Never Ever Dull
With every conversation, I always seem to end with "Never a dull moment"....our lives are rich, complex, and beautiful stories. Join me in laughing about everyday things and appreciating life-bumpy roads and all.
Recently, we were searching for something to watch on tv and stumbled upon the Olympic marathon trials. It was amazing to see the determination marked on the chiseled faces as they pounded those 26.2 miles in hopes of making the cut for this summer's Olympic games. I admired each runner for their preparation and passion for this goal. I really do admire those athletes. I respect them. But they don't make my list of heroes that I keep a running list of in my brain. My heroes look different. They're not always adults.. They're not always people who have it all figured out. But I look up to each of them. Here a few I'd like to share with you: The parents who have been told their child has "problems". I've walked with some parents as they struggle with the diagnosis they were given in a doctor's office behind closed doors. Difficult words to hear and digest, but yet...those parents dig deep and decide to give their precious one the best possible life. No matter how challenging that can be at times. The mom who hears that she has cancer. She tries to process the meaning of it all. Even as she works through that, she smiles and is thankful for what she's got. She laughs more with her family, hugs them tighter than ever before, and sees rainbows in the raindrops. The man who realizes what an abusive home he was raised in...and wants to break those chains that have had him bound.. Searching and asking tough questions of himself, he begins to share bits and pieces and knows there is healing in telling his story. The college girl who deals with anxiety attacks and chooses to be transparent. The heart speeds up and she could remain quiet and handle it herself, but she chooses to let her closest friends know this internal battle so that she can fight it and be victorious. The child who notices that she might be different from her classmates but she opts to acknowledge her weaknesses and not let that hold her back. When she hits a bump in the road, she raises her hand and simply says, "I need help." She pushes through no matter what anyone thinks. Because of her example, it's given every one of my littles the strength to ask for help when they don't get what I'm teaching. Just some of my heroes. I have many. I think we'd all have a running list if we just took the time to hear what a person is overcoming. Take the time to find a hero this week....you might be surprised at how incredible his or her story really is.
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It was her turn to share on Wednesday mornings. Typically, she brings in an object to show our class. This day was different. She stood up and told all of us sitting in the circle that she had a special announcement: Ms. Flowers is coming over to my house....because I'm giving her a makeover. I nodded my head and smiled. The students looked at me puzzled.. I came to the rescue and explained, "You see, I realized I need to add some fun clothes to my wardrobe. And since her mom sells clothes, I thought I'd get her to help me." To my amazement, all my littles began to chatter. I heard comments: Yea, she always wears the same thing....she never wears anything with color...everyday she has on silver earrings. I listened and found myself glancing down at my outfit. True, I do wear lots of black and white and grays...and I touched my earrings. Yep, they were silver ones alright. I went home and stared at my closet of clothing. Everything was black, white, and gray. My students were right. My clothes were boring and lacked some spice. I guess they had been paying more attention to my attire than I had been. I started having visions of that show "What Not to Wear" or those fashion magazine layouts of women with black rectangles over their faces. The ones showing you how bad a particular outfit is on a person. It was clear that I was in need of a transformation. I shared the reality of the situation to my little student who had volunteered for this task. She piped up, "At my house, we have lots of patterns and bright colors. This is going to be so much fun!" She skipped away giggling. How would all this turn out?! I arrived Friday afternoon for the biggest homework project this little kid had ever had: How do you give some style and fun...to your teacher? No worries. My little fashionista matched crazy leggings with patterned tops that I never ever would have dreamed of putting together. Polka dots matched with stripes and patterns?! My head was spinning, but my student never gave up, saying "we can brighten you up!". She did. So...watch out! I didn't select the leggings with planets (I felt that might make me feel like Ms. Frizzle) or the leggings with the buffalo (love my four legged animals but I felt a bit strange wearing them), but I did purchase items that will definitely add pizzazz to the ol' wardrobe. Mmmmhmmm. I survived the transformation due to all of my petite fashionista's encouragement. I can't wait for Monday to enter Room 3126 and show off the "new me"...just to see the look on the faces of all my students and especially my little fashion consultant =) Sometimes, you have to enlist the help of the ones you work with...even if it's a third grader! I'm getting a lot of phone calls from my Oldest. And it really is a good thing. After mentioning her in a couple of blogs as always texting me, she's gone over and beyond to ensure I get phone calls.
But it's not just the calls. It's our conversations that have me smiling; This week, for example, I ended our call simply stunned. We started out chatting about her second "blizzard" in Tennessee. She was totally caught off guard and didn't even get the chance to rush to the store to get her necessary supplies (NerdsRopes). She awoke to texts from her boss telling her she could stay home if her roads were in poor condition. The Oldest couldn't comprehend what he was talking about and stumbled on to work. A mini-blizzard occurred causing two days of no school for that area. She had no clue that a snow storm was in the forecast. I knew I had to come clean. So, I shared my story of my experience with Hurricane Hugo. I was right out of college and living in south Charlotte with one of my favorite camp and college friends, Mary Len. I was having a great time and totally unaware of local or world news worthy stories. My parents knew me well and gave me a call to alert me to the approaching Category 4 storm with a direct path to Charlotte. I had this. I went to the store and purchased a box of band-aids and some batteries for our little portable tv. Just like my Oldest, I awoke to a phone call (no texting back in da day) from my roommate's boss. I tried to sound like I was really awake as I told him that I'd let Mary Len know that he'd call and for her to stay home. I couldn't turn on any lights because our power had gone out at some point. I crept through our apartment in the pitch black to tell Mary Len to keep on sleeping. Like me, she was unaware of what was happening. Together, we pried open our mini blinds peering out into what looked like an eerie scene from a bad B rated horror movie: roofs peeled back, chimneys tossed all over the parking lot, trees down and power lines looking like spaghetti noodles. Mary Len and I decided to turn on our battery operated tv to get the scoop on what was happening out there. I'll never forget hearing: "And after the break, we'll have stunning footage of Charlotte". It was at that point that our 4 inch tv's picture began to slowly shrink. The batteries were dying. The screen went black. I guess we should not have watched all those episodes of Andy Griffith the night before trying out the new batteries. . And those band-aids? Who really needs a 3-inch band aid when trees are dropping all around you? My Oldest laughed as she completely connected with my story. It was late and I needed to get some sleep. I told my Oldest that I needed to go and dry my hair. She said she did too. We both had been on the phone for an hour with wet hair. I told her I needed to work up the energy to get off my bed to dry my hair. "Same" said my Oldest. Neither one of us spoke as we both paused in awe of all the similarities between the two of us. I was stunned. Miles apart, but we're still so similar. I think that's a good thing...most of the time. =) People seem to always feel better about their own lives when I share a bit about my own. Is that good or bad....?! So, I'm keeping it real and hoping you feel awesome about your life after reading! KazKid: My middle schooler got his 2nd semester schedule and realized he had Chinese as an elective. Ugh. How did he get Chinese? We hadn't signed him up for that when we registered. Since KazKid already knows Kazak, Russian, and Spanish, I thought I would try to get it switched to Spanish even though he had missed the whole first semester. That way, he'd continue with one language and earn high school credit at the same time. Sounds simple enough, right? It took a trip or two to his school, many emails to administrators, phone calls, and documentation of previous Spanish coursework to make this happen. Finally, the switch occurred. After his first day in Spanish, I eagerly asked him how it went. His response: I only understood one word in that class. Oh, great. *** TheSeriousAthlete: I try to make every event I can. It's not always possible, but I try. Wednesday's meet was postponed to Thursday due to the forecast of 100% rain with 70 degree temperatures. The next day was gray with really cold temps and even a bit of snow in the forecast but the meet would go on. I got a text from TheSeriousAthlete that he was on the bus headed to the meet. Following my after school duties, I grabbed my belongings, rushed out the door of my classroom, and headed to the meet. It was pouring. I checked my cell to see if the meet had been cancelled. No messages. I park, find my umbrella, and dodge the massive puddles/ponds to the track. I hadn't missed his race. I share my umbrella with the huddle of sweet high school girls who are shivering (their track uniforms remind me of what I wore in my ballet and toe classes with Mrs. Harris minus the tights). I let the water drip off the umbrella unto my back because I felt it was more important to cover these trembling people. My son gets ready to race. Thunder occurs and the rain comes pelting down., winds bending the trees, reminding me of a scene from the Weather Channel's hurricane week. There's no reason to pull out my camera or cell because I can't even see my son. I think I saw a blue blur pass by me (I was even standing on the track! The areas off the track were deep with mud.). The race ended but I couldn't see him due to the massive amounts of rain coming down. He found me and of course, we stayed to cheer on the final competitors. I think I felt my toes four or five hours later. The Blonde: Pretty much like clockwork, the Blonde gives me a jingle as she walks back to her dorm from her classes. Lately, the conversations have all been about the sciences. She's considering switching from a biochem major to ....biology, chemistry, oceanography, ecology...anything with an -ology or an -agraphy stuck on the end. My brain is always spinning during our chats. How many -ology sciences could there be? She wants to take them all. Why not?!! =) The Oldest; I don't get as many calls from the Oldest. She likes to text. So when I saw she had left a voicemail, I thought it would be urgent. The voicemail: Mom, my roommates don't believe that I grew a sweet potato that was so big that we took it to C-ville Market to weigh it. Can you please confirm this so they'll believe me? Sensing the urgency of her plight, I shot back a text: To all Hannah's Nashville roomies: It is true. Back in our homeschooling days, we tried a plethora of things-from dissecting snakes that our cat brought to us as presents (what?!) to incubating baby chickies. In that mix, Hannah did grow a sweet potato. It started in a glass of water on our windowsill...and then we plopped it into our garden (which we of course had composted!-go, homeschoolers!). We forgot about it until late fall. We almost needed a bulldozer to get it out of the ground (kidding), but it was big. We took it to a local market and weighed it. It did weigh 8 pounds. True story. The end. Just a glimpse of what really happens in my sweet little family in a week's time.. ***KazKid took a Spanish quiz on Friday. He was the first to finish...within minutes (that could be good or that could be bad....). He made a 100. I sincerely thank the Lord for Google Translate. |
AuthorFun-loving mom to 4 kids and 1 big puppy. Fifth grade teacher of amazing little people who have never ending things to share with me. Love to discuss Jesus, diy projects, and life. Trying to keep it simple: Love Jesus, love people. Archives
December 2021
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