"Is that an editable Jesus?!” -Rob, 2/27/06 “I meant EDIBLE.” -Rob “That’s not any better.” -Peter, 3/2/06
—work, hahahahaha
"And if you hold on tight / do what you think is your thing / you may find you're missing all the rest"
—DMB
March 9, 2006, pt. 2
TIME FOR AN UPDATE (or Two), part deux
see previous part of the update <<PREV
Mmmmkay, part two. First I should explain that I am NOT being bad by updating. There is seriously NO WORK that can be done right now. I sent all of my projects off to people, at which point they promptly disappeared into the Black Hole of Client Approval. Oh goody. OK back on track.
So what hath transpired since my last update? Many things. One, Jeff got an awesome job, and I probably shouldn't say where. He is very happy though. YAAAY. Two, I saw Stephie, she is so cute with her tiny belly! YAAAY babies. And YAAAY Stephie. Last night I dreamt she was moving to Madison. Wow, too good to be true. So clearly that WAS a dream hahahaha. Three, Jenny started her new job in Chicago. She is already beloved by all I am sure. Four, my mom came up and I got a better table. YAAAY nice table. Five, um, not sure there is a five. Well Diana bought me dinner last night, so that was pretty sweet. Yeah.
So. Something happened this Monday night. No, something good, don't worry. So I finally went back to volunteering, no, not the mentoring part, the helping Somali kids with their homework thing. It's a gig I picked up in my whole 'soul-or-whatever-search-2005' thing. Yeah, we know how that turned, or didn't as the case may be, out, but whatever. The good news is what I picked up from it, which is this Somali thang.
The good thing is that I felt IT. What is IT you might want to know. That sounds really stupid and cliched but I'm being honest here. IT is what I felt on the good nights when I was coaching. IT is what I felt when I was hopped up on adrenaline and excitement because I was teaching someone something. IT is what it is that makes me so certain of my love for kids and encouraging them that I thought I would be a gymnastics coach forever. IT is something that makes me feel totally alive.
(Note, not that my job isn't awesome. And I am not sure I could really be a teacher at all, or a coach for that matter. In fact, let's get into that for a minute: why DID I quit coaching? There are a few reasons, the foremost being I wanted to feel like I was DOING something with my degree. Another being I HATE that gyms are rife with politics. Another was the psycho parents, uggghhh. And another is that I want to make more than $10/hr. and get some businesslike respect, which sounds like selling out, which it is. Hey, I want to live a stable life. These are also reasons I hesitate to consider teaching, which is bad but true. Instead I tutor. More later.)
I was tutoring this kid we call MJ (I can't pronounce any of their names, I should work on that) and his friend. For some reason I always end up teaching math, which is good because for some OTHER reason none of the other tutors 'get' math. Like, fractions. OK, now I'm being a Smarty Pants Snob and a bitch to boot. Sorry. Anyway, also tutoring writing is sooooo frustrating, math is much easier to explain I find. So. Anyway.
So I don't know if MJ rushes or what, but there were several errors in his 'completed' HW. I don't like just telling them what to do, so I asked if he wanted to fix his errors and get his HW right. The best part is that he WANTED to. I loved him for this. Yeah, he tried to rush through it, but he still WANTED to do that. How often do you find this in regular schooling situations? From my experience with certain spoiled brats in the coaching world, not very often. Someone who truly wants to do well just for the sake of doing so.
That's when I felt IT, and that's why I felt so great. It was so much fun working with him and I got to be my old 'coaching' self, where I'm bossing and teasing and shouting and motivating all at once. Even with Math, seriously. Yeah it's very weird and now I sound like a total freak. But it's true. And it was there.
This might not mean anything, and it might just be a side bonus for kickin' it with the Somali kids. But to me, that night, it meant something, and felt like a sign of some sort (you know how I love signs). I felt like I had come 'home', in the metaphorical sense of the word. And it made me happy.
We'll just see where this all goes, if anywhere at all. It's just good to know I can consider other possibilities, even as entrenched in my 'career' as I seemingly am at times. You just never know, right? In the meantime, happy March, and if you read this whole thing, you are amazing!
—Lexi