many books fit on each cylinder.  We find that after the square cylinder and the triangle cylinder have crumbled, the circular cylinder can hold all the books from all three tables!!  I have a little structural engineer in my 1st grade class--he'll love it. 

I did a demo for the kindergarten classes to increase enrollment.  We created a frog's habitat.  Green paper plates represented plants, marking off the limits of the "pond."  The kids got to place rubber, life-sized fish from the Master Angler program into the pond to represent fish.  Some laminated pics of bugs from a Project WILD game represented the bugs in the pond, and the kids got to put those in the pond.  Then I had some toy plastic worms and the kids got to put those down.  We discussed which animals ate which other animals and which animals ate plants.  Then all the kids got to be little froggies in the pond!  (In class, I extended the lesson to demonstrate what happens when the pond becomes polluted--first all the plants get poisoned, then the worms die, then the insects die, then the fish die.  (At this point they've picked up and put away everything that "died" in the pond, and the carpet is clean.)  Can froggies live in a pond with nothing in it?  NO!!!  Show me dead little froggies!!  And the kids lay on the carpet and play dead.  It sounds a little morbid typing it out, but the kids actually LOVE the "play dead" part.  "Oh, no, what killed  to all my little froggies?"  I cry.  "POLLUTION!!"  They answer.

And that's an introduction to habitat :)

After the demo, all the little kindergarteners who aren't in my class wave and smile when they see me.  It didn't actually improve enrollment--I was selling to the kids when I need to be selling to the parents--but it was a lot of fun for all of us.

So, yeah, I feel really good about the work I'm doing. 

I was talking to my brother about a favorite childhood movie when he confessed that the movie had always "given him the creeps."  Although we frequently watched it and played games based on it, he always pretended to like it just so he could hang out with me.

He said that it was similar to how he always wanted to hang out in my room, even though "I hit him a lot," just to be around me.

All of that is true.  I grew up believing I was a great sister.  I was well into adulthood when my brother told me that he remembered me being mean, abusive, rejecting. 

I was all of those things.  I never wanted to play with him and didn't want him in my room messing with my stuff.  When he kept trying to force his way through the door, I made up a game based on "Punch and Judy" called "The Kellie and Tommy" show.  When he was able to force his way so far into my room that we were in front of my mirror (which was the make believe TV screen) we had what was, to me, a pretend slap-fight like Punch and Judy. 

I did hit him a lot, in play.  He would put up with it.  If I accidentally hit him too hard, he would hold himself and show that he was really hurt, and I would beg him not to tell on me, and he would agree not to. 

I never, never meant to be mean to him.  I just didn't know any better.  I was being physically and verbally abused at home and at school.  I was full of anxiety because crises were frequent and unpredictable.  I was used to being alone because it was safe and normal to me.  I knew my brother wanted to play with me, but I didn't understand that I was SUPPOSED to play with him.  And, since physical violence was so much a part of my life, I guess I had a sort of skewed perception on what was appropriate.  To me, hitting without hurting was okay, and he always let me hit him without complaint, so I thought it was okay.

I wish I could change it all.  I wish I could be better. 

But in many ways, I have the same character flaws today.  I can be pretty rejecting of the people I care about.  I can be distant, unfriendly, uncooperative, and even abandon the people I care about for long periods of time.  Socially, I'm very self-centered.  I expect other people to entertain me, and have no talent or skill with entertaining other people.  As a result, I'm terribly socially isolated and I have a really hard time making and keeping friends. 

These are flaws I've had since childhood and I'm only now really grasping it.

I really need to get a sponsor.  :( 

I went to a conference today for educators and education groups who want to bring gardening into school programs. It was completely awesome!!

Since I don't do the garden at my school, I thought the whole training would be sort of tangential to my interests; sort of a "just in case they throw me on a project" kind of background training.

But the training was actually REALLY helpful even for my animals class, and I DEFINITELY have some resources to use if I ever need to take over the garden project. In fact, I'm wondering if a garden-related project would be appropriate for the middle school kids that I will be mentoring?

In the meantime, I met this woman who started teaching in the 1970s who had actually turned her entire elementary school into a ZOO. The hallways were lined with cages and animal displays, the playgrounds and outdoor spaces were cluttered with animal pens, and a different type of animal lived at the end of every hallway. They had bats, chickens, goats, snakes, frogs, salamanders, turtles, ducks, several species of birds, tarantulas, chinchillas, and a venus fly trap. Each grade was responsible for taking care of one species of animal, and the teachers were responsible for managing odors and other logistical problems. The chickens laid eggs and the kids got to watch the eggs hatch naturally, the bats had a baby, and one of the goats had a baby. It was the coolest, most amazing thing ever. It was so incredible, because, like, how did she get PERMISSION to do all that?!?! How did she PAY for it?!?!? (She said garage sales.) It's just so ambitious and so totally amazing.

I'm going to have her as a guest speaker at my school. :)

I'm also planning a field trip to this place called the LBJ Wildflower Preserve. It's more than it sounds--it actually contains about six different kinds of animal habitats, including a desert habitat. If you undergo a Saturday training (which is expensive: $60) then you can take your kids there on a field trip for free and give them a guided tour. I think it's totally worth it, though--you should see this place!! I'm thinking of writing up a proposal where my organization pays $20, the afterschool program pays $20 and I pay $20 out of pocket--I get the training, the program gets the curriculum materials, and the afterschool program gets a free field trip. I think that will go over well if I can get it approved :)

I've decided that I'm going to get as educated as possible about the upper echelons of the program for the next year or two, and then I'm going to move back to Beaumont and incorporate an afterschool community there. To that end, I'm going to start my keeping my contacts there alive. I'm going to send a newsletter to all my former tutoring clients' parents, just letting them know what I'm up to and inquiring about the kids (truthfully, I've been wanting to do that anyway--I miss my teenagers!). With those contacts active, when I go back to incorporate change, I have people on my side who know me, knew me for a long time, know what I'm like and what I can accomplish.

I think I can achieve great things :)

It's possible that I have always been on a spiritual path....that mine began when I first achieved consciousness. But, to provide a more straigtforward answer, I'll define my spiritual patterns of thought not as a path that I travel, but as a system of road signs that I use to guide me to choose where I travel. 

For me, that path is my 12 Step program, which gives me perspective when I am in doubt, support when I feel hopeless, guidance when I seek purpose, and inspiration when I need to change and grow. 

I went to my first 12 Step meeting the day after my younger brother went to prison.  In the months leading up to that, I had attempted suicide.  In the aftermath of the attempt, I dropped out of school and sat on my couch, watching TV and playing boring, repetitive video games over and over.  I desperately wanted help but my psychiatrist had failed me, the local MHMR hospital had told me I wasn't sick enough to benefit from their services, and I didn't feel that I could afford any real professional help.

I didn't feel that my childhood abuse and exposure to my mother's alcoholism were in any way responsible for my condition.  I did not even recognize or admit that I was being deeply affected by the fact that my brother was going to prison.  His girlfriend and her two year old child had moved into my house, and she was consistently rude to me, bullying me in my own home, and I felt helpless to stand up to her.  My brother was probably the dearest person in my life, and there was nothing I could do to save him, but I had no right to "blame" him for my feelings of worthlessness or desire to die.  I had no right to blame my mother or anybody else.  I could only blame myself--I was worthless and that was the end of the story.

So when I went into a meeting for people who had been affected by alcoholism, I felt like a fraud.  At the same time, I was desperate for something to help, so I pretended to be concerned about my past experiences with my mother's alcoholism when all I really wanted was for someone to show me how to fix how screwed up I was.

Lucky for me, that's exactly what Al-Anon is about.  It's not about blaming other people, it's not about fixing someone else's problems, and it's not about wallowing in the past.  The 12 Steps are a spiritual program to help restore me to sanity.  It helped me identify the behaviors that were making my life unmanagable and showed me the way to change those behaviors.  It helped me learn to take care of myself and let other people take care of themselves, rather than always scrambling to solve other people's problems while constantly running away from my own.  It helped me learn to be gentle and kind with myself and view myself as someone deserving of love.  It helped me stop criticizing myself for failing to be perfect, and instead to focus on growing as a person and making progress.

Five years later, I've made remarkable progress, and I continue to choose the 12 Steps as my guide down my spiritual path. 

Someone reached out to me yesterday, and it made me realize that is has been TOO long since I have updated here!!

As I wrote in my profile, I recently moved to Austin to join AmeriCorps.  I am heading an afterschool program at a local elementary school.  I teach science to Kindergarteners, 1st and 2nd graders.

It's been a big change from my previous educator experience, tutoring wealthy teenagers.  But, you know, it only took me about a month to totally get the hang of it!!  I've got classroom management down, and I'm even learning a little bit of conversational Spanish! 

For a while, I was having serious financial problems, because the monthly stipend is pretty low.  I was only officially part-time, but they told me that if a full-time position opened up, I'd be next in line.  So, I decided to go ahead and work part-time for free, to make sure that I would stay first in line.  Plus, it lent a structure to my life that I found comforting, simplified transportation arrangements (my boyfriend, who shares my car, also works full time at the same job) and gave me some extra time to plan my classes and learn all I could as quickly as I could.  And it totally worked, except that my part-time wages weren't cutting it. 

So a couple of weeks ago I spoke with my boss, Eddie, and told him that, although I didn't want to, I was going to have to find another part-time job and couldn't come in in the mornings anymore.  He said he understood, and I started job-hunting.

What I didn't KNOW was that the organization I work for was writing a new grant to establish a mentoring program at a local middle school, and needed some part-time help with the paperwork.  Quietly, Eddie went to HIS boss and recommended me for the job, and I found out yesterday that I GOT IT!!  So my money troubles should be over without destabilizing my life.

Things are looking up!!

Just thinking this through....

Enough.

Good enough.

Smart enough.

I've had enough, and I'm not going to take anymore!

I have enough; I am satisfied with this.

Enough is enough--time to take action!

I've eaten enough--no need to make a glutton of myself.

Did I do enough?  Was I effective?  Could I have tried harder?

Is this enough for me?  Am I selling myself short or missing opportunities? 

How much will be enough?  It seems like the goal increases in proportion to the achievement.

Will I only recognize enough when it becomes too much? 

Heh.  Enough implies a balance, a satisfied moderation.  Moderation is difficult to perceive, difficult to accept.  Satisfaction is difficult when dissatisfaction becomes a habit.  I can tell you what too much looks like, and I know what NOT enough is. 

Is life just a big titrating exercise between too little and too much?