The longest week of the year

In real terms, it's simply a five-day work week, but after almost eight weeks in which I was the boss of my time and when I hung out with the people I chose, this first full week of school feels like a grueling endurance test. Things I've had to get used to: lunch at 10:35 a.m.; moving to a different room for six of the seven daily class periods; spending time when I would be working, planning or correcting in conversation with my student teacher; having to carry and use my personal laptop to try to find locations near my first period class where the wireless network signal works to take attendance each morning; a class in which more than half are repeaters; a student in an honors class so emotionally needy that she makes audible, disparaging comments if the other students don't applaud her work as loudly as (or even louder than) they do other students' work; bringing a cup of yogurt daily for lunch during my prep period (12:30 - 1:10) because that's all my stomach can handle. That last one will change as I adapt to this very different year, especially on days when the cafeteria offers chicken patty sandwiches, spaghetti, french bread pizza, and their turkey dinners.

I mentioned my student teacher, Gina. She's actually very good, much more mature than "Junior" (my previous student teacher a few years ago) was, and quite independent in many ways. Although she was concerned about classroom management, she was running my British Lit class well by Day 3...but I have to admit it's a class of 8 seniors who have almost no behavior issues. However, she is bonding with them and that's an excellent start. She's still learning about pacing during class time and in planning, about the logical order of things, and about different learning styles which is a subject that I assumed was still covered in education classes at the local university, the same one I attended for both of my degrees. It's not. That floored me. I ended up giving Gina a quick mini-lesson on different "modalities" or ways in which people take in and learn information by using myself as an example: visual/spatial memory, auditory intake of information, tactile/kinesthetic task learner, visual curiosity and attention to detail. That should help her to understand why we vary types and styles of assessments (tests, quizzes, homework, projects, etc.) and why we have to present the information - curriculum and assignments - in so many different ways, trying to offer it so that the widest variety of learning styles can grasp it. She's a fast learner so I'm confident she'll pick it up quickly.

Sis3 has had some health issues, so with the help of her kids, she's getting treatment for them. She started this past Monday, and it may take some time, but I know she's being well taken care of, and that's a great relief.

The tendinitis in my arm that's bothered me for a couple of months is starting to respond to ibuprofen to bring down internal swelling. The pain is less and my grip is getting stronger. I thought I was able to stop taking it so I backed off a few days ago, but with the lifting and carrying at school and the work with jewelry making tools, I'm not quite there yet so I'm back to four-times-a-day doses. An unexpected side benefit has been that what seemed like a knot in a muscle under my right shoulder blade seems to have disappeared, and I suspect it was also a tendon that was somehow aggravated. Less pain and discomfort is A Very Good Thing.

September is, I'm happy to say, the month with the fewest craft fairs. It's the time after the summer season to take a breath and begin to make more product for the fall and pre-Christmas times. I need to print more two-sided business cards - one for the jewelry me and one for the shop - to hand out to people. I ran out of both at my reunion, so it's time to get printing again.

Once the dust settles after a significant performance by a friend and his band on September 21, I may be helping this friend write more of a book that was started about a year ago. The collaboration began not long after he had the idea to write it because I know fairly well the original piece of literature from which this story flows. We work well together, ideas flying and flowing, sometimes when we adopt the personas of the main characters, sometimes in almost an interview format, and sometimes in straight discussion. He's the one with the vision, and I'm the one who helps him to flesh it out. I'm very much looking forward to resuming the process.

Today my friend Mary and I will go shopping. Her husband is hunting and my husband is at a cross country meet, so it's just us girls wandering around. I'm not sure where we'll go, I do have a few items I'd like to find but if it doesn't happen...oh well, and it'll be a fine day.We're nearly the same size, and we know each other's taste in clothing, so we're forever finding something and handing it off to the other one to try on. She's such an easy person to spend time with and she seems so capable of handling anything that life throws her, but she too needs time like this to let her hair down and know that our conversations in the car and over lunch go no farther.