Yesterday, we took a group of 6th grade girls to a "ropes" course in the woods of Pell City, Alabama, at Camp Winnataska. It was a fabulous experience that (hopefully) served to build the girls' confidence and their relationships with us and each other.
Surprisely, one of the most difficult exercises for them was the first: the trust fall. In the gym before we hit the woods, we practiced falling and catching. One person trustingly falls backward, and the other person catches them and stands them back up. The students had REMARKABLE difficulty falling. They have a hard time trusting. It was very surprising.
In the woods, we did a trust fall from a 3 ft high platform. The entire group stands below the platform facing each other with arms zippered together waiting to catch, and the "faller" did a NESTEA plunge off the platform. One girl freaked at the end and flung her arms out. I got backhanded across the nose, and the camp counselor guy got it in the eye. My nose FELT broken, but it wasn't. I am a bit bruised and swollen, but the cover-up hides it.
We did a couple more problem-solving, team building activities. The most interesting was the 12-ft wall. 4 people were at the top pulling you up, the rest were at the bottom pushing you up. With no rope, girl after girl - including both Ms. Hammond and me - went up a 12-foot wall and over the top!!! Amazing! My knees were shaking for a while. I had been the person whose thigh everyone put their foot on to get started up the wall, and it felt good to provide a solid foundation for the girls. It felt awkward to rely upon them to get me up the wall, but I guess that was the whole point, huh?
Last night I soaked in Epsom salts to soothe the muscles and calm the bruising. Today, I felt pretty good and had a fairly good teaching day.
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
Does anybody really know what time it is? Care?
Because of the way this job has affected me, I've let my fitness routine diminish, I've lost contact with lots of friends who bring me joy and laughter, and I've done almost NOTHING creative in months. I want my life back. Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes; how do you measure a year? It's tough to trade a year of your life (especially at this age) to a job. I will never do this again. Life is way too short, and the money (although it saved our bacon this year) isn't worth it. No amount of money would be worth what I've been through in this job. I need to receive positive feedback from people DAILY. I need to see that I'm accomplishing something on the job. I need to laugh with people all throughout the day. My teaching team has been great, but we only get a few minutes a day. The rest of the time, I'm with these needy kids that are SO negative and have attitude ALL the time. When they respond positively, I'm like a sponge. When they are negative, I must raise this shield that is SO oppressively heavy to deflect their harsh words and repulsed expressions. By the end of the day, I'm just so worn OUT.
February trudged by, all gray and slimy and cold. March BLEW by like the wind. April is almost gone, and I have only 3 full weeks and 3 days after Friday!!!!!! (of teaching at this school)
Being over 40 does have its advantages. However, emotional stability simply is NOT one of them for me. With the job I have, I have very little creative energy to write and work through the emotions that swirl around in my overactive gray matter all the time.
I have been doing lots of work in the yard; we've planted trees, built and planted 3 garden beds, and finished a sizeable flower bed in the front yard. This kind of nurturing activities really provide a creative outlet that has enough of a physical component to keep me sane.
Hubby has done a great deal of fence-mending with me, and our relationship seems to be really growing again. I can now see a future for the 6 Montalbanos together, and that wasn't true for a long time. It's not that I had plans for us splitting up, but I just didn't know how we'd be able to stay together with that amount of OFFENSE in the relationship. The bleeding has stopped, and the wounds are on the mend.
The sad blanket is off, and I've been really enjoying life at home with hubby and the kids. It is so wonderful to have this group of people who loves me and treats me SO well to come home to after a day at my school. I look forward to some time off this summer.
What time is it again?
February trudged by, all gray and slimy and cold. March BLEW by like the wind. April is almost gone, and I have only 3 full weeks and 3 days after Friday!!!!!! (of teaching at this school)
Being over 40 does have its advantages. However, emotional stability simply is NOT one of them for me. With the job I have, I have very little creative energy to write and work through the emotions that swirl around in my overactive gray matter all the time.
I have been doing lots of work in the yard; we've planted trees, built and planted 3 garden beds, and finished a sizeable flower bed in the front yard. This kind of nurturing activities really provide a creative outlet that has enough of a physical component to keep me sane.
Hubby has done a great deal of fence-mending with me, and our relationship seems to be really growing again. I can now see a future for the 6 Montalbanos together, and that wasn't true for a long time. It's not that I had plans for us splitting up, but I just didn't know how we'd be able to stay together with that amount of OFFENSE in the relationship. The bleeding has stopped, and the wounds are on the mend.
The sad blanket is off, and I've been really enjoying life at home with hubby and the kids. It is so wonderful to have this group of people who loves me and treats me SO well to come home to after a day at my school. I look forward to some time off this summer.
What time is it again?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
