It's Like This

Today, I took cleaning the house in phases.  I did about a million loads of laundry, all the finicky loads that have to be done periodically, rugs, bedding, blankets, special mini-loads of bright colors.  I vacuumed up enough Chewie fur to make about six smaller dogs.  I put away luggage, at least for the time being.  It felt good to bring order to the chaos.

There's order to the mental chaos, too.  I feel sharp and focused, not drifting or sad.  I feel like I have a direction and a goal now, and I haven't felt that way for a long time.  Lately, I have been sorting through the debris in my head, tossing out the bits that don't work, reordering the pieces I want to keep, putting away the new material.  I have a sort of a three-step plan for where I'm headed, and whenever I know where I want to go, I do so much better.  I can stay focused on getting there and tell everything else to step off.  

I have a purpose for what I want to get done in my classroom.  I will be tearing down and totally redesigning my regular English curriculum.  It will be one of the most satisfying things I have done in years.  While I am always tinkering with AP, I haven't done a major rebuild on the regular in...well...I don't know that I ever have. I have never been overly pleased with the way it functions, but there has never been time or an overwhelming drive for me to do it.  Now that I have this new approach and all this support from IREX to do it, though, I am ready to get hands on it and make it work the way it needs to.  I imagine it will take at least two years to get all the bugs out and get everything up and running the way I want it to, and of course, nothing should ever be totally set in stone, but just the thought of this functional change is good to me.

I have a purpose, too, for what I want to get done in my career.  In December of this year, si Dios quiere, I will turn in Fulbright paperwork.  While I know that program must be exceptionally competitive, I hope that my previous experience and my current qualifications will make me a good candidate.  I will not let my fears keep me from applying.  All I can do is reach for what I want and hope for the best.  Additionally, I may also let this upcoming school year be the year I do my National Boards.  I have been putting it off for a long time now, and since I have so many things that would go toward the completion of them in the works anyway, it might be a nice time to "double up," so to speak.  Even if it were offered to me, which I am almost certain it won't be, I will not be taking department chair again next year.  It's time to lay that aside and get some other things done.

I have a purpose for what I want long-range.  And really, that encompasses several aspects of my life.  First and foremost, looking down the road past the Fulbright which would happen in 2013-2014, I do really want to do something that would take me away from here.  That was brought back to me so completely and so fully when I was in DC this past weekend.  I was so happy there.  Part of it was because I was engaged in doing the thing I love most, learning about teaching well.  Part of it, though, was because I was surrounded by the edifices of culture and knowledge themselves.  I could enrich myself.  No, I'm not foolish enough to think that living in DC or any large city would be one giant museum tour, but I could access that part of that life when I needed it or wanted it.  It is important to me, and I do not have any portion of it here, or even anywhere near me.  Birmingham is as close as it gets, and as wonderful as Birmingham is, it is not even an easy day trip for me. 

Then there's the fact that I need to get myself to a place where I fit.  I don't fit here.  I am a big shiny raven who all the other birds just stare at, and I feel increasingly rude for having dropped in on them.  I am rarely able to participate more than marginally in most conversations.  I don't have young children which rules out the concerns of about 90% of people my age here.  It's not like that everywhere.  I get tired of feeling like a total freak because I haven't chosen that life.  

So it's like this, then:  I have a path, and I'm going to walk it until there's some turning.  I think, given the general state of dim illumination we're given in this life to see by, that's all we can rightly do.  If and when something else comes along to make me re-evaluate, I will sit down, consider my options, and figure out what to do about it then.  It just feels good to be moving forward again with determination.