Slice #9- Just another ordinary Tuesday...

 

Today was just another ordinary Tuesday. 

Except for one thing.

My son's car, which actually belongs(ed?) to me, was stolen. 

It really did start out to be just another ordinaryTuesday. 

I was teaching my third and final class of the morning. 

My cell phone buzzed. 

Joliet, Illinois. 

I don't know anyone in Joliet, Illinois, 

and I was teaching,

so I didn't answer it. 

At lunch time, I listened to my messages. 

The call from Joliet was actually from my son. 

Who had borrowed a phone from my neighbor because his phone 

(which was later found in an alley)

was in the car that was stolen.

My son said a terrible thing had happened. 

He had gone to a store (ok, Smoker Friendly), 

but he left that part out when he told me the story,

and a terrible thing had happened. 

He went in, just for a few minutes,

and left the car running 

(because the battery in the fob was low)

and when he came back, 

he swears, not more than five minutes

or an eternity later,

the car was gone. 

And it's still gone. 

There's one another slight problem. 

I bought the car for my son, six or seven years ago,

when he was going to college. 

My name has always been on the title, along with his. 

Last summer, I decided I didn't want my name on his car anymore,

because I was sick of paying his parking tickers

I tried to give the car to him.

It's a ten-year-old Toyota Highlander,

so it's not a new car, but it's a decent car. 

Probably worth around $9000.

He wanted something fancier. 

And he turned down my offer, 

but has continued to drive the car. 

Earlier this fall, I told him I wasn't going to insure the car anymore. 

His brother helped him find a different company, 

and I thought he was paying for his insurance. 

He wasn't. 

So now the car is missing,

and it's not insured. 

If it's gone, it's gone. 

My son doesn't have a job.

Has never worked for more than six weeks. 

Dreams of being independently wealthy,

But doesn't want to work for anyone.

He thinks I should set him up in business. 

I have actually been very close to evicting him

because I am tired of enabling him  to do nothing.

And now he doesn't even have a way to leave.  

Today was just another ordinary Tuesday. 

SLICE #8 Carol's Ten Commandments of Commenting

 0. Thou shalt comment on a minimum of ten posts a day.

1. If someone comments on your slice, thou shalt hunt theirs down and comment on that one. Turnabout is fair play. Or maybe that Golden Rule thing that some people talk about. 

2. If thou reads a post, thou shalt also comment on it. Why would you read it and not say something?

3. Thou shalt comment on at least five late-night slicers from the previous day. Those poor souls hardly get any comments, and darn it, they deserve some feedback too. 

4. Thou shalt comment on the three slices that were posted directly before your slice. 

5. Thou shalt comment on at least two or three people you have sliced with for a long time. You have a history, a relationship to maintain, for Pete's sake. 

6. Thou shalt comment on at least three people who you have never met. Didn't you ever learn the girl scout song about make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver and the other's gold?

7. Thou shalt skim the slice titles and comment on two or three that sound interesting to you. 

8. Thou shalt go back and revisit some of the new to you blogs, especially if it seems like they are not getting very many comments. 

9. Thou shalt forgive people if they have a lightweight post (like this one) maybe they have just had a long day and are too tired to write anything good. Try visiting them again the next day.

10. Thou shalt make notes about some of the more creative posts you read. Maybe you could copy their format. 

SLICE #7: TAKING HER OUT…

 

"I'm a little nervous," declared my mom, sitting in the middle of the couch, with her coat on, ten minutes before we needed to leave.

It was her first evening out in almost a year. My mom lives in a senior living apartment. Last March, when COVID started, they closed down completely. No residents were allowed to go out. No visitors were allowed to come in. My mom is used to seeing my sisters and I pretty much every week.  Betsy, went every Saturday. I took her out to lunch every Sunday. And my other sister, Nancy, and her partner, usually had dinner with her midweek. 

My mom is an extrovert. She is used to going out to lunch. And playing bridge. And doing book club twice a month. That first week, she assured us that she would be ok, as long as she could still see her friends. 

And then her facility shut down even further. Residents couldn't eat in the dining room, or use the amenities, or play cards in the commons area. Everyone had to stay in their rooms.  All the time. Meals were brought up in cardboard to-go boxes. My mom was alone. 24/7. We called every day, and most days several times, but it was really, really hard. I seriously considered taking early retirement and buying a place in her city, sixty miles south of where I live, and moving her in with me. I wasn't sure how much longer she could take being alone.

Finally, after more than one hundred days, her facility reopened. At least kind of. We were allowed to visit my mom, but only in designated areas outside. And only with masks on. No food or drink. And there would be no Sunday visitations. My sisters and I went back to visiting every week. Sometimes we would visit, then go get her lunch, and bring it back for her to eat in her room, alone. 

Mid-fall,  the facility reopened the dining room. With limited seating capacity. And then a few activities. They could go places on the facility bus, but not get off. We took her out to lunch a couple of times, but those were followed by ten day quarantines for her. Finally, she told us she didn't to go out, because she couldn't stand the quarantines afterward.

But now the world is starting to reopen. My mom's been vaccinated, and I have, and one of my sisters, who is a nurse, has also been.  And so we took my mom out to dinner last night, to celebrate her 87th birthday. We went to one of her favorite restaurants, at 5:00 when there were not many people there. My mom had steak, a small filet, and a loaded baked potato, and mushrooms, and creme brulee. Her favorites. At the end, she declared it a very nice evening. 

We are hoping for many more. COVID has been hard on her...

SLICE #6- In which I fail miserably as a learner and learn a lot about teaching…

 I have dabbled in Spanish for many years. 

I started when I was in fifth grade. 

Picked it up again in college. 

Got a little more serious about twenty years ago when I started working in my school district, that has a large percentage of Spanish-speaking families.

And super serious when I went to work as a literacy coach at a dual language school ten years ago. 

For the last three years, I have been taking classes at the Spanish Language Network. The classes are small, usually no more than eight people. The woman who owns the school is a former teacher, who not only knows a lot about teaching language, but also a lot about good teaching in general. The instructors she hires are really good. 

My Spanish has improved a lot. 

So two or three nights a week, at 4:30, 5:30, or 6:30, I switch from Google Meet where I teach all day to Zoom, where my Spanish classes are held. Most nights I just do an hour-long class. An hour is just about right for me, after I have taught all day. 

Wednesday nights, though, are different. On Wednesdays, I do two, one-hour classes back to back. The first hour is reading and writing. The second hour is a conversation table, where we tell stories and watch videos and talk about them. I love the instructor. I love the classes. But the last half hour of the second class is really hard. 

 I'm tired. I've taught all day. And then I've listened and thought in my second language for 90 minutes, which takes a lot of mental energy for me. My mind wanders and I have to tell myself to focus, again and again. 

Usually, during that time, I learn a lot about myself as a learner and as a teacher. Take last week,  for instance. 

During the conversation table,  we were reviewing past tense. Austin, my instructor, wanted us to tell a short story about something that had happened in the past few days. And I knew just the story I wanted to tell. It was a funny story about something that had happened at school. I thought the other students would love it. 

But it didn't go so well. The story was too long and too complicated, and I wasn't ready,  at all, when Austin announced that our five minutes of prep time was over. And then he called on me first. And I totally and completely blew it. The story didn't turn out funny, at all. I'm not sure anyone understood it. And I stammered around and messed up, again and again, and again.

Austin gives us feedback right afterward. And mine was as awful as I knew it would be. I had totally and completely screwed up the past tense verbs. He particularly focused on the word hacer, which means to do or to make. I hd used third person (he/she) instead of first person (I) all the way through. At our level, Austin told me, I should definitely know how to do that. Which I actually usually do.  But I didn't do it this time. 

Afterwards, and even into the next day, I felt really discouraged and embarrassed by my performance. Maybe I will never be able to speak Spanish proficiently. Maybe I should even give up. Why had I even tried to tell that story? I'm the oldest person in the class, and now I'm the stupidest also.

I made a list of harsh consequences- things I definitely needed to do if I was going to keep speaking, e.g. do 30 minutes of Spanish drill online every day, write a conjugated verb, starting with hacer, ten times in a notebook, read thirty minutes a day in Spanish. I wanted to email the instructor and apologize, and explain what I thought had gone wrong- that I was tired, that I had bitten off more than I could chew, etc. 

Now, a week later, I've kind of processed it, and forgiven myself, I'm ok. 

But it has left me thinking about a lot about my own teaching. How do I treat them on the days when they are tired, or have just had enough? How do I treat them when they have taken on a really big challenge, and failed miserably?  How does my feedback impact them? 

I have been taking Spanish classes for a long time. The classes are helping me get better at Spanish, but they are also helping me get better at teaching my kiddos, who regularly suffer from lack of focus or the lure of the internet. And who often fail miserably at tasks they should be able to do. And sometimes take on challenges that are way bigger than they can handle by themselves, or in the amount of time I give them. 

I hope I give them feedback that moves them forward, and helps them to try again, to envision their possibilities. But I'm not sure I always do that. 

Learning Spanish has taught me a lot about teaching in English.

Teachers should always be learners of something a teeny bit hard for them. 

SLICE #5- A Rooney Reunion

 

Tonight I had myself a Rooney Reunion.

Rooney belongs to Canine Partners of the Rockies. He will turn two in a few weeks. When he grows up, he wants to be a mobility dog, or perhaps an autism dog. 

Rooney should have moved into advanced training a few months ago. However, because of COVID, his training has been delayed a little. He's still hanging out with me.

Or at least most of the time he is hanging out with me. One week a month, Rooney goes on a stay-cation with another puppy raiser. The idea is that he gets used to being handled by other people, and also other living situations. 

Last Saturday, Rooney went to his training class with me, but left with Amy. I cried when I packed his things, and I cried when said goodbye to him. On Wednesday, I went to the CAPR office to return Buck, (he of slumber party fame), and Amy was volunteering. I was more than a little surprised to see my Sweet Roo. I cuddled with him for a few minutes, then left. I cried again. Rooney is my buddy. 

Tonight, I got to pick Rooney up. I thought he would be happy to see me, but he really wasn't. 

He got into the car and laid down in the back. I talked to him all the way home, but he barely responded. Maybe he's mad at me, I thought, for leaving him. 

And then we got home. He went out in the backyard and sniffed around, then came in and ate dinner and tried to go to sleep. Galaxy was very happy to see his buddy, and just wanted to play. Rooney growled and refused. 

And put himself to bed in his kennel. 

He's still there. 

I hope tomorrow Rooney will be ready for a reunion. 

I have missed him. 

SLICE #4-- So much more...

 

I hear her voice the second I open the Google Meet

"Ms. Wilcox?'

That's not uncommon. 

She is usually one of the first to arrive and one of the last to leave. 

Sometimes she has a question about an assignment. 

More often, she just wants to visit. 

She and her mother moved up from Mexico two years ago, when she was in fourth grade. 

He mother works during the day and I think she's lonely. 

I don't mind. 

She's sweet and sparkly and playful and just a little bit mischievous. 

She makes me laugh every day. 

And she's also brilliant. 

An English language learner who is totally rocking the school thing.

I adore her.

But today she is sobbing. 

"Ms. W, I-I-I might be a little late to class."

"You ok?"

She is still crying hysterically but manages to say, "Something really bad happened."

I immediately wonder if something has happened to her mom or dad, but that's not it. 

It seems she was in the apartment alone, and a maintenance man came in to do some work. 

Totally legitimate, but she didn't know he was coming, and thought someone was breaking into her apartment. 

And she was terrified.

She tells me she doesn't want to be there by herself. 

Her mom is coming to get her. 

The words fall out of my mouth. 

"Do you want to come be with us?" 

She's a remote learner and has never been to the school.

"I can come?" she asks. 

"Sure. Why not?" I say, pretty sure my principal will be ok with putting a kid's mental health in front of COVID rules. 

"I'm going to ask my mom."

A minute later she is back. 

"I can come," she says. 

Fifteen minutes later, she walks into the room.  

She is smiling, but it's not hard to pick out that she has been crying. 

And it's all I can do to keep from giving her a big hug. 

Yes, school is about academics, 

but every year, 

and this year especially, 

it is so, so much more than that.

I only wish people understood....

SLICE #3- Too old for slumber parties

I'm tired tonight. 

I think I'm too old for slumber parties. 

And we had one at my house last night. It was a doozy!

But maybe I should back up a little. 

I'm training a service dog, Rooney. And Rooney is at the point in his training where he has to go on staycations. About once a month, he spends a week with another puppy raiser. He's doing that this week. 

A couple of days ago, the service dog trainer asked if I would consider taking one of the other pups to work with me. They wanted him to have some experience in a school. I'm missing Rooney, so I said sure. I didn't know though, that I was agreeing to a puppy slumber party. 

Buck, the puppy I took to school today, lives about 15 miles east of me. I leave for work at 6:30, so I can drop off my son at his job, and still make it to work on time. I didn't think I had time to do a 30 mile round trip to pick up the puppy, drop off my son and make it to school on time and so I invited him to spend the night. 

I met Buck and his puppy mom at CAPR at 7:30. I should have known it was going to be a long night when Buck sat in the driver's seat honking the horn while I was trying to get feeding directions from his mom. 

Somehow I didn't get the message. I brought him home anyway.  My non-service dog puppy, Galaxy, was thrilled to meet him. 

First, they did mud wrestling in the pit in the corner of the backyard. That went on for about two hours. Galaxy must have spent the entire time on the bottom, because every time they came in, Galaxy was covered in another layer of mud, Buck on the other hand, remained pristine. I hosed Galaxy off, the best I could, and added, "take Galaxy for a bath" to my to do list for the weekend. 

Next, they did laps, running a loop that started in the hall by the stairs,  went over the back of a chair in the family room, around the dog crate, over my feet, through the bathroom, and back to the starting point in the hall. That went on for about 45 minutes. By that time, I was feeling a little tired, and a little  grumpy. 

And so I Buck into the crate for the night, hoping he would go to sleep. He complained for an hour, and finally did settle down. I did too, for a couple of hours. But then I had to use the restroom, and when I got up, so did Buck and Galaxy. I thought maybe Buck needed to go outside. And then Galaxy decided he would go with him. And it took another 15 minutes to get everyone back into the house. And then there was more complaining about sleeping in the kennel. 

Two hours later, I got up for the day. I had some work I had to get done before school. My friends decided they would get up too. And I spent the next couple of hours shushing them, before they finally ate breakfast and went back to sleep.

Buck slept through most of the school day too. 

I'm tired tonight. 

I think I'm too old for slumber parties.