Energy

My last class of the day was rather lively and I had to take away necklaces from two boys. The necklaces looked, to me, like bungee cords. The boys had removed them from their necks and were swatting things with them.

When the teacher came to pick up the class I simply handed the necklaces over. She said "You know these are titanium, right?"

"Nope."

"Yeah, they are supposed to give you energy."

I was shocked. I had to ask, "These kids need more energy?"

Then after thinking for a moment about how I'm having a hard time adjusting to waking up earlier I added, "Maybe I should get one."

That's when she told me, "They are expensive."

She asked one of the young men I had confiscated a necklace from how much his had been.

"$60."

How much should I be willing to pay to be able to keep up with my students?

Andre the Canadian?

As part of the first-day-of-library activities I have been having all my classes make name cards. That way I can learn their names and if I ever need to assign them seats I can do it easily. Since I saw the last of my classes today (we start the second rotation tomorrow) my speech about the name cards had gotten pretty long. I've been learning along the way.

Their names have to be big enough and dark enough for me to read them.

They have to write the name they go by in class.

They can draw pictures, but the pictures need to be school-appropriate.

The pictures should not obscure their name.

Anyway, one of my students asked me today if he could go by "Andre" (shortened from "Andrew"). I have no problem with shortened versions of their names. I was just telling them to write down what their teacher calls them to avoid things like "Scooby-Doo" and "Bat Man." I wasn't going to object, but he apparently felt he needed to explain further because he said, "It's okay for me to go by Andre because I'm half Canadian."

I love working with kids.

My People

There is a book on the summer reading list that all the fifth graders had to read. I found out right away that most of the students strongly disliked it, so I started encouraging discussion.

Now, I have not read this book. And once I realized it was going to be a discussion topic I should have at least read a good summary. But I didn't. I just kept asking the students to talk about their feelings on the book.

There have been one or two students in each class who do like it, though. And I try to get them to talk too, to get a different perspective. In one of the classes a young lady told me she liked the book because she liked reading about "her people."

This young lady has beautiful tan skin and curly black hair. Her race simply isn't obvious. I had to ask her, "What people are we talking about?"

As it turns out, we were talking about African Americans. It's a civil rights book.

Boy am I an idiot.

I have listened to another of K. L. Going's books on CD, for what it's worth.

Won't Be Worried Long

Way back when we were living in England I started my job search. I even wrote a song about it.

Then John and I moved home and I was still worried. More worried, even. I added some verses.

Well, as the song promised, I wasn't worried long. At least as far as the job search was concerned. I have recently started my new job as a private school librarian. The students came back to school this week and I taught my first classes.

As my job search went on and on I began to think I would have to settle for a job that wasn't an ideal fit. Instead I found a job that is better than I could have hoped. I am truly loving it!

Will I really stop worrying?

There is always something to worry about, and to quote my dear friend Jeff, "Telling me not to worry is like telling me not to breathe. Eventually I'll pass out and do it anyway."

Bring Me a Shrubbery!

When I was in high school Mom was driving Amanda to school one day and they saw a cat get hit by another car. Amanda was really upset so Mom promised to go back and check on the cat after dropping Amanda off. The cat had wondered off the side of the road, but had ultimately died. Mom decided to put it in the trunk of the car and take it home so Amanda could achieve some peace by giving the cat a burial.

Of course I ended up providing the muscle for the endeavor. You see, our back yard is full of red clay and tree roots. I took a pick ax and chopped up the dirt before trying to scoop it out of the hole with the shovel. To make matters worse, Jack (the name Amanda gave the dead cat) had gotten stiff, so we couldn't make him a more compact shape. We finally had to bury him in a standing position with his front legs on one side of a tree root and his back legs on the other side.

I conducted another burial in the yard this weekend. We are still in the process of moving everything out of Mom's house. Even now we don't have everything out, but Mom told me she wanted to unplug the big chest freezer in the garage. The placenta from Virginia's home birth was in that freezer, so I took this as motivation to finally do something with it.

Back when I was planning the home birth I asked the midwives what would happen with the placenta. They said some people like to encapsulate. Other people bury it. When I kept looking at them like I was hoping for another answer they said it was possible to donate the placenta to people who train cadaver sniffing dogs. This third option was my personal plan, however, months after the placenta was already in the freezer I looked up how to make a donation to the cadaver dogs and discovered that I should have stored it differently and donated it more promptly.

On to plan B. I was never interested in encapsulation (and even if I was, that also would have had to happen soon after birth). I'm not as grossed out by it as I was initially, but still - not for me. So that left burial.

I was hoping that being older and wiser I would have less difficulty digging this hole than I did digging Jack's. I did pick a location that had fewer roots but I still had to battle red clay. It was a hot and challenging morning.

Rather than burying the placenta unceremoniously in the yard, I decided to plant an azalea on top of it. After all, life comes from life, and although the buried placenta will surely feed any number of plants and animals before it fully decomposes, it will be kind of neat to look at one of those plants and know that it is being fed by the same organ that fed Virginia for nine months.

Ants

I started work on Thursday. It was the first of three new faculty orientation days. Then there will be the teacher work days and school doesn't start for the students for over another week.

Anyway, on Thursday there were some ants in the library. I won't go into great detail because the school is very nice and I don't want to give the impression that there were ants because it is dirty or anything like that. These things just happen sometimes, especially when it is really hot outside and ants can't find water.

My fellow librarian put out some bait for the ants and when I returned to work yesterday they were gone (whew!). I spent the morning meeting other faculty and learning how to use the library cataloging and circulation software. In the afternoon I was in the office working on my own when the exterminator came.

We had put in a work order for someone to take care of the ants. I went out to talk to him. Told him where the ants had been and that our solution seemed to have worked. He sprayed a little bit for good measure, then wanted me to write the school address on the invoice and sign it.

I am not good at recalling things like addresses unless I make a point of remembering them. (I'm still shaky on our new home address.) I didn't know the school address. It wasn't written on anything that was lying around the circulation desk. He saw me looking around and said, "I'm stressin' you out, baby! I'm sorry."

"No, no. It's okay." I said. "I'm new, I just need to look up the address."

"You don't have any kids, do you?" He asked.

"Actually," I said, "I have an eight month old little girl"

"Oh, you a new mom. No wonder you stressed. You get away from the baby and someone come to work and stress you out."

"You're not stressing me out." I said. "I'm fine."

Then he asked. "You got some water around here?"

I looked around and frowned. "Umm."

"I'm stressin' you out again, baby. I'll go look in the office."

Here I am starting a new job, trying to exude confidence. I can teach classes. I can order books. I am awesome.

But the exterminator saw right through me.

Feet

Even before Virginia was born she had very busy feet. They would poke out of the left side of my abdomen as she stretched and exercised.

As a newborn Virginia kicked anything her feet came into contact with, me, the chair I was nursing her in, the wall, etc. As an almost 8-month-old, she still does this. It just makes life a little more interesting since she is now a lot longer. (How do I hold her in the rocking chair so I can nurse her to sleep without her feet touching anything?)

And now her feet have boldly gone where neither of her feet had gone before: into her mouth. (This moment is brought to you by gDiapers which seem to restrict her leg movements less than her usual cloth diapers.)

So far future job prospects are soccer player or contortionist.