Katherine today. I'm having a good time. I've fired off the appropriate understanding-but-threatening emails to DPS Alternative Licensure teachers who have to finish all the paperwork the Colorado Department of Education requires by this coming Thursday. It's a daunting task. A lot of trees die for Alternative Licensure. These teachers jump through inordinate hoops to meet state standards while meeting the demands of their students, schools and communities. I've coached them and been their best cheerleader all year long. They are tired. So am I. Today is a good day because it is the day I smell summer. I feel like Doug in Dandelion Wine. I feel like he felt when he heard that first lawn mower. I'm so close to being done I can taste it. I'm having a good time.
I hesitate to reveal what I'm doing right now, but I will. Jim is off deck-building with Bud and I'm enjoying a rare day alone in my house. That alone is a happy thing. I adore J., but I have my own guilty pleasures that are much happier experienced without his keen wit ready to point out the absurdity/silliness/cuteness/etc. of my behavior. Don't take me wrong--he has his own guilty pleasures--Rudy, for instance. It comes out even in most ways--he can watch Rudy and any number of incredibly depressing movies and I can watch Cleopatra and all the National Park shows on the Travel Channel. We just need to alone when we indulge in these pleasures.
The only problem here is that my time alone is pretty darn limited. Jim has plenty. I go off into teacher-land (only two weeks more) and he works at home--he writes, he takes care of the yard and the house and the food. He is wonderful. But if he wants to take the morning off and watch Rudy, well-he can.
Today is my day to watch my version of Rudy. It's equally embarrassing and I"m sorry if Rudy is your thing, but it just reminds me of the old Waltons TV show and Little House on The Prairie --fire, blindness, poverty and shortness, etc.--all set up to make me cry. Jim likes Rudy. I resent Rudy; It's best we don't watch together. I love Cleopatra (Gladiator, Spartacus--any movie with men in skirts unless Mel Gibson is involved). It's best we don't watch together.
I'm watching my recently recorded HD versions of my two favorite National Park Travel Channel specials today. One covers Grand Teton National Park and the other is about Yellowstone. Soon I'll watch what Samantha Brown has to say about Belize. Summer is coming and I'm going places that will restore me and make me believe in some things. I'll feel connected with the earth. I'll remember that somehow the world will not come to an end despite the battles between Democrats and Republicans and Tea Partiers and all the other factionists--Mayan ruins have a way of doing that. Summer means going outdoors and bathing in the woods. Summer is the beach off San Pedro in Belize. Summer is fasting from the news.
We go to Wyoming for two weeks each summer. We stay in the Tetons and go into Jackson several days each visit. I've just watched my Yellowstone recording and I'm thinking I'd like to make it the whole two weeks without entering civilization at all. I can probably convince Jim just because I couldn't buy any cowboy boots at The Boot Legger in Jackson that way. I have four pair of boots from Jackson. They are all truly wonderful. A girl can never have enough cowboy boots so I think he'd appreciate the sacrifice. Mostly, I just want to really get away from even the civilization that Jackson represents. Dornan's at the edge of the park would be my limit--it has a grocery store and a liquor store and gasoline. That should keep us going.
The Teton recording is up next. I have to pay attention there. This is what I watch to dream. It's my version of running away from home. The show will highlight trails we hike and vistas we know by heart. My heart will soar because we will be there soon. We will be in Belize sooner. I'm having a good time.
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Reading this was like reading summer's arrival: I could feel the peace and satisfaction, the restfulness in it. It feels good.
This made me laugh: " I love Cleopatra (Gladiator, Spartacus--any movie with men in skirts unless Mel Gibson is involved)." I'm with you! Ewan McGregor has shown up in a couple of films in his kilts, and it has been a quality experience.
About this: "These teachers jump through inordinate hoops to meet state standards while meeting the demands of their students, schools and communities. I've coached them and been their best cheerleader all year long."
Good on you! I was one who did not make it through the gauntlet that Alternative Teacher Licensure requires. Yes, I had an MA from UCD in Curriculum and Instruction of all things plus over 10 years of teaching experience at the time I was teaching in a public school on an emergency license and looking into it, but all of my degrees and experience was still not enough: not enough things in the right areas for me to not do additional coursework at additional cost to me, and I did not have the heart (this was in the early days of NCLB, too -- 2002-2003) to actually go through with it. As a result, I wholeheartedly admire & respect the people who do it, and those who help them. Had you been my mentor for the program, though, I would have reconsidered. :) Anyway, things work out the way they are supposed to, I like to think, and while I may not work for the public education system as a teacher, I contribute in other ways. You have done much -- you deserve a break!
Finally, I think it is wonderful that you and Jim have separate interests and the time to pursue them (even if right now he's getting more of that time than you are). It's important to have that. I cracked up about all you wrote on "Rudy." Yeah, I have a tendency to avoid movies like that unless I am really in a mood to get all sad and weepy. The only exception is "Dead Poets Society." Even though it is a real downer during certain portions of the movie, I can watch it again and again. I'm glad you have had time to watch some of the things you like. Enjoy.
(Not so "finally" I guess...) Last but not least: your upcoming adventures sound like they are going to be amazing, and I can't wait to read the posts with yours and Jim's impressions! What a good time this is right now. You are in that looking-forward mode to the cool things that will happen! There is nothing better than being on the cusp of just-before-summer (and all it entails), when anticipation is at its peak. That's living!!
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