New Year

Here we are -- the new year. After so much consternation involving lost/gained positions, I'm back.

Same school, same job, different students.

I recently stumbled upon my behavior notebook from my first year of teaching. It's a small, brown and green notebook that promises it is 100% post-consumer recycled materials. Inoffensive and unassuming, one would never guess the words it held inside. Upon flipping through, I notice names and actions scrawled in blue and red ink. Rxxx stole pencils. Rxxx punched a student. Dxxxx stabbed a student with a pencil. Txxx started a fight. Axxx ran away from the classroom. The ink trickles down the page like a tear-face, worn from sitting in my flooded basement over the summer.

I was about to throw out the soiled tome, but I stopped. Right about where I listed all the things Rxxx did in one day (two pages front and back of behaviors) and decided to keep the book. It's a reminder of a world that is out there, a few miles south of the school I'm in. It's a reminder of what I went through and how far it took me.

I wonder where those students are. If they continue to be passed through the system, and there's nothing to prevent this, they should be entering 3rd grade this year. I wonder how many of them made it. I'm sure many moved, transferred or disappeared, but my mind still thinks of them.

The Spectrum of Emotions pt. 1

Buckle up ladies and gentlemen -- this is going to be a long one.

Let's start with the basics. It's the end of the year -- officially. Rooms are cleaned out, movies are shown, treats are distributed. The warm stench of humidity and rancid milk can only mean rising temperatures and lowered investment. It's easy to trick younger students into continuing, smelly stickers and math games can get you by -- it's the older kids that require more finesse.

My kids made it, even better, with significant gains! Who would have thought that after the choas of last year I'd bring students to be on-level with their peers.

The end of the year was a flurry of activity compounded with the oppressive heat and humidity. All in all, my time at my school has been both a blessing and a curse.

First, the positives. I really felt as if I had been welcomed into the community. A community that nourished good educators and was very student-centric. I felt privileged, for the most part, to work with my peers and in turn felt appreciated. It was great to see a school that was highly functioning in the Chicago Public School district despite the massive debacle that was happening several levels up (more on this in part 2).

For the negatives. It seems as though my time at my school may have ended and not by my own hands. This is one of the most infuriating developments within my short tenure as an educator. I remember a year and a half ago thinking that I could never teach and that I did not want to teach. I was exhausted and drained and felt like teaching was not for me. Fast forward to a year at a supportive school where I was able to make a difference for a handful of students. I felt and saw the difference in their lives, and with that a difference in my own. I truly felt like I could make a difference and, interestingly enough, truly wanted to continue to do so.

Now, it seems, like the choice to positively affect student achievement has been forced from my hands. As for the reasons why and my anger with these decisions, I will save that for part 2. Suffice it to say that I will most likely be evicted from teaching in a classroom.

After so thoroughly convincing myself that I am able to make a difference in students' lives, unfortunately I'm not able to do that this coming year.

It's bittersweet, after all -- these two years in Teach for America. I had anticipated growing and evolving as a human being and certainly I did, but in ways I could never expect. I have been pushed to the very limits and been rewarded beyond my imagination. I think about my students like Faith and Randall and Daeshaun that are lost and behind and, most likely, will continue to be as such. I think about students like Deondre and Duaa and Zain that have been put on a different path in life and will continue to succeed.

It's the bitter and the sweet that truly make life a decadent meal. The bitter sting of defeat and remorse offset by the sweet sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. I think about all the things I never new about children and education and about myself that I now have such a firm knowledge of.

I've discovered passion and fire that I never dreamed I'd have in me.

There is cause to celebrate, as this era comes to a close -- yet the abyss that lies before me is a grand chasm of unknown. It's somewhat exhilarating not knowing where I will be or what will happen and I hope to experience the same feelings of growth and accomplishments soon.

Accepting the Present

It takes something like death to shake one out of the doldrums. All too often I found myself wearily progressing. Then, like a freight train, death comes barreling out of a darkened tunnel.

The death of my grandmother was something we were all prepared for. My mom had begun funeral arrangements long before the hospice nurses arrived. We began discussing plans for a smaller home for my mother. Despite the best laid plans, I was sorely unprepared for the morning of April 23rd -- I've become so familiar with the date that I don't even have to scour my brain for the exact number.

I realized that in my life I look forward to the future, albeit one that is uncertain. My fears and anxieties stem from the total lack of knowledge of what's to come. Suddenly I was forced to reflect on my past and the past I shared with a loved one. Sitting her, I realize that I dwell on the past far more than I thought. I think about people that have come in and out of my lives and the ones that are still here with me now. I think about past regrets and the shadows they cast over my present being. I think, "what if" and allow my mind to painfully live out a life that most likely will never come true.

It's easy to claim no regrets yet it's far more difficult to accept. It's these moments of quiet reflection when my mind tends to drift. Time flows forward, constant and unmovable and in its wake memories that were and might have been.

I really wish I could accept the present as a gift, but again easier to claim than to believe.

A new challenge

One of the hallmarks of Teach for America is reflection. I definitely have taken this pillar to heart. Of course reflection, in Teach for America speak, involves creating plans that address the shortcomings of the day.

I've been reflecting on my journey -- the twists and turns and sudden falls and steady climbs. I think about where I was and where I am and I'm amazed at the trip I've taken. All of this reflection seems to carry a moribund tone but alas, I have no current plans to kick the bucket.

It seems as though the ultimate challenge I've faced this year, when you distill all the fighting, tears, pain and strife, is the unknown. No, I don't want to sound like a motivational poster with a singular image of a frosty mountain peak, but the cliche words are never truer. For me not knowing has been the scariest thing.

Rewind to Spring of last year -- not knowing what projectile would be flung at my head or which student was going to be suspended caused me massive amounts of anxiety. This year, as my situation evened out, I became more uncertain as my skills as a teacher. As the year draws to a close, my future once again looms its ugly, minimum wage-paying head.

I've been all-but assured that I will not have a position at my school next year. After that conversation I felt upset but I wasn't quite sure why. I never intended to teach for more than two years but a part of me feels like I have missed the entire experience. I haven't had the opportunity to move my own group of students from point A to B throughout the course of an entire year. I'm talking about day 1 to day 180.

So here we are, again with the unknown, but I can't help feel a slight (ever so slight) thrill. The opportunity, the freedom, the exhilarating breath of air -- grounded by the reality of unemployment. I don't know what's on the horizon -- but who really ever does?

Oscar, Oh Oscar

I'm a movie snob.

I'm sure that doesn't come as a surprise to most of you. I say this as a caveat to the arrogance (or perceived arrogance) that might follow in this post. You see, when people talk about movies it drives me crazy. When people misquote movie information it drives me crazy.

The worst is when people are exiting a movie theater and have post-cinema banter. It -- drives -- me -- crazy.

I'm remembering to breathe.

But alas, here in late winter, most of the world is buzzing with Oscar talk. At this time of year, this old crone gives most movie gabbers a reprieve because movie talk is inevitable.

Yes, it's Oscar time.

I think what drives me insane about public opinions and Oscars is that people are clouded by favoritism. Of course you want your favorite movie to win because it's your favorite, but how unbiased can your opinion be if the only Oscar nominated movies you've seen are Avatar and Up? Avatar does not merit the highest cinematic awards simply, "Because it rocked in 3-D" or because, "The blue smurf-cats got it on!!!". Well, maybe the latter is sufficient justification.

When people talk about movies I roll my eyes. I sit erect and assume a look of casual superiority. I know, I'm a snob. I do appreciate, however, the way that movies can elicit such strong feelings from people and be objects of such contention. It's such a subjective medium that any film can be the best film of the year for a multitude of reasons and which people are more than willing to argue about.

Perhaps that's why people want to fight for their movie -- to prove that it's the best. But movies are locked in a boxing ring, slugging it out for top honors. Movies speak for themselves, they speak to our experiences and our emotions and reveal a lot about who we are. They don't need Joe A-hole exiting the Kerasotes on Western pontificating why Transformers 2 is the bitchin'-est movie of all time.

All I'm saying is movies need to have their own story -- let's let them speak for themselves -- I'm talking to you Joe A-hole.

More Nostalgia?

It's funny that when you're living life you don't immediately think that these are the moments you'll be nostalgic for.

I remember in college when life was a blur of booze, fast women, and baked goods (well, mostly the latter), I never stopped to think, "In five years I'm going to yearn for this feeling of reckless irresponsibility". Yet as I think back to all my friends and all the feelings and emotions, I do wish I could have an ounce of those feelings back. Back when we were all a little silly, a little frantic, but ultimately a little closer.

Now I look around and my friends are, no joke, doctors, lawyers, business people, journalists, public servants, and people working to survive. The current of life sweeps in and drifts people apart. Who knew we'd be where we are now?

All I know is when I stalk my friends on facebook I get this pang in the deepest recesses of my heart for the way things were. But I know those feelings could never be recreated. I cherish those times and recall them whenever I'm feeling lonely.

Christmas Homecoming

Before my voyage to San Antonio I liked to complain about how I was not looking forward to visiting while in the back of my mind, I was actually quite elated. I would complain to friends and passersby of the warm winter and obligatory family functions, but I was secretly anticipating both.

So when I touched down in San Antonio, in the balmy 65 degree weather, I had a facade of ambivalence but in my heart, feelings of warmth waiting to burst forth. In my 24 years of life, everytime I came home for the holidays I always felt like a child -- to be coddled and catered upon. For the very first time, I felt as if I were an adult, coming home to a life that seemed so long ago. The environment had changed little, imperceptibly so. The sights, sounds and smells all rang familiar. Time seems to have soldiered on with the only hint of evolution being the massive highway system that seemed to have been erected in, well, no time at all.

As the days went on, however, I realized that there have been small bits and pieces that were different, but not in the fast-food landscape (the Whataburger still stood proudly on DeZavala and I-10), but within my own mindset.

When I came home I, due to woeful negligence, had forgotten pajamas to sleep in and I had no back up. While riffling through the discounted novelty t-shirts at Walmart I realized that this had never happened to me before. Unfortunately, when transplanting my life 3,000 miles away I had forgotten to leave a sliver in San Antonio in case I needed it.

While growing up, I had always thought my family was excepted from bad circumstances. Sure my mother suffered from some medical issues but we would always make it through. My dad, though flawed, would always have the uncanny ability to fix a problem (or at least take it off my hands). Money, while an object of contention as to whose hands it should be in, was never a problem to procure. This time, however, I saw that all the exceptions I perceived were not there. My family was just as ordinary as anyone else's.

As I ponder the lives that have developed from the Lim household I wonder if they are what my parents expected when they started a family some thirty years ago. I can still remember being seven years old, the age of the students I teach, and not knowing or even thinking about my life twenty years later.

I've been thinking a lot about what it means to be an adult. Does it mean coming 'home' and realizing you don't have a spare set of clothes to change into? Is it noticing the scraggly gray hair that wasn't there last year? For me, it's something far less tangible. It's a switch that remained dormant for so long that, when it was finally clicked, caught me off guard. In many ways, I still feel as though I'm a child, kicking and screaming as I'm dragged into the world of grown-ups, but I know that it's inevitable no matter how hard you try to put it off.