It's Our Little Gummy Bear

It is official! We are going to have a little baby, who currently looks like a gummy bear (so says my doctor), but hopefully will grow out of that...but if s/he doesn't, we will still love him/her as our own.

Currently, I am 9 weeks and 5 days, which puts me due on April 29, 2009. There is very little dispute on this date, since I know exactly when I got knocked-up: August 6, 2008 at exactly 10:45 A.M. This is the beauty of modern-day technology. (Don't worry...I'm not giving you our ... schedule. We got pregnant by IUI). We already have stellar names picked out, which we refuse to tell anyone because I know everyone will love them and steal them, since baby-making is the regular past-time in my ward. And we aren't going to find out if s/he's a she or a he until the big day in April. Just to drive everyone nuts, including my mother and my mother-in-law. I haven't been sick at all, just really tired, and I am not a nice person when I don't eat. Just ask my A3 class, whom I yelled at for turning in their assignments. On time. In the right basket. On the due date. Yeah. Big-time B#%@^. But just feed me, and I am the nicest person in the world!

We went to the doctor for our very first appointment today. It was very exciting. I was starting to get scared that there wasn't anything in there because I haven't had many symptoms or anything. It's unreal, when you've waited as long as we have, to actually believe that there is really a little person floating around inside me. And s/he was floating, boy. That kid was kicking and punching and waving. S/he looked kind of like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory when Charlie and Grandpa Joe drink the soda and it makes them float and they have to belch to get down. We were so excited and happy and just so glad that it's finally true.

However, I will be breaking the tradition of the floating fetus. Even though my fetus was floating...but Joe can't stand it, and honestly, I get a little creeped out by the thing. I did buy a shirt that says, "The Hottest Fetus Ever," because I thought it was hilarious. And my fetus is probably the hottest ever. Even though it looks like a floating, kicking, gummy bear.

I would just like to say thanks to everyone out there who was rooting for us. I know there were a lot of prayers sent our way, and I know our names were on many a temple roll. And I know everyone has been very concerned, and we are so grateful to know so many wonderful people and have so many great friends that care about us. And I would like to thank the academy, and of course, my manager.

Pity, Party of One?

Have you ever had a week where you just feel that it has been the longest, most horrible week, but then you look back and realize nothing really bad has happened to you? I have just had one of those weeks, and the crappy thing is that I really want to complain and write a very long blog about how horrible and bad, bad, bad that my whole life is, but, unfortunately I can't think of anything that has made it horrible and bad, bad bad. But I'm going to write a really long blog and complain about it, anyway.

I guess it all started Sunday when I came home from church, and it suddenly dawned on me that I have three callings. I love serving in my ward, don't get me wrong, but when I realized that I could never be late to church because I am the Relief Society chorister, I could never sneak out on Sacrament Meeting a little early because I am the Ward Choir Director, and my Tuesday's have to stay free and clear because I am the 11 year old scout leader, I got a little distraught. I am not a skip-out-on-church-type of person, but the idea that I'm not free to if I ever wanted to...well, I feel a little trapped. I have been assured that they would release me from one of these jobs (either the first one or the last one; the middle one is new), and I am sure I will be. Soon. Hopefully. Obviously, I need these callings, or someone needs me, so I go where I'm called. Still...

Monday was actually a really nice day because I went to a follow-up workshop. I went last summer to a week-long cohort called Secondary Literacy Institute, which has four follow-up sessions throughout the school year, and Monday was the first one. I have really enjoyed my cohort, and I have learned so much while I am there. The instructor is fun and entertaining, and he helps me make my classroom fun.

But it was an epiphany I had on Monday that is a little distressing: I really love professional development. Those of you who are not in the educational field, or even those of you who are not secondary ed might not realize the dire consequences of this discovery. In my school, professional development is synonymous with Satan's Plan: the worst thing that could ever happen to teachers--especially those veteran teachers who have been teaching 20+ years. So admitting that I enjoy professional development is like choosing Satan's plan, and now, I am one of his minions who must go out and persuade all those other "righteous" teachers to cross over.

And, another realization: I think I prefer being a student to being a teacher. I do love my job, but there's so much less stress and more enjoyment being the student. I do what you tell me to, and I don't have to make a whole lot of decisions, and the best part? I don't have to grade anything. You don't know how disheartening it is to realize that when you are a good teacher, and you have planned a stellar lesson with meaningful homework, and you've just done your job to the best of your ability, that you are then punishing yourself with loads of your own homework--90x what I have ever given my students. Sigh.

Tuesday I was so tired, all I wanted to do was sleep. But alas, I had dumb scouts from 4:30 to 5:30 (which usually lasts an extra 15 minutes), and I had signed up to take dinner to a very nice lady in our ward, but we needed to have it there by 6:00 because the person I had signed up with needed to be home by 6:15. And I didn't have anything I had volunteered to bring, because I had forgot about it in the midst of my Monday Epiphany, so I was reduced to salad kits and Peterson's pumpkin cookies. I came home exhausted. Thank goodness Kristin was so sweet to bring me dinner for no reason at all! Thanks so much!

Wednesday was the longest day of my life. I had a meeting at 7:15 about the up-coming split of our high school. When I realized one my closest friends here might have to go to the new high school, I was all sorts of wound up. Then I went to lunch, and everyone there was being these huge negative nay-sayers, which was starting to make me upset because, contrary to popular belief, my principal isn't ALL evil. And then it was Parent/Teacher Conferences, the most dreaded day of the whole school year. I hate telling parents their kids are failing. I hate it even more because then for the next few days I get stacks and stacks of late work, and everyone wants their grades updated right away. I finally got to leave the school at 8:00 only to find that Joe had pulled muscles in his back and wanted me to pick up Icy-Hot patches and cheese. So then I went home and fell asleep on the floor.

Thursday was so long, just because 5 hours of talking to parents following 8 hours of teaching exhausts you.

Today, I finally broke down. I have to plan for two classes on A days: English 11 Honors, which I have never taught before, and Creative Writing. Since I have never taught English 11, all my time is spent prepping for that one class, which leaves no time for my Creative Writing class, so things usually get thrown together. I feel like a very harried and bad teacher in my Creative Writing class. And to make things worse, I forgot that I didn't have any lunch, and my lunch hour is only 35 minutes long, and when you are competing with 2200 students all getting lunch at the same time, it's pretty much impossible to pick up anything and be back in time. So I went to my parent's house to eat something, and their fridge stinks. Literally. It smells like rotten fruit. So I couldn't eat anything there because smells gross me out. So I called Joe, and that poor guy, I started bawling on the phone about how hard it is to prep for three classes, and I couldn't do it, and it was too hard, and I'm too tired to do anything, and this week was too long, and how I couldn't even sleep in tomorrow because of women's conference, and that my parent's fridge stinks so I couldn't eat. I feel really bad about it now. It's not fair to call Joe with that type of stuff because he feels helpless, and then he worries the rest of the day. But I guess I needed to get it out.

The rest of the day was interesting. I yelled at my A3 class for no reason, and a I got mad at a couple of students turning in assignments that were due, but I hadn't called for yet, because I lose things if they aren't all turned in at the same time. By A4, I was better, but I was so drained that I didn't care what they did, and I don't think anyone learned anything from me today.

But it's the weekend, and I'm going to say thanks but no thanks to our Women's conference tomorrow morning so I can sleep in and still go to the General Relief Society meeting tomorrow night. I just wish the weekend consisted of two Saturdays and one Sunday, because my Sunday certainly isn't a day rest....

Life will be better Monday. I know it will. It's just been a very long week with Parent/Teacher Conference emotionally exhausting me. The week is over. I'm going home in 15 minutes, and I will finally get a chance to breathe. I'm okay.

Just Listen by Sarah Dessen

I was trying desperately to find a book to read. I am really tired of trying to plow through The Odyssey, and trying to enlighten my mind by reading classics like Madame Bovary, The Scarlett Pimpernell and Anna Karenina just to name a few of my latest attempts. I actually don't mind The Scarlett Pimpernell. I think I would like Anna Karenina, but it involves too much thinking. And don't even get me started on The Odyssey. For some reason, my Honors kids are really psyched about the idea of reading that. So I am trying. Oh...but kill me now! (I am SO NOT a world lit girl. Give me the good old ex-patriots of the Modern American movement every time!) So I wanted to read something that was for pure entertainment, but wasn't about crazy vampires and wolf-people (because Edward insists they aren't really werewolves), or about crazy 50 year old wizards who are trying to kill boys with weird scars. And I didn't want to read about sex. I tried to read a few YA lit last summer, and well, I am about fed up with all these teenage girls having sex and drinking beer and talking about finding themselves. Don't get me wrong, I am all about finding myself, but to be completely honest, I had to find myself before I got to have sex. It can be done, people! Anyway. We were on our way to the ward campout, and I just really wanted to read something fun and didn't involve deep analysis.

I scrolled throught the e Book store as fast as I could, because I knew I didn't have time to go to the library or to the bookstore (I love that thing!). I didn't even know where to start, because for the last five years, I have been reading only what I needed to read for planning classes. I don't really have any idea of what the students are reading because for the first little bit of my career, all my students were reading Harry Potter, and then once that was over, the Twilight phenomenon hit, and those who aren't reading either of those are reading weird fantasy novels in a series, and I really can't handle all these different people from Zoltron or where ever the hell they're from. And Oprah's books fall into that category of too much thinking. And there's probably a lot of sex in those, too. So I finally found something that looked familiar. It was the cover to this book called Just Listen by Sarah Dessen. I had seen the book on one of my student's desk this past week. My student is a fairy intelligent girl, who reads voraciously, and I think I could trust her taste. She, just like me, read all the Twilight books, thought they were okay, but wasn't impressed. I think I could trust her. So I hurried and downloaded it, and we were off to the campout.

I didn't actually read at the campout, even though I had fresh battaries in my book light, but I started it the next day (Saturday) and I finished it today (Sunday). I'm not jumping up and down, but I was pleased and surprised that I liked it.

The story is, yet again, about a girl who is trying to find herself, but in a way that was different than anything I had read this summer. She wasn't sleeping around. She wasn't experimenting with drugs, and she wasn't being a brat to her family. She is just a quiet girl who was trying to deal with something tramatic that had happened to her over her summer. Her friends have abandoned her because they think she did something she didn't, and the only person who ends up understanding her is this weird, slightly scary guy, Owen. Of course the sub-plot with Owen is predictable, but everything else in her life a long the way is interesting.

The book talks about how her family (a traditional family: mom, dad, and siblings) have handled issues such as eating disorders and depression. The girl, Annabelle, is the youngest of three girls sisters. Maybe that's why I enjoyed the book. I could totally realate, being the youngest of three girls, myself. I was interesting because the oldest sister, Kirsten, was loud and dramatic (um...do I hear a Natalee?). The middle sister, Whitney, had a really hard time reckoning with her position of the family, and her decisions reflected that insecurity. She struggled with her choices, and learned from them (sounds familiar, Yarley). And then the main character, Annabelle, saw how her sister's choices affected her parents and tried to do everything she could to make life easier for them (Did I ever tell you why I didn't get in trouble in high school?). But while the similarities were eerie, there was also enough for me to remove myself and look through a different lense.

There was one scene at the end when all the sisters were together, and Whitney reads something she wrote. It was beautiful, and I started to cry because I could see me and my sisters in that scene, with Yarley talking about all that she's been through. I don't know if you can fully understand that moment unless you have sisters. As for the Owen story, predicatble? Yes. But you couldn't help but root for it. He was so good for her. He saved her from herself.

One last thing that I really liked about this book was that it didn't focus on the worldly aspects of life. It was mostly focusing on Annabelle's growth in learning how to express herself, and how to deal with the ups and downs of life one day at a time. It had a good message. There was one quote that I particulary liked: "Like Owen said, it was day by day, if not moment by moment. All you could do was take on as much weight as you can bear. And if you're lucky, there's someone close enough by to shoulder the rest."

It was nice to read a book that fell in line with my own personal beliefs. Because I do believe that you do the best you can with the resources you have, and someone else will take up the rest. But I don't think it's luck. I think it's our gift from a loving Heavenly Father. It was nice to read something that taught that, and it was nice to read something about families getting through crappy stuff together. It made me feel like there was hope for my students if they read this book. Anyway, if your tired of vampires, sex, drugs, cutting, death, and all the other happy literature there is out there, you should read this. It's not all nice. Bad things happen to good people. But the way the characters come through it is refreshing.

Burgeoning Story

So I wrote the beginning of a story a couple of years ago in my Creative Writing class as a result to a prompt I was having my students do. Every year, when we do the exercise, I read my sample to them to show how one little sentence can lead to a potential story. Every year, I always have at least one student (usually a girl) come back and ask me what happens. And guess what? I don't know. I have know idea where to go from here. So I am posting this to all those who read out there and asking for suggestions.

Please keep in mind (fellow ward members) I have a slight swear mouth. Something I am working on, but my characters are not. I am sorry if I offend anyone. But if Bella can have wild vampire sex, then I can swear.

Quite Frankly

Quite frankly, I was expecting more. More fireworks, dizziness, Puccini, anything to meet the elaborate expectations years of movie watching had built up. I guess I’m not being exactly honest—there was dizziness involved. It just accompanied nausea and vomit. In fact, it was the doctor that told me I was in love, not Puccini.

Those were his exact words, too, “Congratulations. You’re in love.” Oh good. I have a funny doctor. He couldn’t just come right out and say I was pregnant. No. He had to make it cute, “You’re in love.” What the hell is that supposed to mean?

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Well,” funny doctor smiled. Did he take pleasure in seeing my whole life do somersaults through those crazy fire rings? “That means that you’re going to have a little bundle of joy in about seven months, here.” Yep. He was enjoying this. “Got a boyfriend?”

I was going to kill him. No, not the boyfriend. The doctor. I might kill the boyfriend, too. After all, he was the one who got me into this mess. This was his doing. I always figured that everything would be safe. I mean, what are the chances of one of those things not working? One in a million, I figured. Well, my dad always did say I was special.

“Well?” Oh yeah. Him. The doctor.

“What?”

“Well, do you have a boyfriend, or a fiancée, or…” I envisioned a slow and painful death for Mr. Funny PhD. I won’t go into it here, but I will tell you it involved swords and a very dull spoon.

"Yes, I have a boyfriend-type of man.” I have been trying for the past year to keep my relationship with Chad strictly non-committal.

“You might want to decide if you love him or not.”

“Why?” My brain had ceased working properly. I knew it was a stupid question, but all I could think of were the various ways I could commit a capital crime right here in this office.

“Well,” Mr. Not-So-Funny-Doctor continued, “Well, you are now going to be a mother, and I suggest you find out if your baby’s going to have a daddy. And if not, you need to decide what you are going to do.”

“You mean I have to decide now? You mean I have to decide whether my boyfriend-type-of-man and I are in love or not? Listen, sir, I know you are probably a very nice person, but I don’t think you understand. I had to close my eyes this morning and poke a pile of my jeans with a pin just to decide which pair I wanted to wear. I have only been dating this guy for like, a year, and I have to decide now whether I love this man or not? NOW?”

“Well,” the doctor suddenly looked tired. I wondered how many girls have given him the same look I felt on my face right then. “Well, it’s better now than in seven months. And you might want to devise a method of deciding that doesn’t involve sticking things with pins.” He thought that was funny, no doubt.

So here it was. No fireworks. No Puccini. Just a stick with pee on it, and I was in love.

Slowly, I returned home. I walked into my dark apartment and looked around. Suddenly, I felt that this space that I had inhabited for the last year was alien and new to me. I looked at all my Harry Potter posters, my concert tees that now doubled as “artwork,” my Red Socks pennants, and I wondered what type of freak lived here. This wasn’t the apartment of a potential mother—mothers should have café curtains and floral wallpaper. And mothers definitely wouldn’t have my long, messy, hair. Their hair would be short and coiffed with enough hair spray to kill off some kind of cute blue frog somewhere in the world.

I had a feeling that a good mother would never wear a shirt that had hung on her wall and then staple it back up at the end of the day. I did. I did it all the time. I used to think it was cool, hip, unique; it was something just quirky enough that would prompt some guy to fall madly in love with me, and, even though he would pretend that it bothered him, after I died a tragic death this guy would write a book about me and say very endearingly, “She wore her own posters.” And everyone would read the book and think, “I want to be like that girl with the shirts on her wall,” and all of a sudden my poster concert tees would be the trend. Everyone would start stapling their shirts on the wall, and even the designers on Trading Spaces would think it was cool and inventive—maybe not so much Edward or Frank, but defiantly Hildi or Genevieve.

But now I was pregnant, with child, knocked up. Suddenly concert tees on the wall weren’t so quirky. They were downright irresponsible.

Nothing in Particular

So I have been BMIA (blogg Missing in Action) for some time now because school started. And I have nothing to write about. So, I am going to make this short. Be patient. Soon, I hope I will have real glorious insights to life. Right now, I am just trying to make it through until God decides to bless me with great and grand ideas to make me feel like a good teacher, not one who just wants to die and sleep for the rest of the afterlife... Fall Break is not coming fast enough!