Sly Foxes

“I want a life that sizzles and pops and makes me laugh out loud. And I don't want to get to the end, or to tomorrow, even, and realize that my life is a collection of meetings and pop cans and errands and receipts and dirty dishes. I want to eat cold tangerines and sing out loud in the car with the windows open and wear pink shoes and stay up all night laughing and paint my walls the exact color of the sky right now. I want to sleep hard on clean white sheets and throw parties and eat ripe tomatoes and read books so good they make me jump up and down, and I want my everyday to make God belly laugh, glad that he gave life to someone who loves the gift.” 
― Shauna Niequist, Cold Tangerines: Celebrating the Extraordinary Nature of Everyday Life

 

Today the volunteers had to go to a lecture about living in community by a visiting priest.  At first I wasn't feeling it.  I was tired, cranky, and very emotional from a rough week of teaching.  He talked about accepting your selfishness, using God's gifts that He can you, and the truly listening to one another.  He also brought up the idea of expectations in relationships versus demands.  All of these things have come up in my life recently.  It was weirdly accurate.  There goes God again.

 

From time to time, I remind myself of Niequist's quote and how we can it apply it to our daily lives.  It's about not taking yourself too seriously and remembering you too deserve to act like a kid every once in awhile.  That's why on Wednesday I taught my students how to act like foxes and slyly walk from our building to the other elementary building.  Every so often I would turn around and they would stop in their tracks with a scared look on their faces.  Must have been because I told them if I caught them that the enemy critter would eat them....... 

Too Much

Things I've Learned the Past Week and Some Things That I Already Knew But Resurfaced:

1.  If you don't have anything nice to say, then don't say anything at all.
2.  Sometimes kindergarteners seriously need a nap and then everything will be a ton better.
3.  No matter how rough today was, tomorrow is always a new day.
4.  Trusting in God's plan may be difficult. 
5.  Knowing that I need to trust in His plan makes each struggle worth the battle.
6.  Six year olds have more germs than eight year olds. Doing "air fives" instead of high fives will save a teacher from numerous colds and sore throats.
7.  Having a strong support system here and back home may be the only reason I survive my first year teaching.

Today was ultimately the hardest day I've ever had as a teacher. I can't get into details. I can tell you though that I reached my breaking point.  Yes, I'm here to teach.  Yes, I know why God put me at this school on this reservation.  No, I wasn't prepared for the incident that happened today.  Today really made me wonder why God specifically put me in this kindergarten position though.  I wasn't ready for kindergarten.  It takes a special gift to work with the kids at this age level.  My mom has it as does my friend Holly.  Alas, I've always known God did not give that gift to me.  I came to Red Cloud knowing that, but I wanted to be out here on the Rez badly enough that I just thought of it as a learning experience.  My heart yearns for the second graders again. 

I want kids in my classroom that can read, tie their shoes, and remember to raise their hand to talk.  I want kids that do not have "accidents".  That hasn't proven to be a part of God's plan though.  He has me with the germiest, youngest, most undisciplined, and squirreliest ones of the entire elementary school. Maybe this just goes to show that God has a deeper understanding of what we need....gosh,  He's done it again.

Come Back Martin Luther

Today I went to another mass, but at a new place for me.  Honestly, I'm tired of trying to understand being Catholic.  Since I'm working at school that teaches Catholic/Lakota values, alot of our volunteer community is Catholic.  Little did I know how much this would affect me.

I want to worship with other Christians.  Going to mass each week with members of my community let's me do so.  But to me, this isn't my path.  Everything about the Catholic service still seems so foreign to me.  Yes, the Lutheran denomination is the closest to Catholicism that you can get.  Yet my synod, ELCA, is the furthest away from what most Catholics believe.

I miss being able to take communion.  I miss having lots of little kids at church.  I miss our choir.  I miss actually having a youth ministry.  I miss everything about my church at home.  Most of all I miss my church family-the people that I feel comfortable serving the Lord with.  While being out here on the Rez, most Sundays feel as if I'm just "playing church".  My faith has not grown while out here.  I haven't found people to hold me accountable about my faith journey like I do at home and at camp.  Apparently, most Catholics don't like to "free pray" like us camp counselors.  It's all the traditional kind of prayer that makes it hard for me to see God at work.

Even though this struggle continues, my teaching has gotten better and so have many relationships with friends out here.  We all challenge each other with rants about the way our school system works or what really proved to be most important to our school community.  I've grown very close to one of the guy volunteers and care about him alot.  It's a very different type of relationship than I've ever been in and people in our community never saw it coming.  I learn new things about him everyday and appreciate him challenging me to be a better person. We're very different but for some reason we mesh.

 He loves football.  I don't understand it.  I do understand his passion for coaching though and that's all that matters.  He hates lying down in grass.  I love being outdoors.  He's Catholic.  I'm Lutheran.  It's something we're still working on together.  He gives me compliments.  I don't know how to react to them.  This is one time in my life that I'm willing to take this experience slow.  So many of my past relationships went way too fast and have paid the consequences. I've learned so much about my journey with Christ and the person that He wanted me to be this past year.  Maybe just maybe, we've both finally gotten the timing right :)

Meet Squeakers

Yesterday I noticed the worst thing ever....my voice started to get deeper.
In the life of a camp counselor/teacher that can only mean one thing-----utter chaos.  My voice went completely out today.  Even when I tried to talk normally to my students either a squeak or a whisper came out.  They kept asking, "Miss Abby, where did your voice go?"  I said if I knew, then I would go get it. 

I wrote out these huge plans for my two aides at 6:30 this morning, but decided to stay in the classroom the whole day just in case something went wrong.  My aides did really well with the whole group reading instruction and discipline.  Thank God for people who are willing to step up.  In the morning we had kindergarten through eighth grade mass at the chapel here.  My little ones sat between the eighth graders.  I hadn't warned them and it showed.  A few of the youngest kids were terrified but eventually warmed up to the big kids next to them.  It easily made my day.  During the afternoon one of my kids took a number 2 in his pants.  Apparently, his family had a case of diarrhea throughout the week.  My aide, Mikey, had to deal with the bulk of it by helping the kid clean himself off.  Got to love the life of a kindergarten teacher. 

My voice is still crapped out as of right now.  Off to write more lesson plans for my aides tomorrow.  The adventures of teaching continue....

Kindergarten-Boogers, Untied Shoes and Being a Mom

It's been way too long since I last posted. 

I'm officially a kindergarten teacher.
I'm officially a certified bus driver.
Apparently God finds some humour in these things and the way my life has turned out.

Life on the Rez got really serious the last three weeks.  I'm done with two solid weeks of teaching my twenty students.  Honestly it feels like I've been "playing school" as my mom's put it.  But, now it's time to teach my little ones how to read.  Crazy.  I always hated relearning phonics in college and now I have to teach it.  Not one of my favorite scenarios.

Since I'm teaching in a private school, my kids are all on a 30 day trial.  The first week I had to tell one of my students that he couldn't come next week.  His behavior was out of control even though his academics were sound.  Talk about a rough first Friday of the school year.  Although he gave me and the aides a lot of trouble, I couldn't help but like him.  I cried when I put him on the bus.  The next Monday I had a new student to replace him.

Every day I'm learning about the kind of kindergarten teacher I want to be.  These kids have absolutely no manners.  They poke, pinch, and give each other rattlesnake burns.  They can't tie their shoes.  They ask to go to the bathroom every five minutes.  I know that I'm not going to teach this grade forever.  But, I can't help but love being a mom to them--holding their hand on the way to Religion/Lakota class or to PE, opening their milk for them at lunch, tying their shoes, stuffing their folders, or making sure that they have an extra set of clothes just in case they have an "accident".  For some reason right now, I know that God put me in the "magical kingdom" of a classroom.  Although I may not be able to see through the intense reading curriculum, I know my kids will come so far by May. 

What He has given me in challenges at school, He made up for it in my friends here.  They are very supportive and that's all I can ask for. When Claire and I finally make it out of our classrooms, we bake cookies while talking in weird accents.  Anna tries to dance on me while we cook.  Kevin and I end up wrestling when we get too frustrated with school work.  Liz makes up random lies that we can only tell she's lying when she bursts out into contagious laughter.  Tim and Maria always have a meal going when I come in at six each day from school.  Shannon talks about her days in med school and stories of the ER. Plus there are too many stories to count.  Some how we make up a huge family that just seems to work in our volunteer program.  These people challenge me to be the real Abby, not the one my college friends knew.  Thank God for these people and kids in my life.  Every day makes me glad I'm here.

Sometimes I still wonder what teaching in Indiana would have been like.  Every time I think that though, I know how grateful I am for this experience.  Hopefully I'm being the woman of God that I'm meant to be.  Even if it involves little five year olds....
God Works.