march (d)

good morning. here i am with my first cup of green tea for the day and the boys behind me watching their favorite program of recently, Super Why.

i've been having some interesting flashes of perspective lately. the first occurred last week when i went for a lunch-break walk and found a temple in the neighborhood. on the grounds there was a city of the deceased, the dead tucked gently away under towers of mossy stone and shiny marble. it was so quiet there you could almost hear the magnolia trees blooming. i felt very alive at that moment, as if i could feel all of my cells pulsate with life.
the second came yesterday when i read about a young woman battling a chronic infection that causes her to be in severe pain daily. her doctors weren't able to figure out what exactly was wrong or how to fix it. the solution that she was facing was surgery, major surgery to fix a pain mysterious in origin and uncertain of cure. after i read that, i laid down to sleep with my family and felt how extremely lucky i was. all this panic over choices takes away from seeing my life as it really is. so last night, laying in bed sandwiched between two boys whose breathing overlapped like waves, i came to a decision about all this future business.

i have decided that i will finish this semester and that i will take the summer semester off. during the summer, i will participate in a writing workshop. if i am ready, then i will return to the program in the fall and try to still graduate by next spring. as much as i don't like the degree, i think eventually it will be what i do with it not how it is currently constructed.
i also take the pressure off of myself to get professionally developed. i don't need to attend every teacher's conference and write research papers. i don't have to become this perfect stereotype of a teacher, a persona that would be false for me.

that being decided for the short-time, i also figured out that teaching will always be a part of my life as i really enjoy humans, simple as that sounds. yet it should be based on what i am passionate about. teaching grammar is not my passion as the only use i have for grammar is understanding how i can apply the rules to my writing. which made me realize that i am passionate about writing so... that is what i want to teach. i am not sure my current degree program is appropriate for this ambition so that is what i will be figuring out over the summer.

it may seem that writing is not a viable alternative for someone who has a family to support and is already in a field that has a certain amount of job security. yet, writing is similar to any other job in that you must invest a lot of time and energy into it. if i am willing to take such great measures for a career that started off as my "day job" out of university, then i should be willing to undergo even more for a dream that has lived in my heart since i was a small child.

so, that is settled. i just thought i would share that with you since you have had to read about my uncertainty and discontent.

now, time to go and have another cup of tea and get ready for sunday. a paper on noun phrases plus some pants' knees to patch and some origami creatures are all on today's agenda.

hope you are all well. take care and thanks for reading as i processed my hopes and fears here.
xoxo