This blog is dead.

Dead as a door nail. It's sad. It never really saw its prime, but I also did not have time to utilize it.

I have just endured the most difficult semester of my life [resulting in 2 A's and 3 B's], and I have been admitted to intern next semester. Starting January 11, I will be a student teacher at—I'm not sure yet. I will find out Tuesday. I'm looking forward to knowing, though.

I will have some assignments and junk I have to complete, but for the most part, I am not going to have papers to write or any way to practice my writing, so I want to start a blog that is about my student teaching. I have some stipulations about this. I won't necessarily write something every single day about my classroom or my experience, but I will also be writing about my development as a teacher. I want to do a few article reviews and share ideas I have for my classroom. I want to actually share this blog with other people and future interns.

As lame as some of my colleagues think it is, we made a promise to be life-long learners, and I am very serious about that. I want to learn the best practices for my classroom and never get comfortable. This will hopefully help me not to get complacent. If I ever have nothing to write about, then there's something wrong.

I'm looking into getting this thing started on Monday. I want to share my fears, hopes, and anxiety before I find out where I am going to be. Then I will continue to share where I am placed and so on.

This is something I really want to take seriously. It's actually something I'm passionate about, so surely I can make it happen.

“This life is what you make it. No matter what, you're going to mess up sometimes, it's a universal truth. But the good part is you get to decide how you're going to mess it up. Girls will be your friends - they'll act like it anyway. But just remember, some come, some go. The ones that stay with you through everything - they're your true best friends. Don't let go of them. Also remember, sisters make the best friends in the world. As for lovers, well, they'll come and go too. And babe, I hate to say it, most of them - actually pretty much all of them are going to break your heart, but you can't give up because if you give up, you'll never find your soul mate. You'll never find that half who makes you whole and that goes for everything. Just because you fail once, doesn't mean you're gonna fail at everything. Keep trying, hold on, and always, always, always believe in yourself, because if you don't, then who will, sweetie? So keep your head high, keep your chin up, and most importantly, keep smiling, because life's a beautiful thing and there's so much to smile about.” —Marilyn Monroe

I could not agree with this more.

"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody." -Bill Cosby

It's so rare that I update, and I apologize. I'll work on it, but I'm not making any promises. :)

This is my last semester of classes, and my last year of undergrad. I'm terrified and excited all at the same time. It's thrilling to think where I might be a year from now, yet it's terrifying to think where I might be a year from now. Ha! I have plans to go back to school to get my master's in either English or administration. I think I'll probably do English first. So, hopefully this time next year I'll already be working towards that.

I also hope that perhaps I'll have a ring on a certain finger that will lead to a lifelong marriage and lots of little ones running around, but I'm content waiting, too. As much as I want to be married, I also want to be prepared to be married. With Wes's job situation like it is (he is no longer a supervisor at Best Buy and was forced to take a major pay-cut because of it), I just want to know that we will both have money on which to survive. I'm sure we would be fine, but I would like to have job and him to have t more stable job, and I'd like to know where we are going to be at that point in our lives. If it's here in Florence, great. If it's elsewhere, fine. I just want to know.

Anyway, other than my thoughts occasionally being consumed by those, I am also chugging along through this difficult semester. Well, thus far, the most difficult thing is the 70 observation hours to complete, but I will do what I have to do to get those puppies done. My assignments don't necessarily seem difficult. I do have one class that requires I read 14 novels. I'm on the eighth one right now. It's all young adult lit, though, so it's not terribly difficult. This is the reading list:

The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton

Fat Kid Rules the World by K.L. Going

Waiting for Normal by Leslie Connor

Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly

Breaking Night by Liz Murray

Borders (poetry) by Pat Mora

Who Do You Think You Are? Stories of Friends and Enemies (short stories)

The Giver by Lois Lowry

Speak by Laurie Anderson Halse

Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

Looking for Alaska by John Green

I have three more I'm supposed to read. I read The Hunger Games series in the summer, so I'm probably just going to count that, but if I end up with spare time in the end (doubtful), I'll probably read a couple more.

Other than that, most of my classes have one big project and little else in between, so it hasn't been too bad. I have my first on Tuesday. Whoop! It'll be easy peasy. No big deal.

What has been stressing me out more than anything else is my desire to say yes to everything people ask me to do, even when I know in the back of my head, it is unlikely for me to get it done. I still try. I still fret. I still stress. And...more than anything, I feel bad when I fail at getting it done. I have never really realized it until this year, but I am a people-pleaser. I want desperately to break this, otherwise it will be the death of me. Guaranteed.

I also have a cat now...for those that didn't know that. She is half tabby and half calico. Her name is Pepperann! :) She has also added to my stress (until I declaw her, that is. And don't start on me about how inhumane that is, but you can't convince me of that. Sorry.) Her current favorite pastime? Tearing down the currents in my bedroom. Yep. I just love her.

Daddy called me tonight. :) He's in Hawaii, and it's rare that he calls me, so it's worth mentioning. I was telling him that I wanted to get my master's, which he seemed pretty impressed with (especially for the fact that I want to get two). I also talked to him about how if I my master's in English right after I graduated (like start in June), then I could have the opportunity to go to London in July as a mini study abroad program. I missed out on it this year because I knew I wouldn't be able to afford it, but I sometimes regret missing that opportunity. Daddy actually encouraged me to look into that, which was exciting. I usually feel like I'm doing the right thing is he encourages it or seems proud of it. :) Either way, that was my good feeling for the evening. That, and my cooking skills with honey mustard grilled chicken (wes did that), lemon butter broccoli, and mac and cheese. I always feel good when I cook something. Slowly, but surely, I'm convincing myself and everyone else that I can cook! :D

That's all for now. To sum up, I'm reading a lot, graduating soon, still trying to please everyone, and I'm learning to cook.

Fin.

Sylvia Plath – Mad Girl’s Love Song

I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

The stars go waltzing out in blue and red,
And arbitrary blackness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

God topples from the sky, hell’s fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan’s men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I fancied you’d return the way you said,
But I grow old and I forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

Some things I've realized...

Writing is a lot like child birth. Granted, I haven't had a child (really, my only follower on here that has is Kelli), but from what I understand, they're a lot alike. Perhaps when I actually have a child, I'll be able to update this with more detail.

-You carry it for a long time. (You might carry an idea for a story for a while, and then you carry a child for 9 months.)
-Many do both while they're on some kind of drug. (Many authors were drugged the heck up.)
-You push and push and try and try. (Sometimes you get nowhere with either.)
-Each push gets you a little closer, but not quite to the end.
-It is painful and dreadful, but pays off in the end. (Be honest. Both hurt, but in the end you either have a beautiful baby or a beautiful work.)
-Once you're done, you cry. It cries. Everyone cries. (Well, somebody cries.)
-You're very protective of the result. (You know, the baby or the work. It might have a cone head, but you don't notice. It might have a comma splice, but who cares?)
-It doesn't matter how much you learn and hear about it, you're never ready for it to happen. (You can hear what you're supposed to do when you have your first child, but I don't think anyone is ACTUALLY prepared before they go through it themselves. You also learn all about the writing process, but until you do it, you really have no idea how to create an actual decent piece of literature.)
-The placenta comes out afterward. (Yeah, maybe not.)

Kidding about that last one. But seriously, I was trying to think of something that was similar to the process of writing the other day. Don't ask why. But the only thing that came to mind was child birth. At the time, I had plenty of more examples, but I can't think of anymore that I originally came up with.

I decided to drop a class this semester. I went from classes every day and 16 hours to classes only on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and 13 hours. I just couldn't handle another class. I beat myself up over it for several days, but I've come to the realization that I am an adult and I have to make that decision. If it wasn't going to work out, then I needed to remove myself from that situation. I just hope it doesn't jeopardize my graduation plans. May 2012, baby! It better happen or I'm giving the heck up.

I spent my first Saturday off (in months) at my friend's house. Amber Crews and I have known each other for as long as I have worked at Best Buy in Florence. She is married with two kids, but tons of fun, not to mention I absolutely adore her kids. We just hung out at her house, eating quesadillas and cheese dip and drinking margaritas and talking and playing with the boys. It was a relaxing and enjoyable way to spend my Saturday. I don't think she believes I really think that either. Ha!

Crap. I've ran out of momentum to keep up this post. I'm going to go to bed so I can be at work at 6am tomorrow. I'll try to post again before summer. Ha!

Personal business and my ambition. Just another post, I'd say.

Updated: Because I'm a big baby and afraid to start drama, I deleted the first part of this post. I couldn't figure out how to make it "friends only".

On to more important things.
I'm getting off to a slow start for school. I did go to my literature class today, which I thoroughly enjoyed. It's a discussion class versus the lecture type of lit class I had last semester. He actually asks us what we think about the selection and we can have opinions! What a concept!

I have an advanced composition class that I'm looking forward to. Despite everything they tell you in high school, you don't write more in college...or maybe you should, but UNA doesn't require it yet. Supposedly that's all changing. I think it should. I wrote a 10 page research paper last semester for the first time in over a year...meaning I had 8-10 classes that did not require me to write at all. I am an English major! Good gravy. I should take initiative and write on my own, though. I want to get used to writing, but I want to be critiqued. I want to be torn down and built back up. I actually want to learn! Ha! So, perhaps this advanced composition class will kick my tail and I can get a lot out of it.

I also have Instruction of Composition, which I think will be a good class. I've had the professor before, but that was my first semester at UNA and it was a lit class. She reminds me of Professor Trelawny from Harry Potter. Either way, we had a long discussion on Wednesday about our job as English teachers. She was explaining to us that we have the toughest teaching job for the following reason: We learn to speak from our parents. We usually develop the same accent, vocabulary, and speed of talking, etc. Our identity begins with our parents. So, when a child enters into an English class and relays what they have learned up to that point, and it's not perfect standard English, we correct them. By correcting them, we are telling them that they are wrong, that their parents are wrong. We are questioning their identity. At a certain point in our lives, we do realize that our parents are usually wrong (ha! kidding...kinda), but at a young age, most kids admire their parents for the most part. With math, a teacher can point out the error and explain why it's wrong. Most wouldn't take offense to that. I always struggled in math. My dad used to help me out a lot, and he would show me a different way of doing the problem that was easier for me to understand. I remember one teacher I had telling me that the way I was doing it was wrong (although I always got the right answer). I took great offense to that because my daddy showed me how to do it. By telling me that was the wrong way to do it, she was telling me that my dad was wrong, and that's not okay. Get what I'm saying?

Also, with writing... the few followers I have on here I know are writers in some form or fashion. I can remember writing my first few essays and thinking they were wonderful and then I get them back from my teacher and they are butchered. Surely you can remember being young and writing a piece or coloring a picture and just thinking it's the greatest thing you've ever done. So when someone "insults" it by pointing out that you went out of the lines a couple of times or forgot a comma, you're crushed. I am training for that job of "insulting" a student's work.

So how do you change that? How do you read a paper that is seriously the most horrible thing you have ever read and try to maintain positivity throughout? How do you know whether the student legitimately doesn't get it or just isn't trying? Hopefully I'll learn these things in this class. I don't want my future students to hate writing or literature, but I don't want to feel like I cannot critique their work in efforts to make it better. Would I be doing them a disservice if I did not correct all of their errors? Should I find the biggest mistakes, address those, and work on the smaller things later? I don't want to make students terrified of a red pen. I want it to be a collaborative process. I don't want them to dread getting papers back. Either way, it's a fine line.

I'm dealing with this in other aspects of my life. I am trying to learn how to be over people, build relationships, and still be able to maintain the power over them. I'm trying to learn to deal with passive aggressiveness without inducing tears by confronting the issue. Rule with an iron fist, but wear a satin glove. Ha! Anyone have a satin glove I can borrow?

Thank you, Charles Bukowski.

so you want to be a writer?


if it doesn't come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or
fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don't do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.
if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all;
you're not ready.

don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in
you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.


—Charles Bukowski