I motioned to the gentleman who had just congratulated Lincoln Public Schools for receiving recognition from NAMM for being one of the best Communities for Music Education.   I just wanted to introduce myself because I had “met” him through email and wanted to put a face with his name.  As we were talking, he gestured towards the seats filled with teachers coming back to prepare for school beginning on Monday and said, “you know, not every place is like this”, to which I replied, yes I know. But he looked at me again and said, “seriously, not every place is like this.” 

As I looked around the room full of people excited to be back at school, I was reminded that where I work is a special place.  Look, teaching can be ridiculously stressful, exhausting, and thankless.  And yet, here they were, laughing and talking with each other, enjoying the learning and looking forward to beginning the new year with students.  I love that I get to work with these people and that when things get really crazy during the year we can vent and laugh and cry together.

Have you ever looked back at your life and realized, that in that moment, not every place is like this?  Those are the times when you think about how lucky you were, or how special it was or how amazing the people were.  The stars that aligned at just the right time to allow you to experience something really extraordinary.  Sometimes we allow the everyday mundane or busyness to overshadow what may end up becoming some of the most memorable times of our lives. 

I’m not talking about those milestones in our lives – graduations, marriages, births – but those situations or activities with those special groups of people that can change who we are or even the trajectory of our lives.  My high school and college band experiences, the boards and committees I’ve been fortunate to serve on, the school district I’ve been lucky to work for.  Meeting and working for and with amazing people who change the way you think about life and about yourself.  The people who teach you those core character traits and those life skills that you carry with you the rest of your life.  The people who see you in ways you never see yourself and encourage you to step out to do things you never thought you could.

So much of it depends on great leadership and yesterday was the perfect example.  The reason where I work is different than other places, I believe, is because of its leadership.  The kind of leadership that walks beside people, that challenges and encourages, and provides what people need in order to learn and grow.

Does this happen intentionally or is it truly just the stars aligning with the right people at the right time?  Perhaps it’s a little of both, when you get a visionary leader who builds intentional relationships with people.  Whatever it is, I’m grateful for those people and experiences and so glad to be in a place that’s different in a very good way.  

2021 has been an interesting year so far, at times full of frustration, and at other times full of hope and possibilities.  It was dealing with grief and loss, not just human, but of freedom as well.  A time of change, some planned, some anything but planned and while there were also amazing blessings along the way, I knew that my well had run dry.  

Some may refer to this as the need to fill their bucket or fill up their gas tank. Constant work had become a lifestyle, something to “brag” about, to try to impress people with my productivity.  I’m used to working hard and committing to what I’m working on; I blame my band director, who insisted we be at every rehearsal on time, stay as late as it took and push through things like pain, lack of sleep, sunburn, and even sickness to get the job done.  I don’t mean to sound like this was a bad thing really, as we played as hard as we worked, and I learned a lot of life lessons from this which have served me well.  But in the last ten years or so of my life, busyness has taken its toll, even though I know better.

This year and a half has been a roller coaster, with many ups and downs.  New jobs and responsibilities and a lot of work that I committed to.  So much work that I have found myself working on my computer up to 13-14 hours per day and then working on weekends as well.  On top of trying to keep up with the house as I had time and schedule the occasional time with family and friends.  After all, this wasn’t hard work.  It wasn’t like I was doing any heavy lifting or manual labor.  And I had work.  Some people I knew didn’t have work.  I had no worries about money or where I was going to live or if I had food to eat.  No, life was great, except all I was doing was working for others.

So it was no surprise when this past spring I found myself sinking into that familiar dark hole, getting up every morning, smiling through work and going home to work.  A planned vacation in the late spring did little to alleviate the work as I was still doing more output than input.  The idea of “running away to find myself” kept creeping in my head, despite it sounding like a 60’s cliché.  I kept thinking of my parent’s and grandparent’s generations and thinking what a weeny butt I was.  So I kept working.  I took four days to get away on my own, did a zoom meeting, checked membership and emails every day and worked because I felt guilty if I didn’t.  I took a short vacation with my husband promising myself I wouldn’t work.  Oh well.  All that output and very little input. 

Until this week.  I did the unthinkable.  I cleared out two days to attend a leadership summit by myself where I couldn’t work on anything else.  I felt guilty just thinking about it, but in a fit of craziness, I actually paid money to attend this summit and the guilt of wasting the money was larger than the guilt of taking a couple of days away from work. So, for twelve hours I did nothing but sit and learn about something I wanted to learn about. Twelve hours of listening, taking notes and applying.  To everything.  Application to myself, to my school work, to my association work.  The creativity flowed, the ideas flourished, the excitement grew.  My head cleared for the first time in a long time, I was able to remember an entire statement and write it down without looking at it 100 times.  Input.  Lots and lots of input. It only took twelve hours of intentional, focused input to begin some rejuvenation in my mind and soul.  

I have a friend who has worked with me on my strengths who reminds me that I’m a learner and that I need time to think.  You might think this would not be that big a deal, but anytime you work against your strengths it has to make a difference in how you function as a person.  I have been working against my strengths for a long time now and I shouldn’t be at all surprised that my mind and body are rebelling. 

There were some major takeaways from those twelve hours that sound easy but will take some major changes in my life.  It’s easy to talk balance, it’s hard to make it happen.  It’s all about making space in my life.  The best analogy was about building a fire.  Even if you layer all the right materials to build a fire, if you don’t leave space between the materials, it won’t be able to breath enough to allow the fire to start.  That time to breathe is not just for recuperating, but also for reflection to get those creative fires burning.  As a leader, it’s not only my job to work hard alongside others, but to model healthy behaviors as well.  

So now the hard part – application.  Sitting down to set up boundaries and finding more opportunities for input to balance the output.  I need to purposefully set up time for play and creativity, doing these things every bit as hard and with as much commitment as I do the work.  We were told that when we identify changes, that we change, and it moves us to action.  Here’s to hoping that I can identify all the changes that need to be made, begin to provide myself with more input and find my groove.

I have spent the last four days on a riverboat docked on the Missouri River.  Even though I have traveled by myself before, there has always been someone I know at my destination and so I’ve never been totally alone.  This time I purposefully chose a place I had never been, with people I have never met, having to make decisions about my day and not having it dictated by others.  I maybe shouldn’t say dictate, as I have chosen my current path and that path tends to dictate what I do each day.  That says a lot, doesn’t it?

Today was wonderful and today was a struggle.  I find great comfort in spending time alone with my thoughts and I have had plenty of alone time today.  For those of you who have done StrengthsFinder, my top five strengths are Deliberative, Learner, Ideation, Individualization and Input.  I need a lot of time to think.  But like those faculty meetings where you’re asked to brainstorm something fairly detailed in five minutes, my days are filled with questions and requests for quick answers and turnarounds and after a while, my brain says NO!  So the wonderful part of my day was that I was able to work on NMEA things sitting on the deck in an Adirondack chair looking over the river by myself.  Then I went for a walk by myself through the beautiful little town cemetery taking some great pictures.  Then I took a long drive by myself with the top down, winding around farms growing lush green corn and soybeans waving in the breeze.  The conversations in my head were mine alone.

After lunch, I went back to the boat, did a little work and took a nap.  When I woke up, not that I hadn’t thought about this before, I came to the realization that this was the last night by myself, a good thing because I miss my own bed and Doug of course, but sad because I really needed this time of quiet contemplation about life and it was about to end.  Time slowed down so much over the last four days to the point I would think it was time for dinner and it was only 2:30 in the afternoon.  My days are usually so jam packed with “stuff” that I can easily work at my computer for 10 hours a day and time flies by.  And I’m exhausted.  But here, I eat when I’m hungry, I sleep when I’m tired, I do things when I want to do things.

I had planned to drive into the next town and grab dinner, and almost talked myself out of it, not wanting to leave the room.  Realizing how impractical that was, I finally got my stuff together and headed out to my car. On my way, I ran into the owner/innkeeper who asked how things were going and what I had done today.  We discovered on the first day that we both have a love for convertibles, and he was asking me questions about my car and telling me about his. Most people who come to the boat come on the weekends when there’s more to do in town.  I think he was concerned that I hadn’t enjoyed myself.  The conversation turned to why he decided to open a B&B on a riverboat.  He explained that he has run his dinner cruise for nearly 50 years but it wasn’t until 2003 that he decided to buy this riverboat and it wasn’t until 2009 that the rooms were completely renovated and ready to go.  All of this while he was working full time.  He smiled slightly, sharing his plans for the future of the boat, referring to them as his “last hurrah”.  Doing the quick math in my head, I’m thinking he’s at least 75 if not more and I see that even though he is retired from his “job” he is still pursuing his passion.  He talked about the flood that occurred a couple of years ago and the pandemic last year and shared that things had been rough.  But yesterday the power washer was out cleaning and the painter was out today painting and he’s making plans to move the boat to a higher, safer place soon.  He’s having his last hurrah on his terms despite the unexpected roadblocks that have come his way.

This was yet another well timed conversation with someone I didn’t know this week, and I found myself asking as I drove down the quiet two lane highway, what is my last hurrah?  What is that passion I work on even while I work at my “job(s)”?.  What is the thing I haven’t done for a long time because I haven’t given myself enough time to think?  The answer was obvious – it was writing.  The writing that hadn’t happened for a long time began again the second day and the stories are writing themselves, both last night and now again tonight.  Can’t tell you how much I’ve missed it.  And maybe, like the innkeeper and his last hurrah, maybe writing is mine.  Published or unpublished, doing it for myself, taking time to think and maybe, just maybe, getting others to think about and share ideas as well is all I want. 

I hit the ground running tomorrow morning with two meetings and getting things ready for upcoming events, and I’m a little afraid that I’ll pop right back into bad habits and end up having to dig myself out of the craziness I’ve brought upon myself again. I’m thinking that I might put a little water feature on the balcony to remind myself of the river, how it is bringing my passion back to life and perhaps setting into motion, my last hurrah.

The newly formed break in the river allows the water by the riverboat to be more calm while the river on the other side of the break flows swiftly by.  Apparently it’s to keep things from hitting the boat after a flood or heavy rain and keep the wakes down from other boats going up and down the river. I’ve heard that you can’t walk in the same river twice, which seems obvious, but as I watch, I see this log that has gotten stuck in the calmer waters by the boat come back over and over again, caught in the slowly swirling water, trapped by the manmade breaks to the side and front of it.  There are a couple of openings which allow the water to flow in and out, but it would take some force to make the log leave.  So it just keeps floating back and forth within the breaks with no chance to escape.  It’s safe, familiar and other than the occasional fish that jumps out of the water near it, there are no surprises.  It just keeps floating, back and forth, back and forth.

The last few days have been full of analogies and opportunities to reflect on the feelings, or rather, lack of feelings I’ve been experiencing for a while now.  Things that used to bring me joy and give me purpose are now just things I have to do or what is expected of me. I’ve always said that music is not what I do but is who I am, but for the last few years, except for the occasional little burst of excitement, music is the last thing I want to do.  I crave distance and silence, no longer wanting to sing, attend concerts, or even listen to music in my car.  It’s all I’ve known for so long that I don’t know what else to do and there is such shame for me to admit this to others in my field as I’m supposed to be a sort of spokesperson and I feel like a fraud.  It takes up so much of my time and sucks up so much of my mental energy that I find myself escaping into a screen.  Not to write, like I’m doing now, but to scroll mindlessly or play solitaire.  So, I’ve taken a little break to “find myself”.

While I would love to say that I have had a life changing epiphany in the last few days, I CAN say that there have some rays of light and realizations that I need to address.  First of all, I need to stop doing things because I perceive that others expect it.  I grew up with people who let me know loud and clear that no matter what I did or how hard I tried, it was never enough.  The perfect gift I planned so hard for, the degree or position I worked so hard to achieve was always turned into a comparison to something else greater than I had done or some detail I had left out.  Even at my age, with those people long gone, I still find myself doing things I don’t really want to do just so people will think well of me.  Sometimes these are friends who have stepped out to help me get where I think I want to be or do what I think I want to do and so there’s the guilt feeling attached. I need to get over this because if I’m doing something I wasn’t meant to do, it means I’m not doing something I AM meant to do.  

Secondly, I need to focus.  While I get that I’m a hummingbird, flitting from flower to flower to get what I need or want, I need to focus on what gets me going and focus on that alone.  Have you noticed how many times I’ve said FOCUS?  My pastor was always saying that people don’t do what they do unless they’re getting something out of it, good or bad.  Whether it’s security because I’m making more money or I’m able to network with the right people or just because it makes me feel good about myself, we stick with it because it feeds us somehow.  Right now I’m doing things that feed me temporarily but they are not allowing me to do what REALLY feeds me.  It’s hard to let go of some of that security in the hopes that the next flower I flit to is worthwhile, hence the hesitation.

I’ve never been a great planner. It seems I either luck into things or have great mentors who open pathways for me.  Which leads me to a conversation I had with a couple at breakfast this morning about museums and how the husband had gone to the Eisenhower Library/Museum and spent the whole day trying to learn how a little country boy could become a five star general and then president.  After his research, it came down to the fact that Eisenhower had a great mentor.  The gentleman then shared with me that he felt he got where he did in life because of his mentor, his grade school teacher.  She taught in a one room schoolhouse and he had her for six grades.  She never married, lived into her 90’s and stayed in her own home her entire life.  Her students wrote her letters yearly, checking on her and letting her know how they were doing.  Later in our conversation they asked what I was planning to do for the day and when I said I wasn’t sure, suggested a couple of parks relatively close by.  I did both.  The first was a beautiful drive, but the second one, the one I wasn’t sure about because it was in the middle of nowhere, turned out to be divine.  It was as if God was speaking through the rustling of the leaves in the wind and in the beautiful architecture of the little buildings.  I think the family who created this little gem in the middle of cornfields in Nebraska, built it for that reason.  Bible verses were on all four sides of one little building and this one jumped out at me; “As he thinketh in his heart, so is he.” Another building had this inscription “Art is nature made by man, the interpreter of God”. Perhaps I’ve lost the purpose of music in all of this busyness of trying to gain the approval of others in my life.  Perhaps what I’m thinking about in my heart has affected who I’ve become. Perhaps I need a new mentor. Do you ever wonder if God just puts people in your path to teach you something or lead you somewhere?

As the sun is going down on another day, I see that log still going back and forth, waiting perhaps for that powerful push to get it out into the river itself.  I’m hoping this time of quiet and meditation and those put in my path this week will prove themselves to be the energy I need to push me back into the flow of life and solidify my purpose.

Before I tell this story, you need to know that I have great boys, who have grown into great young men. However, at some point in their high school careers I had to speak to each of them about “playing the game”. In this world, there are rule followers and those who question the status quo.  I remember the parent teacher conferences where the teacher would say one son or the other was not reaching their full potential because they wouldn’t turn in their work and therefore weren’t scoring high enough,  with my sons countering with, I ace all my tests, why do I have to do the busy work?

You see, I’m a rule follower, a game player.  I read my opponent and make my moves accordingly.  To be successful in school, I did my homework, I did my studying , I wrote my papers and did as well as I could on tests.  Even when it didn’t make sense, even if it seemed redundant, even if it seemed my teacher was learning the subject right before he or she taught it, I played the game.  At this point in my life, I’m beginning to realize that playing the game can limit you and I know that striving towards a number or goal is all relative and is only as valuable as it is perceived by someone.  Completely arbitrary and yet totally powerful.  Someone decides numbers have meaning outside of the obvious as they determine whether or not a student passes a test, gets into higher education or achieves tenure.  The numbers can justify so many things, back up belief systems and many times, the people who decide the significance of the numbers perhaps have more power than they should.

For those who know what they know and don’t want to spend time playing the game, this is frustrating.  Just leave them alone, let them learn and do their jobs.  But no, someone is always scrutinizing them, always analyzing, always assigning numbers and sharing those numbers with others who feel those numbers have meaning.  There are those who feel that comparing numbers creates opportunity for competition, whether the other person wants to compete or not.  And if the numbers aren’t high enough, others judge based on those numbers; you’re not as smart, as fast, as educated, as worthy as those who somehow play the game or luck into the numbers.

The fact that we allow people to get away with this is where the problem lies.  We take the numbers we’ve been given and deal with the frustration because we wonder what’s the point.  It’s a system, run by people who believe they can turn anything into a numbers game (usually in their favor), and the truth is if you’re willing, you don’t have to play the game.  You can still do whatever you want to do, and while there will always be those who won’t take you seriously or will continue to judge because you don’t live up to the numbers that they’ve determined make you successful, there are always alternative ways to play the game and have the last laugh.  

So there is a choice to make.  Do we continue to live our lives based on the expectations and numbers games of others, or do we play our own game with a completely different score at the end?  

My husband recently had a 2,237 mile adventure, calling it a second mid-life crisis.  He spent that time driving home to see family, visiting former students and colleagues and places that had been important to him in his life and career.  The mid-life sports car was put to the test and passed with flying colors, creating conversations with strangers and giving his mom a ride with the top down to visit local cemeteries.  He came home a different person, a little lighter in spirit having created some needed closure.

There are things that I’ve done where I’ve thought I might be going through a mid-life crisis myself. I bought the beetle, changed jobs, continue to color the hair when we ALL know it’s just REALLY gray.  But there have been changes in behavior as well.  I’ve often categorized it as “grumpy old person get off my lawn” syndrome.  My patience with things like, well, stupidity is shorter than ever and I tend to get snippy at the drop of a hat.  My eating habits have changed as well.  I knew there was something really wrong when I got Pokeman cards in my cereal and I have to have maraschino cherries on my ice cream every night.  I want people to just leave me alone and I could really get into hiding in my room – except I share it with someone now.  And then it hit.  I’m not having a mid-life crisis.  I’m having a second adolescence.   

I’m not sure I had a first one.  I’ve always been a rule follower, I didn’t have hissy fits or an attitude, at least to their faces (I knew better), I didn’t even try to drink, smoke, swear or do anything remotely inappropriate.  Unless you call eating ice cream sandwiches for breakfast inappropriate. As a teenager I didn’t get the cool first car, I rode my bike, took the bus or got a ride with friends.  Next thing I knew I was a 20 something with a husband and kids and working to make ends meet.  It only makes sense that since I didn’t have time to be a totally annoying adolescent/teenager when I was the right age, that I’m doing it now.  

Seriously, the mood swings, the cravings for sugar, the lack of self control, the drinking and swearing – well not all the time – the not wanting people to tell me what to do.  Yep, classic adolescence.  I want to selfishly do what I want to do, when I want to do it and how I want to do it.  And then I feel guilty about it.  Ok, so maybe I still don’t have the adolescent thing down. 

However, there is one part of adolescence that seems to be in full swing and that is I still want to have adventures and explore new things.  One of the hardest things during this pandemic for me was that feeling of being grounded by my authority figures.  For over a year.  I should say I was fortunate enough that not only did the virus not affect me personally, it didn’t really affect my family at all.  Other than we were stuck and unable to do the usual things like vacations, work travel and such.  After a whirlwind of traveling for several years, everything came to a complete stop, and just like an adolescent, I moaned and groaned about my lack of freedom.  It was difficult to know how to behave as I watched many in authority positions doing and behaving in ways that were contrary to each other.  How’s a kid supposed to know what to do with that kind of example?

I’m betting that a lot of you have gone through a second adolescence as well in the last couple of years. Adolescence is defined as a time of rapid physical development and deep emotional changes.  I don’t know about you, but this body definitely changed and the emotions have been on a roller coaster.  I’m angry at those in authority and don’t want to follow directions, looking at every possible excuse to ignore them and do my own thing.  But the biggest development is that I’m finally figuring out who I am and how I fit in the world.  Some might say it’s a little late, but I like to think it’s never too late.  This blossoming idea of self and watching it tick some people off has been very enlightening.  Some who have known me their whole lives are questioning my thought processes.  But I’m also figuring out that if I wasn’t making people question who I am, that I wouldn’t be changing.  And change, growth, and becoming everything I am meant to be is a good thing.  So let them question and look at me like I’ve lost my mind, I’m going to be whoever the hell I was meant to be. (See?  Swearing.).  The more I see and experience and learn by interacting with a variety of people means that if I don’t change, then there IS something wrong with me.  So this repeat of burgeoning adolescence is a good thing.

So, if you see me coming, don’t run away in fear like you might do with most adolescents but come join me.  While there may be the intermittent scary emotional encounters, you might begin to embrace this part of yourself again, just like I am.  And together we’ll go riding our bikes through the neighborhood, singing songs from the Top 40 and having ice cream sandwiches for breakfast.

In the nightmare that has been the last year and more, introverts have frequently joked that this time has been a dream.  The idea of not being allowed to hang out with a lot of people is truly a dream come true for some of us.  Not that we don’t like people, and it’s not that we’re shy, but if you understand it correctly, you know that introverts become drained both physically and mentally when hanging with a lot of people for a long period of time.  But despite that, we too dreamed of a time when we could freely go to social events with friends without a mask, and the time finally arrived for me this week.

Last weekend was Mother’s Day and we decided to go to the Farmer’s Market.  In the days prior, we were told if we had been fully vaccinated we could be outside with others without masks.  Who would have thought that would be such a big deal?  It was a beautiful sunny morning with a nice stiff wind (there are no breezes here) and it was glorious.  I have to admit I’m a bit of a rule follower and so the mast wearing had become a habit, and with it, that slight guilty feeling for not wearing it.  But it makes no sense to be vaccinated and still wear a mask, so we didn’t.  The farmers market was busy but I was distracted by the grandsons, so it wasn’t that overwhelming.  Probably a good warm-up for yesterday.

Yesterday marked a great day, the first time in a long time where friends and I planned to go together to a social event, complete with music, wine, lots of people and no masks.  It was a wonderful afternoon, a day when for a little while, it felt like the nightmare had never occurred.  We laughed, caught up on all the school stories for the last year, shared family stories and how everyone had fared.  We sat in the van together without masks, different from the last time we had gone somewhere together where we HAD worn masks. 

Yesterday I watched friends and families sitting on the grass talking together, people tasting wine and eating from food trucks, dancing to live music, playing bingo and shopping.  It was truly as though all the craziness of the past year had never happened, but about halfway through, and perhaps the wine had a bit to do with it, I started to feel overwhelmed.  There were too many people, the music was too loud, there was too much talking, too many things to see all at once.  I had trouble keeping track of conversations and found myself distracted by silly things.  I realized that I just wanted to sit and observe, watching people in an environment I hadn’t participated in for a long time, to soak in the sights and sounds by myself.  That’s the introvert speaking – I loved being with friends again, but I’m almost wishing there was a way to slowly transition back into life again.  I mean, even in my jobs this year, I’ve been able to isolate a lot.  Being in my cubicle with a few people or being at home with my small family had not prepared me to sit among hundreds of festive people. 

There were just so many stories happening all at once and I couldn’t focus on one long enough to formulate something to write.  I mean, just writing about the crazy things people wear would be a great blog – there was a lot of fashion over function happening that just begged to be written about.  And did you know the 70’s have returned?  I could have told them that some of it didn’t work the first time.  But being distracted by all the other things going on kept me from focusing like I used to. 

Perhaps this is where the stories begin again.  Perhaps now that we’re getting back to normal I can be more intentional in going places, whether with someone or by myself, to sit and contemplate and share my thoughts again.  Being by myself is great, but it doesn’t make for good storytelling.  The great stories are out there with all those people but perhaps this next time, we’ll start with something a little more simple and try to avoid the stimulation overload.  

There’s something wrong with shopping for flowers with a shopping cart.  The sound of metal awkwardly running over uneven asphalt and concrete completely ruins what should be a zen shopping experience.  Rows and rows of picked over flowers and plants, the frantic shopping to see if you can find something that looks like it might make it home with you before someone snatches it away from under your nose.  Literally.

I don’t shop for flowers in a hurry.  There is too much subtle beauty to speed through – too many shapes and colors to choose from.  Whatever I choose has to be able to take a LOT of afternoon sun and survive me leaving for a week of vacation. It also has to be screaming at me, telling me to take it home with me.  Instead of spending slow, quiet time looking for lovely flowers, I found myself dodging people who were on a mission.  As I was looking at one rack of various plants, a woman literally squatted down at my feet.  My anxiety level increased when I shifted out of her way and she continued to crawl in my direction.  She never made eye contact or smile. I got the message and moved away, only to be practically run over by several people with carts racing for petunias I’m sure.  Doug had chosen a few herbs which he put in our cart, so in a run for my life away from the crazy flower people, I told Doug we needed to go elsewhere.

So we took the herbs to the car and drove to a place with a little more of that zen feel I was craving.  I’m grateful for a husband who will follow me around in circles until I make the decision as to which flowers I’m going to buy.  It’s a big deal you know.  Once I buy and plant them, I spend my summer working to keep them alive.  

So after walking around in circles several time, taking in all the shapes and colors and imagining what they would look like in my various pots and planters, I took the plunge and starting buying.  This is good and bad, because I’ve finally made a decision but now I’m buying things.  And it’s hard to stop, so I’m hoping that I haven’t bought too many for the pots I have at home.

This becomes the atmosphere for my summer office.  It’s my favorite time of year when I get to go outside in the morning to have breakfast on the balcony, feed the birds, water the plants and work on exciting things I didn’t get finished the day before.  It certainly makes the work more palatable.  

As the sun finally dropped below the treeline, the last of the flowers and herbs were planted, with Doug saying he hoped we didn’t wake up in the morning and wonder what kind of mess we had made in the dark.  I for one can’t wait to see them in the morning light and watch them grow each day.  By myself. And not have to worry about crazy women crouching at my feet looking for flowers. 

It was honestly not in my plan to go to the Dark Side.  My husband has told me on more than one occasion that he didn’t think he could be married to someone who went to the Dark Side.  For a while I actually went to school to join the Dark Side, but a move changed all that and once again I was on this side of the Dark Side.  So for years, I blissfully worked in the light, sometimes working for the Dark Side, but never actually stepping foot in it.  Until this past year apparently.

Most people think the Dark Side is a place of power, a place where you can make your own rules and nobody is telling you what to do.  You are master of your realm, the maker of your destiny, but this is not true.  Those who go to the Dark Side have to answer to even more people, be more accountable, be more in the public eye, not allowed to hide away in their perceived lair.  They’re expected to have all the answers, and if they don’t, they have to find the answers.  So many questions!!  So many answers, over and over and over.  (Nobody reads anymore).  I’ve watched my friends and colleagues who went over to the Dark Side and it’s tough.  I made my decision years ago not to cross over.  While there are bright spots to be had, and triumphs to be experienced, there is also conflict, and unkindness and accusations – things I try to avoid like the plague.  Another reason to definitely NOT go over to the Dark Side.

So I’m having this conversation with a good friend last night, and we’re talking about ways we can get others to get a taste of what teachers deal with, and seeing as we’re both in the classroom…. No, wait.  One of us is still in the classroom and the other is not.  And he says, yes, you were in the classroom, but now you’ve gone to the Dark Side.  Me?  The Dark Side?

There’s no “Dr.” in front of my name.  I don’t have the title of “principal” or “supervisor” or “Darth”.  My title is “teacher leader”.  Teacher.  It’s in the name.  But the truth is, I’m neither a classroom teacher nor an administrator within the Dark Side.  I’m like the drum major in a marching band – neither a member of the band nor the director.  A no man’s land.  To the teachers I am no longer a teacher and to administration I’m not administration.  And it’s exactly where I want to be.

There comes a time in your life when you know you need to get out of the way for others to do their thing, when you know that what you’re doing may not be as good as it once was, not done with as much enthusiasm as it should be.  Teaching is what I’ve always done, I’ve given literally half of my life to the profession, but there is more to teaching than just the act of teaching and that’s where things get exciting – in a completely nerdy kind of way.  Now I work to help make things easier for those hard working, give everything they’ve got teachers, because I DO know what it’s like and now I can now advocate for and in some cases provide things/services I wish I had had.  

So perhaps I have one foot in the Dark Side and one outside, but that just allows me to see things from a couple of different perspectives.  I’m learning that maybe the Dark Side isn’t the bad place it’s made out to be and again, I’m exactly where I want to be.  

“I love you!” “Have a great day!”.  Standing on his front stoop in his happy pants and a sweatshirt holding his coffee, the man waved and yelled at the top of his lungs.  It’s right about 7:45 a.m.  I know this because the school sign is on, telling us to slow down to 25 mph and there’s a reason.  A middle school kid, walking across the busy main street that runs north and south, on his way to the middle school on the other side, head down, hoodie up was trying to ignore the man yelling.  When he finished crossing and reached the other corner, he turned slightly and yelled “love you” and kept walking, head down, his mission to get to school and hope nobody heard his dad.  

I smiled.  Maybe dad was choosing to be a smart aleck, giving his boy a hard time, understanding how much he was embarrassing his kid and getting some enjoyment out of it.  A one time thing.  Not so much.  Today I saw him again, yelling to the boy, with the boy doing a type of call and response back.  “Love you!”  “Love you!”  It was obviously a morning ritual that I had either ignored or was a little too early or late to witness but in the last week I had the opportunity to see it twice.  This kid probably has no idea how lucky he is to have a dad willing to looking silly in his happy pants on the front stoop yelling “I love you!”.  What a wonderful relationship during a crazy time of life.

The last couple of mornings on my way to work, my thoughts have been interrupted by a couple of crazy kids waving at me like crazy from their car.  I didn’t see them at first, but I caught the movement out of the corner of my eye.  There they were, my two grandsons, waving and smiling as their mom was driving them to school.  The second morning, again my mind was wandering, this time on some not so pleasant things.  Those two crazy boys again, in the same place as the day before, were waving and yelling “hi” and “love you”.  They had no idea how much I needed that.  I love our relationship.  

I had the opportunity to sub a day in the district yesterday.  The last time I had subbed was 1993, a couple of years past graduation.  Things have changed quite a bit since then.  I walked into the classroom, feeling pretty confident – I could do this in my sleep, right?  By lunch, I realized that while things weren’t going too badly that it wasn’t anything close to having my own kids.  As I stood out on the cold playground slab watching the 4^thgraders play basketball, another teacher asked me how things were going.  It was my first time teaching at a Title 1 school and quite frankly, I had dealt with several things just that morning I had never dealt with in my 30 year career and I shared that.  She looked at me and said, it just proves that it’s all about building relationships doesn’t it?  

Even in the short amount of time I was there, I got several hugs from a Kinder, had a 4^th grader share his love of soccer and a little girl who came up and whispered “I hope you get to come back”.  It doesn’t take much – all you have to do to begin building relationships is to show some interest.  I could see how someone could get really attached to these kids.  Maybe not me – I had to nap on the couch when I got home.  God bless those teachers who work with kids who struggle, love on them and build relationships.

When all we see of the world is the violence and hate, and polarizing of people and groups, sometimes we miss the great things happening and how everyday people are building positive, loving relationships one person at a time.  During those times when I can’t take any more of the negativity in the world, it’s people like the dad in his happy pants, my silly grandsons and those amazing teachers that bring sunshine to into my life.  I hope somewhere, something I do brings sunshine to someone else.