Category Archives: Life

Aug 07 2012
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Dogs, Family, Life, Teaching, Travel

Five Things in a Bag

While I cannot take credit for this great idea, still want to share.  Part of the new school year is designed around building a positive classroom community where students know and trust each other.  Tomorrow, my fourth/fifth grade team will ask students to bring five things in a bag that represent themselves.  We’ll share our own bag to model the project and then allow students to ask questions about what we brought.

Me in a bag:

1.  Since I will be sharing my bag tomorrow, on my birthday, I chose the lion stuffed animal my dad bought at the hospital the day I was born.  It represents the fact that I am a Leo and reminds me of my family growing up.  I heard the story of this lion so many times.  It also caught most of my adolescent tears.

2.  My travel yoga mat kills two birds with one stone.  I love yoga, I love traveling.  Easy.  Debating whether or not to gross out the kids with a description of hot yoga…

3.  The little green ball with the face belongs to my dog child Simon.  Yes, I just called him that. No further explanation necessary.  Although, I will note that he looked confused about why I went out to the backyard to get his toy and then put it in a bag instead of playing with him.  He probably thinks we’re taking a trip.  He knows that bags mean trips.  Come to think of it, he’s now sleeping by the door.

4.  I included my Buddha notebook because it is filled with my writing, which is obviously an essential part of who I am.

5.  Last, I grabbed a wedding picture off the side table in our living room.  The kids got a kick out of hearing that we met in fourth grade and I wanted to also show them that they can bring pictures and/or drawings if what is important to them does not really fit in a bag, (you’re welcome Alex that I did not ask you to get in the bag instead!).

My five things…

…in a bag!

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Aug 06 2012
2 Comments
Life, Teaching

Life is Full

As you probably already know, I was dreading going back to work.  I feared my writing life would be over, that the summer me was gone.  While the students returned today, I actually went back to work last week, transforming the past two days into my first legitimately earned weekend in awhile.  To my surprise, instead of feeling rushed or deprived, I instead felt like life was full.

Even though I hate to admit it, there is something comforting about the return of the school year. For some reason I give myself more opportunities to relax when I know I have to go to work than when I’m trying to fit every imaginable pastime into the open expanse of summer.  I don’t understand the logic, but it’s true.  This weekend I actually hung out on the couch for a couple hours and did nothing.  Oddly, that didn’t occur once this entire summer.

Suddenly I am craving the return of new episodes of my favorite television shows, the subtle darkening of the sky a little earlier each night, and the eventual change from summer to fall.  I know it’s still a ways off, but starting school at the beginning of August creates a false sense of the impending shift in seasons.  Still, this transformation brings me back to my childhood, the whispers of Halloween, then Thanksgiving, then Christmas around the corner.

One of my favorite parts of teaching is this difficult to verbalize connection to my own childhood love for the change in seasons.  I’m sure I won’t feel this way every night during the school year, but tonight at least, life is full and the return to my routine is comforting.

Happy first day of fifth grade!

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Aug 02 2012
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Family, Health, Home, Life, Teaching, Writing

Balancing Priorities: Looking for Secrets

I’m now officially back into the world where I spend zero personal time on the computer during the workday.  Accordingly, I have to fit all my blogging and other social media needs into my personal prime time, when exercise, family, dog walking, house cleaning, writing, reading, and that pesky schoolwork are also competing for my attention.

As such, I’ve decided that I need to cut down on all behaviors that are a waste of time.  In other words, my internet usage has to be get in and get out so that I still have time for all those wonderful things that matter more, particularly writing.  I have to admit, it’s a little depressing to walk away from my writing after getting to focus so many hours a day on it, but this is the reality for most writers, so I need to make the best of it.

What are your secrets?  How do you balance your writing life with your personal and work lives?  Do you have specific hours that you set aside during the week for writing? Do you have any tricks for helping to minimize the amount of time spent wasted on endeavors that aren’t as important on your priority list?  Plenty of people seem to write and still have rich personal and work lives… Right?!

I want my focus on work evenings to be exercise/health, dog walking, time with my husband, and writing (be it blog or novel), so I get really frustrated when I realize I’ve spent thirty minutes looking for a lost receipt or surfing through a bunch of inane chatter on Facebook.  Accordingly, my goal is as little wasted time as possible.  Relaxation does not count as wasted time, but too much internet usage does.

I think that’s my cue.  Closing laptop now.  Look forward to reading your secrets soon.

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Aug 01 2012
9 Comments
Life, Teaching

The Birth of Our Inspiration Wall

Rome was not built in a day.  Over the past 24 hours, I’ve repeated this little mantra in my head over and over.  Why?  Because school starts in five days and my to-do list is already long enough to claim my time for weeks.  No joke.  If I did everything I wanted to for my classroom and students, I would not have time to even sleep at night.

So, I’ve been reminding myself that Rome was not built in a day.  Instead of trying to accomplish everything, (which is really impossible, because there is always something more I could do, no matter how many things I cross off my list), I am giving myself windows of time to work my absolute hardest and then giving myself a break.  I discovered last year that trying to do everything just led to burnout and made me a worse teacher.  The law of diminishing returns, I suppose.

Accordingly, as I feel my stress levels rise, I tell myself to relax, do what I can, then be happy about it.  In this spirit, I decided to make myself a little sign for my classroom wall that says simply, “Relax.”  Last year, as I navigated my first ten months on my own, I discovered an amazing little secret that too often escaped me.  While students put on shows or some other momentary chaos unfolded, I just relaxed, took a deep breath, and waited patiently before reacting.  This literally changed my teaching life, although some times it was easier done than others.

Thus, the importance of my new classroom reminder.  As I made myself this sign, I reflected on how I always make myself little positive notes around the house, my old cube, my desk at work.  Until recently, our refrigerator touted “Today is the best day of your life,” “Act like you want to feel,” and “I am grateful for _____,” all written on small notecards.  My old work computer had a sticky that said “Posture.”  You get the idea.

Thinking about these notes and what they mean to me, I realized they mean something to my students too.  During STAR testing last May, when we had to cover all instructional materials on our walls, I made little signs with motivational words, like “Believe in yourself,” “You can do it,” “Mrs. M believes in you.”  When the students walked in, I was surprised by how many little voices were reading the signs aloud, smiles on their faces.  The signs remained on the walls for two weeks and I caught their eyes tracing the words over and over again.

So, in making the relax sign for myself, I realized it was not only for me.  The students will see it too, and hopefully, they’ll internalize its message.  That’s when it occurred to me that this sign should go above our focus desk, where students take time outs in front of a poster of Machu Picchu.  This inspired me to make other signs, which quickly resulted in a renaming of this desk to the inspiration wall.  Now, I plan to invite students to contribute what inspires them, be it a few words or pictures, to hang alongside my inspirations.

New words for my evolving inspiration wall.

Hopefully these words will be inspiring to at least one student that visits the inspiration wall for a break… I’m excited to see what they add to the wall themselves.  We had a really cool class motivation collage full of pictures of their families and heroes last year.  It will be awesome if we can take the idea a step further with this wall.

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Jul 30 2012
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Family, Home, Life, Travel

How do you pick where you live?

Every time Alex and I get home from vacation, we want to move.  We long to live somewhere with cleaner air, maybe even a beach to run on with the dog.  Somewhere you can comfortably walk to town from your house or apartment, where the car is less important than it is in suburban Sacramento.  Our wish list goes on– less heat, more connection with the outdoors, you get the picture.

But does this place exist?

Yes, I’m certain it does, but not without trade-offs.  It probably costs more than Sacramento, not to mention that our jobs are here.  The irony, is that we already had much of what we were looking for when we lived in Berkeley, minus the right jobs.  Walkable urbanism, nearby coastline, no need for a car until it was time to drive back to Sacramento to see family.

But, therein lies the catch.  We, or as my husband likes to point out, I, wanted to come back to Sacramento all the time for family events.  My family is big and close, so there is always something worth coming home for.  Eventually, we realized we could live in a house in Sacramento and not drive back and forth all the time for the same price as our tiny North Berkeley apartment.

We also recognized that life was pretty much the same in Berkeley as it is in Sacramento– jobs, dinner, exercise, sleep, weekends.  However, ironically, we traded friends for family returning to Sacramento, as most of our close friends have now migrated to the Bay.  This trade in itself is alright, family should come first, but the idea that life is the same wherever you live is a partial truth.  In the big ways, it is mostly the same, but in little, surprisingly important ways, it’s different.

We miss walking to the grocery store, running in the Berkeley hills to stare out at the Golden Gate Bridge instead of people’s unwatered lawns.  Jumping on BART to be in San Francisco, arguably my favorite city on earth.  Our weekend jaunts to the Pelican Inn, only forty minutes to enjoy the ocean.  So many things, really.  And, to be fair, there were also downsides: expensive rent, earthquakes, small/noisy living space, mentally ill bums defecating outside our front door… Alright, Berkeley was not perfect either.

I get that life is trade-offs.  You pay more for less in places that are most desirable.  You leave behind family and/or friends to chase different priorities.  But something makes me sad about prioritizing where I live above my family.  Then again, something makes me sad about not being able to comfortably breathe the air in the city where I live, at least in summer.  Don’t get me wrong, Sacramento has plenty of aspects worth appreciating, but the smog and sprawl really crawl under my skin.

Three years into our return, we’re at a precipice.  I want to spend one more year with my same students, as I loop fourth and then fifth grade, but after that, we’re thinking of leaving again.  For where, I’m not sure.  Carmel (more likely Salinas/Monterey/Santa Cruz), Portland, Ashland… The list is just beginning to form.  But, I have this feeling, that no matter what, I’m giving something up. Either proximity to my family or those other things I value.  My mom chose Mt. Shasta, my dad lives in Sacramento.  It’s in my blood to be torn.

The compromise, of course, would be to stay but try a different neighborhood, which is something we’re thinking about doing in the interim.  Small neighborhoods, like East Sac or Midtown, show glimmers of those things we like, but we’d likely have to rent instead of own, at least to have anything comparable to where we live now.  And, it would still not fix the smoggy air or stifling summer heat, let alone the lack of ocean.  No, not all of California is on the beach, (too bad, really).

I want to know, what have you picked in life?  The familiar?  The different but far away?  How have you coped with the compromises inherent in any of these choices?  Or, did you hit the jackpot– all the friends and family you could wish for in your ideal place to live?  I want to hear about your experiences as I think through my own future choices.  At the end of the day, I know happiness exists wherever you let it, but other places still call to me, particularly those places with crashing waves.

I think my first choice of places to live would be somewhere near Carmel (above), but my husband favors even rainier places like Portland or Dublin, (yes, really).  Above all, I find myself drawn to the sea.

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Jul 25 2012
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Family, Life, Writing

Something Worth Remembering: Digging for Childhood Memories

The importance of childhood memories has been bombarding me lately.  First, the suggestion by a careful listener to my book that my characters needed to be softened through their childhood memories, then bird by bird underlining the importance of conjuring up the past as a writing exercise, and then, finally, listening to The Perks of Being a Wallflower on our car ride to Oregon, paying special attention to how the protagonist recalls his own childhood woven seamlessly together with his present.

So, sitting in the car with my husband, brother, and sister, caravanning with the other half of our family in the car in front of us, headed toward what is a yearly family retreat up on the Oregon coast, I decided there was no better place to conjure up the past.  As a way to pass the time, I asked everyone to share the first childhood memory that came to mind, then we dug deeper, and deeper, until finally the memories were flowing, randomly associated to the ones before, bouncing us all around the sharp and smooth corners of our childhoods.

Thinking back on my own experiences, I realized my memories are already blurred.  It is hard to distinguish between fact and fiction, between what really happened, what I was told happened, and what I probably picked up from some other stories somewhere along the way.  Throughout the past couple weeks, I have been reading Milan Kundera’s The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, which while often scattered, is also layered with the complexity of memory and how it propels us forward, even when blurred around the edges.

I’ll leave you with the first blurry memory that came to me playing this game in the car.  I invite you try the same thing with those you love or as a writing exercise.  You might find something important buried deep inside yourself, something worth remembering.

***

For a short period of time following my parents’ divorce, we lived with my aunt deep in the eastern foothills of California.  Maybe it was not that deep, but as a child it felt like it.  We were easily thirty minutes outside Placerville, which is really only a small town itself.  To reach Sacramento probably took about an hour and a half, although time is warped in childhood, so maybe it was not quite as far as I remember.  Regardless, it was a different world than my brother and I were used to.

In order to reach her house, you had to drive down a long dirt road that was covered in frogs during the late spring, precious little croaking green things that would get stuck in the tires, smashed flat across the dusty road, or worse yet, squashed unwillingly beneath your bare feet.  There were no other houses within eyesight, only trees and the kind of pond any kid would dream about.  Galoshes were a necessity for traversing the muddy banks, and a huge Border Collie, German Shepard, perhaps even Saint Bernard, mix of a dog named Muttly followed us around, keeping close eye on everything we did.

Save for the occasional encounter with a coiled, ticking rattle snake, it was a childhood heaven.  I can still smell the dusty, dry, hot earth in summer, taste all the treats my mom protested so much in the sugar drawer, feel the icy cold water of the swimming pool on my face.  But what stands out more than my tough aunt taking a shovel to a rattle snake or me coercing feral kittens to love me or watching chicks hatch or bottle feeding baby sheep was an evening spent with my dad on the steps of the wooden deck, staring up at the summer stars through a break in the large oak trees.

That night, my dad held my brother and me close, and told us to absorb this moment because it would soon pass.  I remember sitting there, just eight years old, loving my dad so much, sensing the sadness in his acute awareness of the brevity of life.  Of course, this same awareness was lacking in me then, but it was his insistence on how important that moment was that forced me to scrunch my little face together and force the memory of those stars and his love for us deep inside my brain.  To this day, this is the strongest recollection of my childhood.

New family memories in Bandon, OR

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Jul 23 2012
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Family, Life, Travel

It’s Not an Adventure Until You Get Lost

Heading the wrong direction south on I-5 tonight with no exit to turn around for miles, I reminded myself that it’s all part of the adventure.  In the past 36 hours I have flown from Lihue to Honolulu to Oakland, driven from Oakland to Sacramento, and then from Sacramento to Mt. Shasta and then Ashland.  Needless to say, I’m ready for a week of relaxation on the Oregon coast, but I’m also trying to make the most out of the time spent getting places, even when lost.

That’s the thing I’ve noticed lately, time is moving faster, and faster, and faster.  The prospect of this only accelerating is frightening.  Hawaii was gone in a second, Oregon will likely be too, I’m realizing that life is way too short to spend impatient, ever.  So, each moment I catch myself wanting to get to the next thing, I stop and remind myself that there is something worthwhile in every moment, even if it is just laughter, a little lesson, or time to reflect.  Besides, knowing where you’re going all the time can be pretty boring, both in travel and in life.

A stolen moment along the route to Ashland today, the headwaters in Mt. Shasta have a beautiful little labyrinth trail filled with streams and a place you can actually drink water coming off the mountain.  My favorite spot is a small bridge that you can stop and dip your feet in the icy water.

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Jul 21 2012
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Health, Life, Travel, Writing

Life Beyond the Computer Screen

Yesterday, I took a break from blogging, my first since summer vacation started.  After reading “iCrazy” in Newsweek while lying on Tunnels Beach, one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, I realized I have become too dependent on the public approval fed through Facebook and WordPress, the notifications popping up in little dopamine doses on my smart phone.

While I rationalize that blogging is at least part of my mission in establishing myself as a writer, the reality is that it has also become part of my greater addiction to the internet.  The number of likes and new follows either negatively or positively affects my mood after posting, (not to mention the compulsive checking of my inbox for feedback).  My solution, forced breaks, turned off email notifications, and only checking my blog when I post new material.

In just 48 hours of silence, I’ve already noticed that not receiving email notifications to my phone has made a huge difference.  Not knowing what activity I am receiving is better than the high or low of immediate reinforcement.  I no longer have the urge to pick up my phone every two minutes.  In fact, I left my phone off all day today and yesterday, save for checking for voicemails and text messages once in the morning and once in the evening.

Taking a day off blogging was also nicer than I thought, as I resisted the urge to complete my daily ritual.  That’s the thing, even on vacation, I derive satisfaction from the exercise of blogging, I am just trying to move away from it being an obsession.  So far, giving myself a little space is making it feel a lot less compulsive.  Best of all, a break made me hyper-aware of how often I think about being online or checking my inbox.  It was more often than I like to admit.  However, the more time I let pass, the less often I had the urge.

The important life reminder– I value time spent disconnected.  A big motivation in becoming a teacher was creating a life where I was not connected to a computer for work all day.  I have to remind myself this as I dive head first into the world of writing, an evolving world shrouded in technology.  If any of this resonates with you, I recommend reading the article linked above, although I’m not suggesting that it is a problem for everyone.

A few pictures below to remind you how beautiful life can be beyond the computer screen.  I look forward to reconnecting with you all next time I post!

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Jul 19 2012
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Life, Travel

The Real Hawaii

I’d like to think I’m not an obnoxious traveler.  I like it all– cheap, luxury, anything in between.  Today we discovered the real Hawaii.  Not the resort or the places made to manufacture an experience.  Instead, we ate where locals eat, snorkeled at public beaches, shopped in a gritty little town where surf clothing was actually on sale instead of marked up for tourists.  We even discovered a hostel on the beach with beds for $27 a night.  No, we did not stay, but the fact that such a place exists is pretty awesome.

Sometimes I get tired of the glossy, clean, perfect version of travel.  I would have a hard time staying at an all-inclusive resort where I did not step foot off the property.  I want to know how people live in different places, I want to meet to them, to talk with them.  I especially like discovering places that are gritty, down-to-earth, without pretenses.  I get a thrill out of enjoying food that is both delicious and cheap.  Somewhere I can stand in line and actually start a conversation with someone that is not also from California.

I got my wish.  These pictures will share my finds better than my words.

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Jul 18 2012
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Life, Travel

It Did Not Rain on Our Parade

A rainy day, three tropical storms somewhere far away.  But that’s okay.  It did not rain on our parade.  The rain was beautiful and warm, leaving little waterfalls trickling down the mountainsides. Time to explore Hanalei Town, hike between downpours, and enjoy the evening at the pool, clouds parting to a stunning, setting sun.

Proof it only rains on your parade if you let it.

Ephemeral waterfall running off the mountain from the rain.

Hard-earned sunset in the pool.

New fruit adventures… The one on the left was really stinky and weird, we don’t know what it’s called.

Dragon fruit tastes just like kiwi, delicious.

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Jul 16 2012
9 Comments
Life, Travel

Permission to Enjoy Life

This afternoon I had the good fortune to lay out on the beach of the St. Regis in Princeville, Kauai. If my husband and I were traveling alone, we’d be kicking it a lot more low-key, but we are fortunate to have family that invites us places.  Absorbing all of the opulence around me, I could not help but understand why people strive for wealth. As a teacher of low-income kids, I will be the first to proclaim wealth and happiness are not the same thing, but sometimes a bit of splendor can be pretty alluring.

Anchored out in the bay was an impressive yacht, complete with its own helicopter parked on back. The St. Regis staff told us it belongs to the owner of Budweiser, whoever that might be. What a different world from the rest of us on this planet.  While a yacht is more than I would wish for, it still struck me as a very interesting contrast.

Back during the school year, on days that were particularly challenging, I would imagine myself lying on the beach in Kauai, and everything else would be fine.  The fact that I could have this fantasy and really live it out provides a different, but also very real contrast between the relative prosperity of middle-ish class America and the poverty that exists in our country.  While I may feel like a have-less when I look at the truly wealthy, I am a have-a-darn-lot when compared with much of the world.

What I am trying to work on is transforming the guilt that sometimes accompanies this disparity into an extreme gratitude that I am as lucky as I am.  As I was sitting there thinking about the differences in worlds between myself and the people on the boat, as well as myself and the students in my classroom, I finally had to just tell my mind to shut up and enjoy it.  Life is short, we work for a better world, but we should also give ourselves permission to enjoy whatever good comes our way.

I’m on a boat and I’m going fast and…

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Jul 16 2012
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Health, Life, Travel

Wanderlust vs. Sleep

It’s my little tradition to wake up early in Hawaii and run on the beach.  Our resort is perched up on a bluff, so I had to get creative.  The people at the front desk warned us not to take the public access trail to the beach at the entrance of our resort.  I figured they just wanted it for themselves, so of course, that is where I had to run.

At 5AM, like clockwork, my eyes opened, not accustomed to the time change.  Fighting the urge to just lie there, I pushed myself out the door, reaching the dirt trail by 6AM.  At first, I was a little nervous, reading all the signs warning me of danger, suddenly alone in a canopy of trees. Determined to keep going, I carefully maneuvered down the steep, muddy slope, and discovered a glorious little beach.

So glorious, in fact, a few smart campers have their tents protected beneath the thick tree branches, waking up to this amazing view.  I startled a bohemian sort of man, meditating alone at the base of the trail, his canoe and tent behind him.  Or, maybe he startled me. Either way, he has the best front yard on earth.

Jogging on the beach, I let a passing rain storm drench me, smiling with my face pointed to the sky.  My wanderlust restored, I reveled in life.  Sleep is tempting, yes, but nothing beats an early morning outing, alone, on the beach.

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