it's been a while

It's been a while since I've come around here to write about what's going on in my life.  This week was a great week.  I had my last day of work on Tuesday and have been running errands and enjoying my freedom ever since.  

This past year has been an interesting one at work.  I have confirmed a few things: I like to teach and I have a lot to learn still.  I am looking forward to next year working at a new school.  I am going to teach 4th grade and do the International Teaching Certificate at the same time.  It will be a lot of work but, I think that it is the perfect time to do it.  I hope that the work I have to do for the certificate program really complements my teaching.

During this break I want to write, run, play, and read... Ariel and I want to go to Boquete and the Volcan and at the end of the summer enjoy the visit of a couple friends and do some touristy stuff with them.

There will be more to tell but, for now that is going to be it.

Quito!

I had a great time in Quito last week.  I had no idea how much history was packed into the city and country of Ecuador.  It was a great time.  I would love to go back to visit again sometime.

I spent most of my time at an International Educators Conference but, I spent the rest of the time with Ariel and our friend Mariqui touring the city.  She did a great job of showing us the highlights.  

What I liked the best about the city was the Colonial part.  We got to cimb up to the highest tower of the Basilica and that was great because we got a great view of the city.

Mariqui, Hannah, & Ariel

Mariqui also took us up one of the volcanoes that surrounds the city called Pichincha.  On the way up we got a spectacular view of the city, once we got up to the top we were in a cloud.  Ecuador's climate is quite cold most of the time.

 

Mariqui did a great job of showing us the highlights.  We walked around the old city and saw the churches, Ariel was able to see on of the museums and she took us out to eat real Ecuadorian cuisine.  

Probably one of the best parts of the trip was getting to spend some time with some of Ariel's Ecuadorian friends that he made when he lived in Guatemala.

I loved the people, the flowers (there were so many beautiful flowers everywhere!) and the culture (so much art, museums, history, etc.).  I would love to go back someday.

It's December!

It has been a rainy December so far.  Aside from the mud in the driveway, I LOVE IT.  The rain is fantastic.  Especially because every day there is a little break when we see the sun and then it starts to rain again.  Everything is nice and cool, chilly almost.  So nice for snuggling and drinking tea.  It's December!  

I think I'm more excited about my birthday this year because I get to spend it with Ariel.  I'm also looking forward to Christmas... 

November 3: Separation from Colombia

Little kids in a parade...

Today is a national holiday and the begining of my longest break since the begining of school. I have to say that I'm tired and it is much needed.  

Today Panama celebrates it's separation from Columbia November 3, 1903.  I've had to teach and re-teach the story to my students in the past couple of days so, I'm becoming re-acquainted with my country's history.  For some reason I need to be around these things for it to stick in my memory.  Teaching it is great because I've been reminded of some of the little details of how it all played out.

Ariel is leading a youth activity right now so, I'm doing a little bit of cleaning and will do a bit of writing (my novel, hehe) and hopefully some reading.  It's so nice to have some time to rest, I feel very thankful right now.

"the rest of your day is in Spanish"

A couple days ago I was leaving work and one of my favorite co-workers stopped and said, "So...the rest of your day is in Spanish."  I thought this was funny since I am the Spanish teacher here... the fact is that almost all of my day is in Spanish.  It's been interesting to be the Spanish teacher here.  The fact is that teaching turns you into a pretty good student.  I hope my students are also learning. 

The school has a pretty tight nit community.  The fact is that most of the people that work here have some other type of connection to each other or the school (they have a child who is a student or they go to the Church where the school is located).  This makes it much harder to enter into the community.  I also am a teacher who goes in and out of classrooms so, I'm not quite as close to any particular group of students or to a team of teachers.  My Spanish team is kind of random.  To be honest, sometimes I feel like I am the department psychologist.  I do a lot of listening to other people's complaints.  

Anyway, I have decided that I want to do some more writing.  I'm going to try to write something everyday in the month of October either on this blog or on the Contrapunto blog in Spanish.  I think that the only way to get into the habit of writing more is forcing yourself to do it.

I love the rain.

So, last week was a bit crazy because our car wasn't working properly.  The radiator was overheating.  At one point, we were driving on the highway in pouring rain and the car decided to overheat so, we had to pull over to the side of the road and wait in the rain as cars and trucks drove by us.  It was pretty crazy.

You know?  I love the rain here in Panama.  The truth is that it's felt almost chilly in the evenings for the past week or so.  There's been a lot of rain and when you have a car, it's really nice.  It's the kind of rain that falls so hard that you can't see in front of you.  I love it when I'm at home and can snuggle in bed but...when you have to ride the bus here it's absolutely awful.  Most of the buses here have no air conditioning so, when it starts to rain the windows go up and the bus gets all steamy, hot, and smelly.  You can imagine...

This past weekend we didn't get to go see STOMP (it had sold out), so we went to eat some good food at the end of the Causway.  First we drank coffee (Ariel had coffee, I had tea) and read a while.  Then we went to eat lunch (the restaurant we were going to go to was closed because of the Jewish holiday.)   The location was beautiful, there was a fantastic breeze and we sat where there was a view of the city and the canal.  (We could have asked for a bit more regarding the food but, it's ok.)  Otherwise... it was just gorgeous.  It's nice to spend some time just enjoying being together in a lovely place.

That reminds me --this past weekend was a Jewish holiday and in Panama, half of the businesses close down for the weekend when it's a Jewish holiday.  It's crazy but, it's so interesting as well.  Ariel and I counted businesses, at least half of the shops and stores at the mall were closed.  Panama also closes down on Muslim holidays and Christian holidays.   Panama is such an interesting place.

the fourth

I'm so happy that I got to spend the 4th of July in DC this year.  It was my first time to spend it here in Washington.  It makes for a fitting last weekend.  That culminating in fireworks kind of last weekend.  I think that I feel just the way I should right now, deeply thankful for the opportunities, experiences, and friendships that I've made here and utterly thrilled at moving back to Panama.

I've shed a couple tears at some goodbyes.  I wish with all my heart that it was easier to just come and go, to be able to see loved ones with all the ease of calling up and saying "Hey! Let's get together!"  Nevertheless, I am confident that this place and these people will be in my life long after I have left and possibly moved multiple times.  It has been meaningful and worthy of a grand fireworks display.

brother in town

Andrew made it safely to DC tonight!

weekend

This weekend was LOVELY.  I was exhausted at the end of Friday but, I still went to an Engagement party, a Photography event, and a Cheesecake tasting all in one night!  It was the busiest Friday that I've had in a while. I went on a hike on Saturday.  It was the first hike I'd been on in a long time.  Then, Sunday was spent with some friends tasting some delicious food.  I ended it all going to Church, then coming home to mentally prepare for a couple days of lead teaching.  The truth is that life is beautiful...

excuses, excuses

I could come up with hundreds of excuses for why I haven't written very much recently.  I have so many things going on, I'm getting married, it's the end of the school year, I'm moving back to Panama, it's spring time in DC, etc. etc. etc. but, to be honest, all of that is bogus.  The truth is I have MORE to write about than I have in a long time and I've just felt overwhelmed by it all and haven't come around here to let my feelings out on the screen.

I know I have no obligation to anyone else to write but, I do disappoint myself when I don't write.  What a strange thing.  So, I'm going to start by talking about my weekend.  I have a theory about "catching up" with friends or anyone, you really have to start by asking what they did that day or that week before you can go back however many months or years you're behind.  So, I'm going to do that...in the next post.

Communité

The word "community" is derived from the Old French communité which is derived from the Latin communitas (cum, "with/together" + munus, "gift"), a broad term for fellowship or organized society.

Once again I am plagued with the fear that I have failed to live up to these things which I claim to believe.  Principally, that "community" is something deeply, deeply important. I know I believe this but, I am afraid that I feel at a loss as to what my place ought to be in community.

I'm thinking that I like the origin of the word because I think that community really is a gift.  A gift that ought not be taken without deep gratitude.  Nevertheless, I still wonder.  Am I living generously and gratefully towards and for my community?  Or am I holding back?

I wonder sometimes how deep the community bonds are.  I'm afraid of not being missed because somehow I didn't live grateful for what I was given.  It is so selfish to want to be missed so, perhaps that ought to be the lesson I learn.

However, I do wonder if I have given what I could and if I have invited people into welcoming hospitality as often as I should.  I'm afraid of failing to be a good friend.  I think that is one of my biggest fears.

happy (lunar) new year!

I forgot to say "happy year of the tiger" to everyone on Sunday.  I've been enjoying the "lunar new year" stamps these days as I've been loving the snow break to write cards to my friends. I think this is going to be the best year of the tiger ever.

That being said, we went back to school today after our snow storm break.  We were thinking of all the snow related compound words like "snowman", "snowball", "snowflake"... I also had to respond to the principle's question about individual's intent to return next year.  

To be honest, I teared up as I was writing it.  I am going to miss it there.  I have had a very good experience and feel like I've learned a lot.  The people have been so incredible and I'm so thankful for such a wonderful team of people.  I know I'm not leaving yet but, I want to make the most of it.

Not that I'm completely sad.  The truth is that I'm mostly happy because in addition to having to say goodbye to lots of wonderful things in my life, this year is also going to be filled with new and wonderful things (like getting married) and hopefully experiencing and learning in another school setting.

Apprentice: learner, prentice, works for an expert to learn a trade

I have a lot of things rushing through my head right now. I’m tired. Being a teacher is hard. Being an apprentice is not as hard but, it’s still hard. I am being convinced, more and more, without a doubt teaching makes a difference. Teaching is probably one of the jobs that make the biggest difference in people’s lives. It may also be one of the most difficult jobs out there.

My education was so random and varied I don’t think I realized until the past couple of years that teaching is what I have been wanting to do all this time. I have wanted to be involved in helping develop stronger communities and giving people the opportunity and reasons to dream and create. All of that is hopelessly idealistic and I intend to stick to it. What it looks like in reality is much less lovely and much more incredible. The obstacles are bigger than you could imagine and the rewards are much more subtle --students learning that they like to eat vegetables, parents getting their students to the doctor, and other non-“standard based” accomplishments.

I have been working with such dedicated and excellent teachers. I admire them so much. I feel so honored and inspired working with them. Our students are actually reaching their “grade level” standards. I am exhausted but, I intend to learn all that I can so that I will also one day be as good of a teacher as the ones I’m working with right now. Their unwavering dedication to children and their learning is incredible, patience, so much patience, work, so much work, and commitment. It’s fantastic. It’s hard.

I left work feeling so disappointed. How are we supposed to teach children whose parents are caught up in their own emotional messes? If they are not nurturing their children and giving them safe homes with relationships that are secure? Some of our children are so distracted by their relational poverty that they have a very, very hard time learning. It’s difficult, but it’s still so important what we do, in spite of all the odds being against them and us, they are STILL learning. It’s hard but, it’s unbelievably rewarding.

Solace in Friendship

I just finished reading this memoir, Truth & Beauty by Ann Patchett. On the back of the book it reads: "Truth & Beauty is Patchett's tribute to Lucy Grealy, at once a grief-haunted eulogy and a larger meditation on the solace and limitations of friendship." The questions in the book about love and friendship are so very intense.

I've been thinking about it quite a bit, especially because I have several students who are in the second grade and I can see them as they struggle feeling like they are not loved. Even though there are broken relationships in their homes the girls still have the idea that getting married will solve all their problems and that only in that way they will live happily ever after.

It's fascinating to think of "the solace and limitations of friendship". When I look at my own life I am profoundly grateful for the friendships in my life, particularly the girls who have been my friends, and I think that I have so much solace in those relationships. Many of those friendships have been rich and delightful. On the other hand, the theme of many friendships has often included questions like "will I ever be loved?" or "will I ever get married?".

I've often thought about how strange the question of being loved is in the context of a friendship. The question of "will I ever be loved?" doesn't mean the same thing as "am I loved by anyone?". That strange craving to have ONE person love you beyond and above everyone else is a different desire than having a friend love you. I've been lucky to have friendships that are deep, comforting, transparent, and unbounded. Having friends can be so satisfying but, for some reason, friendships don't seem to satisfy in THAT way. It's kind of hard to realize that as a friend you are only partially satisfying. It's strange.

Real friendships are gifts and I'm still thinking about the limitations of friendships in light of how lovely they are, I'm still thinking about it.

Fear & Courage

There is no way I could have possibly talked about this a month or so ago but, I was mugged/attacked on my street in November and it has changed me in significant ways, some that I'm not yet clear on how to articulate.

Tonight, I re-told the story to Tommy and I have to say that telling what happened has a weird effect on me. My heart starts beating very quickly, my mind gets a little blurry as what happened rushes through my mind. I've tried to be willing to talk about it --people tell me that it will help me keep it in perspective-- and I'm thankful that I don't dream about it anymore but, it was scary. It was one of the scariest things that has ever happened to me.

The thing that is hard is that it happened so close to where I live. At night, my neighborhood that I love during the day, becomes the exact location of my scariest memory. My heart beats quickly, I become nervous and glance over my shoulder fearfully at the people around me. Footsteps are a source of anxiety and anyone wearing a hood that partially covers their face scares me.

I don't know entirely how it has changed me but, I know that it has definitely caused me to act differently and even approach my friends differently. I ask for help not because I want to but because I need to because if I don't I'll be paralyzed by fear. I'm regaining a bit of confidence but, I am not the same person that I was and that might be a good thing. In the mean time, I realize how much I need people and maybe the fact that I'm growing more willing to let people know that I need them is also a good thing. There is a type of courage required to let people know that you need them.

Henri and I

Yesterday, I walked out of work and went down to the Potter’s House to get a book that I wanted to share with a friend. (It is always dangerous for me to walk into bookstores.) I got the book I was looking for… and two others.

One of them was “Clowning in Rome” by Henri Nouwen. I had heard about years ago but I had never read and it seemed so fitting to my current state of internal restlessness that I bought it. I went out from the bookstore down to Tryst (a very hip spot in Adam’s Morgan, DC) and spent several hours reading and writing. I started reading “Clowning in Rome” and felt like Nouwen (as usual) knew me and was speaking directly to my current circumstances. This has happened before.

I remember when I worked all summer in the mountains of Colorado and was feeling broken and lonely. I went down to Denver one weekend and walked into a bookstore where I saw the book “The Wounded Healer” and bought it without knowing what it was about. It was exactly what I needed to hear at that moment. Needless to say, I don’t know if everyone gets Nouwen the way I do, but I love how I feel understood by him.

Today is a full moon, I'm not sure how that has contributed to my mood today but --all in all-- I've had a good day. Today the School Review Board came to "review" our school. That is how the school continues to have recognition as a school, getting funding and all that type of stuff. We had someone in our classroom observing in the morning and then I was invited with a group of 10 other teachers to participate in an "interview" with the people who were reviewing our school. I felt flattered to have been chosen. I'm not sure why they picked me but, it was a good experience.

I also taught my second writing lesson today. I was nervous because it was with the more difficult class to manage. I enjoyed teaching the lesson and I hope that the students got it and were into the writing. I'm excited about them seeing writing as something that they can and want to do. I think that it's so much fun to write. I stayed late at school today. I was thinking about how school is such a refuge for me. I like how it keeps me completely busy and occupied.

I left and got a phone call from a good friend in Vancouver and I was so happy to talk with her, it has been a long time. There are a lot of people that I haven't talked to in a long time. I think that it gets harder to stay in touch with people as time goes on, in part because there are more people to keep in touch with and in some ways, it's harder for me because I'm doing better at being completely present to the people around me. Which is good even if it makes it harder to stay in touch with people.

Not long after I got off work a good friend from Idaho arrived in DC and I went to meet him and took him to my friends place where he was going to crash on their couch for the rest of the week. It was so good to see him. He's another friend that I hadn't seen in 2 years! It's amazing how quickly time flies. I'm excited to go back to Idaho at Thanksgiving but, there will still be a lot of people that I'm not going to get to see when I go back. It's kind of sad in some ways that such wonderful people cannot continue to be active and present in your life after you're gone.

I'm just trying to write, this was totally stream of consciousness, I'm not trying to do anything special, just getting into the writing habit again. I like it. That's it for tonight.

I have a problem. Recently, I get a sense of anxiety when I'm at Church. I don't enjoy it so, I don't feel like going to Church anymore. I don't know why exactly, but I've been thinking about it and I wonder if it has something to do with my craving for quality one-on-one time with people and conversations about transcendent types of things. Recently, the conversations after Church usually end up being a rapid pace of fast "how was your week?" superficial conversations which I get tired of really fast.

The other problem is that recently, Church is one of the only spaces where I pull out my notebook and get to be alone with my thoughts yet surrounded by a lot of people. I love that! But, I feel guilty when I realize that my mind is wandering and I'm not paying attention. I just wish that I had a friend or two who enjoyed being alone "together". You know? Pulling out a journal or book with a friend, maybe surrounded by people, maybe in a quieter space... and let thoughts grow and become something. Maybe after a couple of hours or a couple of days a conversation will be born and it will be meaningful. I miss that.

staying for 10 years

Last week I got to know one of my co-workers a little better. She told me that she'd been working with the organization that runs the school I work at for about 10 years on and off since high school. She said, "This is a good place and it only gets better and better." I think anyone would admit that there are areas where the organization could improve, that is just one more reason that it's a good organization.

I spent the rest of the evening thinking about staying somewhere for 10 years. I haven't lived anywhere for 10 years in almost 10 years. I've spent the better part of the last 8 years moving from place to place. I wonder if I will ever be in one place for 10 or 20 years. There seems to be something very, very good about investing in a place with that type of commitment.

Some day, I'd like to be around long enough to see children I knew in elementary school graduating from high school and maybe stick around longer than that... I don't know where that'll end up being but, there is something in me that craves it a little at least.

I'm happy...