End of the summer

So clearly, I'm still bad at this posting frequently thing. I can't guarantee it will improve either, because summer is over and my last year of schooling is about to begin. This summer was an interesting one, but it did not go out with a bang. Camp just sort of faded away and summer with it. My summer in Syracuse ended with me whimpering in the driveway saying good bye to seeing my best friend every day. Hello to twice a month and adding lots of miles to my odometer.
Now I'm back at home, trying to reorganize myself. It was so much easier in Syracuse when I didn't have much stuff. Sleeping in my own bed again is nice, possibly it has stopped my talking/ searching for kids and crab spiders in my sleep, but then again no one is in the room to witness it now.
At the very end of camp one of my 10 year old campers commented on how fast the summer had gone by for her. "It only gets faster, each year you get older. Faster and faster," I told her. If anyone has read "My Pretty Pony Time" by Steven King, you'll know what I mean when I say I really miss my pretty pony times. Sometimes I want time to slow way down so I can enjoy my youth and the fun times, like our table camping trip or going to the State Fair for the first time. It won't though.

Responsibility

Okay, so I haven't been so responsible about posting very frequently. Sorry about that, esp. since I've recently found out that I do have more than one reader. I'll try, really.
I've been thinking a lot about responsibility lately because there are a lot of things changing in my life that are requiring more of it from me and others close to me. One major thing that has happened recently was the marriage of my brother and his now wife Courtney. The nice, informal wedding took place on a very sunny 5th of July. Its still not sunk in yet, partly because my brother is so far away, training for the Marines in Pensacola, FL. and partly because I don't feel old enough to have a married brother yet. Weird.
Living in a house has been more responsibility for me as well. Living in an apartment in college for two years was a big help preparing me for all the cleaning, dishes, laundry, furnature arranging, etc, but having a yard and many more rooms that needed some help has added on. Mike and I have managed to clean up quite a bit, ripping up rugs, doily and other old lady paraphernalia removal and even painting in one room. This past weekend we spent some time working on the outside of the house, "the jungle" as the neighbors call it. There's still a lot to do, but we're making progress. In a way, its good practice having to do this stuff. It will prepare us for when we actually own a house, but without having to worry too much about the major issues. (IE- if the roof needs work here, thats the landlord's responsibility).
My job this summer has also been a big step up in the level of responsibility I have. I'm working at a summer camp (which shall remain unnamed- I signed a contract saying I woundn't) as the director in charge of the 10-12 yrd old program. This has been way different than any camp job that I've worked in the past. Instead of being in charge of 30 or so campers and spending the day with them, I'm spending snippets of a day amongst 8 groups of about 11 campers, with a mixture of meetings, paperwork, feilding phone calls from parents, and other miscillanious errands mixed in. For the first two weeks at least, I felt like I was student teaching again. I get to work about 20 min early, work 7 hours, then 2 hours extra for kids who need to stay later at camp, and then I would come home to do 2 more hours of paper work! This session has proved to be a little less intensive, mostly because I'm just reusing alot of what I did last time and just changing the names and numbers. Don't get me wrong, I do really enjoy being there and I know its going to help me grow professionally and look great on my resume. I think it has pretty much secured in my mind that I don't want to be an administrator later in life, I'd miss the interaction with the kids too much. Not to mention that kids are much easier to discipline than staff. I think that I'll be able to increase the time I spend with the kids as the summer goes on and I get better at oraganizing and deligating paper work and errands. Just as long as I don't have any more nights like last night- I woke Mike up at least once or twice "looking for the kids".

Things that I should be doing presently...

But am not..

Watching video blogs in ASL to improve my receptive language skills
Meditating daily
Exercising daily
Making phone calls to friends to meet up (it would be so much easier on me if you called)
Writing in my blog weekly (I'm getting there on this one)
Posting the pictures I take
Saving money
Making real plans for a big trip
Making real plans for a small trip (namely a camping trip with the table crew in August. Sorry guys, I'm a little slow on the uptake)

Maybe this week will be different.... or not.

Whats your word?

Lately I've been enjoying reading " Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert. I've been reading it for about a week and I'm nearly done. This is one of those books where I keep thinking of people that I want to share it with. The list has gotten very long!
In the first section of the book, in Italy, the author and another character are talking about how every city, and every person, has a word to describe it. The author thinks about what word could possibly describe herself and her life at that time and struggles to do it. I was thinking myself of what my word could be. Its difficult, because I feel like this part of my life is all about transitions. I'm looking forward to a lot of changes in the near future, but I'm still close to the past. I haven't crossed the threshold yet. I'm not really sure what my word would be. Maybe "foundations" because where I am right now is trying to get every thing set so I can build my dreams once school is done. The other word I was thinking was "hungry". Besides being physically hungry for food.. which I always am... I am hungry for learning and experience. I want to travel all over the world, meet people I would never meet here, try new challenges and enjoy all of it. I hope that my future holds all of this.
Another thing that brought out this sentiment is the arrival of the EMS catalog. Some women drool over purses and shoes, but this is my weakness. Looking through the summer gear guide I see on every page something that I wish I was doing this summer. Rock climbing, yoga, slack-lining, cliff-diving, kayaking, camping... okay, maybe not the page with the guy skateboarding... but he does have a cool t-shirt on! I don't have the gear or the money to do most of those things now, but I hope that when I do, I will have the time and ability to do so. I have a great life, I know, and lots of time left to do these things I want to do. ( I am going sky diving in June... one thing to cross off the list!) But every so once and while I feel like emulating the author of "Eat, Pray, Love", leaving everything behind and traveling around the world.

Condesending? Once

I have a big fear of being thought of as condescending. I think someone told me once that I was, and though I don't remember who it was, or when or what it was regarding, it is something that has been bothering me for quite sometime. Its something that I have been trying to consciously change, and there are times when I feel that I have been condescending that I just feel awful about. One of the ways this appears in my daily life, especially at school, is regarding knowledge. I really get excited about things I know and I want to share that knowledge with other people. I'm sure thats why I am going to be a teacher, and probably (hopefully) will make me be a good one. Here's the scenario that I really struggle with. In classes a professor will be lecturing and will either pause, waiting for someone to finish the sentence with information we're supposed to know, or asks a direct question. Sometimes the information is right there in my head and I want to fill in the blank or answer the question right away. And sometimes I do. After this happens several times in a class, I realize, guiltily that I have been answering most of the questions. So I have to make a conscious effort NOT to answer, even if I know it, and even if no one else is saying anything for a minute or so. This is a big effort for me. I know that other people in my class know the answer and its not fair for me to just jump in all the time. Wait time, its called. Its a skill that teachers have to practice when questioning students, so maybe its good that I'm having to practice it now. Other times, I want to offer constructive criticism, like on the structure of powerpoints presentations, my pet peeve thanks to a great professor at SUNY Geneseo. Today told one of the girls in my class that her power point was excellent, and had a lot of great information, but that many of the pages had too much text and it was a little overwhelming to a viewer. I worry now that I hurt her feelings, when I just meant to help. Also, I want to add my 2 cents to topics that I know about, because I want other people to know the cool things I've found out. Today, a professor was giving a presentation on something that I had just done extensive research on for a paper. I had to practically bite my lips in order not to add something. I wasn't always this way actually. I remember teachers in late middle school and early high school telling me that I couldn't get an A unless I raised my hand more in class. I had to make a big effort to do that then. I remember keeping a tally of how many times I raised my hand in French class to make sure I was participating enough. Then, I think, as I became more confident with myself, I was able to raise my hand more. Its funny now that the same thing is having the opposite effect on how I feel about myself. I guess I'll just keep trying though.
So I left school feeling pretty rotten, with all the stuff mentioned above, as well as the stress of the end of the semester work load and exhaustion from a long day. I turned on NPR as I pulled out of the parking lot, as usual. Fresh Air, which is a arts show was on. They were talking about an indie film called "Once" that had won some Grammies, but that I had never heard of. But when they played a song from the movie in the introduction, called "Falling Slowly", my attention was immediately caught! I had heard this song before, as well as several others they played later in the show. It turns out that film is directed by a former member of the Irish band, The Frames, and the main male character is a singer for the band as well. This is a band that I was introduced to during my time in Ireland, and who I really enjoy, but don't hear about much here at home. I'm really excited now about seeing this movie, and watching the clips from the movie make me want to watch it more. That picked my spirits up a bit, and I will listen to The Frames for the rest of the night whilst I try to wade my way through the last remaining projects of the semester.

Fat and weathy or healthy and broke?

Recently I bought some crystal light to-go, fiber and probiotic drink mixes. I thought that they would be cheaper than buying the delicious Naked juice I like so much, but offer some health benefits and encourage me to drink more water and its low in calories. So I tried the things and they were pretty good. But then I started to get headaches. I finally figured out that they came after I drank the mix stuff. So i checked the label and it contains aspartame, which causes headaches in many people. Needless to say, I won't be drinking those things anymore. Back to drinking just water so I can save money for school, a moped, and a trip to colorado (more about those in another post).
If I wanted to save money, but still drink things besides water, I could probably get a case of soda for the same amount as a couple bottles of the Naked juice. Clearly that would not be the healthier choice, but it would be healthier for my bank account. I'm miffed that it seems to be that way for healthy foods in general. I remember being a poor undergraduate student buying my own food and often would resort to the wegman's boxes of mac and cheese, 3 for $1, instead of making something with lean meat and veggies that would have served me better, but been much more expensive. I hope that as consumers in the US continue to demand healthier (for both people and the environment) alternatives, prices on these types of items will become more reasonable.

Sorry, not an artist.

Sometimes I wish i was more artistically talented. There have been so many times in my life when I get what I think is a great artistic idea in my head. I can picture it, down to the smallest details. Sometimes these artistic ideas are photographs I want to take, or paintings, and sometimes they are sculptures. I had one of those moments today. I was listening to NPR's "All Things Considered" about a guy who does sculptures made of nails. (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=87808787). I was listening to the descriptions of his art and all the different ways he used nails and my brain started going off on its own tangent. (which probably isn't good because I was driving, but I'll save that for another post.) I imagined a nail about half way hammered into a piece of hardwood (oak?) with a nice grain. The view would be from the side, so the nail could be seen penetrating the wood. Underneath the wood, where the tip of the nail would usually be seen, would be "roots". I'm not sure exactly what these would be made of, either small nails welded together, or wire, or more solid and realistic looking roots, but made of the same material as the nail. I visualized the sculpture pretty large, with the "nail" with a head about the size of a bar stool and the piece of wood similar to a small table. When I pictured it, it was in a art gallery with spot lighting, similar to the exhibits I have seen at Rochester's Memorial Art Gallery.
I would love to attempt a sculpture like this. Besides not having the time to spend on it or the money for materials, my general lack of artistic ability holds me back. In the past, I usually attempted my sculpture/photo/painting ideas, but so infrequently have they even approximated what I imagined, I've pretty much given up. I don't even have the drawing talent to sketch it out and have someone else make it for me! All I have now is my new digital camera, which will make attempts at any artistic photographs a little less painful, if I can figure out all the buttons.