November 10, 2004

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  i've been wanting to blog for a while now, but there's just so MUCH that i've been too overwhelmed to update... so let me just give you some reese's pieces (that was a nickname i had in junior high--the "reese" comes from the theresa in crystal theresa).
  
  
  1) work. 
  
  i think the 9+ hour day is starting to burn me out again.  thank goodness there are no classes tomorrow!  i am sick again.  i've been getting sick once a month, so far, but this time it isn't so bad--i guess my immune system is starting to adjust to the myriad of germs pummeling my body.  sometimes i wish this school was year round. 
  
  this week i started planning out activities for the extended care kids, mostly because some of them would be there from 12:45-5pm.  they worked on "all about me" books and Thanksgiving Cards (i drew a turkey in parts--tail feathers, head & neck, beak, 2 weeks, 2 legs & feet, that thing that hangs from the beak, and the body in 4 parts--they colored, cut, & pasted) in which they wrote to someone thanking them.  today i but up a bulletin board (consisting of blue butcher-ish paper and those wavy borders, in yellow) for the extended care kids, which said "Happy Thanksgiving" on the top and "from Extended Care" on the bottom.  I stapled their cards up and hopefully there will be more up next week as more kids make them. 
  
  For the older kids I drew a still life thing of fruit in some bowl-platter-thing in a 4x4 grid.  I'm going to have each of them draw one square and the plan is to collage them together, kinda like a mosaic or quilt. 
  
  the sixth graders also had a service project today.  we cleaned up the neighborhood around St. Charles.  some high-and-low-lights include students fighting over who gets to sweep up the garbage, a couple syringes, broken glass, condoms, diarrhea, and one girl saying, "Why do people litter?  It's so rude!"
  
  
  2) home. 
  
  so a pipe from our kitchen sink is leaking down our downstairs neighbor's closet door, which means that we haven't used our kitchen sink all week. 
  
  the intercom is malfunctioning, as in when you push the button to "listen" you hear a really loud and high pitched "eeeeep!" 
  
  there is something wrong with my bedroom doorknob.  you know that thing that sticks out of the edge and moves in and out when you turn the knob?  it doesn't move out anymore, so our door doesn't click shut--as in you can just push it with your pinky and it will open. 
  
  but!  our gas heater, aside from the slightly creepy sound of creaking metal, works wonderfully, and I do enjoy having a BEDROOM, digital cable (it's more manageable when divided by three), and the quiet of the neighborhood.
  
  
  3) me.
  
  i'm writing just about everyday, again, which feels really good.  i was in a slump for a while--i think mainly because i was still adjusting to my work schedule and taking a break from the college burnout.  i started by reading on my bus rides to and from work--The Poisonwood Bible--which is a good book, except for the last chapter.  and then when i was going to read another book, i realized that i didn't feel like reading any of the books i head, so i started writing on my bus rides. 
  
  i've been eating healthier since i'm on foodstamps now--you can't use your ebt card at fast food places =P.  actually fast food makes me feel sick when i eat it now, so i try to keep my intake to a minimum.  it's fun packing myself snacks and lunches, though sometimes i don't get up early enough (like when i'm not feeling too well).  the good thing is that i can buy a snack for $1 (a mini croissant ham & cheese sandwich, a bowl of hot chicken noodle soup, a bowl of cereal and milk, and a grilled cheese sandwich are some of the things they offer) and later lunch for $1 (spaghetti, lumpia, fried rice, chicken adobo with rice, and a corn dog are some things they have for lunch).
  
  when i was at USF a couple of my professors told me that i would make a good teacher.  today the third grade teacher asked me if i was going to be a teacher, and i said that i might, and she said, "i think that's your calling."  and maybe it is because teaching was never something i wanted to do, but for over a year, that's what i've been ending up doing: the poetry and art workshops with high school students,  tutoring the basketball players, and now working with elementary school students.  and in all of these situations, i've been working with at-risk students, or "at-hope," as the facilitator at one of my workshops said.  my first semester with the poetry/art workshops was with students transitioning out of juvie and the second semester was with teenage mothers; the basketball players are the first in their families to attend college, some even to finish school--they have siblings and friends in gangs and in jail, and one has a cousin on death row.  now i am working at a title I, inner city school with a lot of students who are below grade level in a lot of their subjects, who have problems with their families, and who have social problems.  but sometimes i just get so frustrated and feel so helplessly ineffective that i just want to walk out and sit sulking in some dark corner.  but goodness, seeing them finally understand a concept, watching their behavior improve, and earning their trust creates such a tremendous feeling it's like i'm gonna burst.  and then, i can't imagine doing anything else.

  • 11:31 pm
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