March Challenges

Today is the first day of March and the first day of a lot of things for me.  I have decided to join two challenges this month.  The Fitblogger Challenge and the March Writing Challenge at 750words.   I saw that Bonnie posted about the Fitblogger challenge and I am excited to join in order to complement another health  related challenge I've joined at school.  

I like the idea because it is described like this on the site, "the challenges are not a competition with others, but with ourselves, to strive for something we maybe didn’t think we could do, and challenge our own definition of ourselves... The challenge can take whatever form of goal you’d like fitness, nutritional, it’s entirely up to you and what your personal goals are."

• You can pledge minutes, miles, consistency (like 5 days a week).
• For this challenge, no weight related goals please. That might be a bonus for a more active lifestyle but we’re focusing on health. You might want to work in a nutrition goal, like drink 8 glasses of water a day, eat 5 fruits and veggies, etc.

March goals:

My goals are focused on having more healthy eating habits and mostly more healthy physical activity levels. The great thing about combining this activity with bogging is that I can feel accountable with other goals that I have.

1. My goal is to get 20-30 minutes of physical activity (swimming, jump rope, etc.) five times a week.  I think that is a very reasonable goal and it is my main goal.  
2. I think that on a nutritional level I want to focus on drinking more water and eating more veggies, specifically make sure that I get some type of fruit or vegetable every day.  

I have signed up to write in the monthly writing challenge with 750 words and in order to avoid ending up on the wall of shame, I have to write at least 750 words every day.  This is a great motivation to write and I use part of my 750 words to write my entry for my blog post about my participation in the March Fitblogger Challenge (this is all working together quite well, eh?) and then, to add to that, I want to focus on writing daily on Contrapunto (our Spanish blog) and this is another way to really help me do that. This is going to be fun and I'm looking forward to it.

love wins?

So, in the past few days I've been reading a lot about this new book that Rob Bell is going to publish called "Love Wins" and it's interesting because a lot of people are very upset that its message is going to be completely universalist.  The truth is that it may be and yet, at the same time what he has to say in the video that is a type of preview for the book rings true in a certain way.  I will be curious to read the book and see what he really has to say.  I'm not convinced one way or another.

LOVE WINS. from Rob Bell on Vimeo.

The fact is that in the past couple of weeks I have been thinking about censorship and it's implications for politics and religion.  Then, this week, I've found myself considering two possible examples of both.  The issue of political sensorship is one that I'm thinking about because of the situation with a Spanish reporter that got deported today from Panama and the only reason that I can think of for them to do that is to try to get him to be quiet.  They have been trying to get rid of him for ages because they are afraid of the way that he makes people think.

Then, there's the issue of Rob Bell and the reaction that makes it seem like possibly what he has to say is so bad that you shouldn't read it because something bad might happen to you or the people around you.  I would like to read it for myself and see what he has to say.  I always feel nervous whe people want to stop people from talking.  It is true that ideas have implications and for that very reason I don't think that anyone should be given the freedom to arbitarily stop someone from sharing their ideas.

attack on freedom of expression

Panama is going through some strange times.  For the past couple of weeks there have been some pretty heavy protests about mountain top mining being approved in some of the indigenous regions of the country.  There are a lot of people quite upset about the decision and a lot of people have shown their concern.

This past weekend a journalist and Human Rights worker, Paco Gomez Nadal, was arrested at one of these protests and today he was deported to Spain.  It is amazing, this government has had it in for him ever since they came into power.  He is the kind of person who was not afraid to be critical of the government and by doing so he earned their disfavor and ultimately they've deported him.  This is a bad sign.  The government is afraid of criticism and the freedom of press is in serious danger.

It's sad and it's going to be very interesting to see what happens in Panama in the next few months.

750words

Saturday morning.  Listening to Morning Edition on NPR and doing some morning journaling from bed...looking forward to listening to This American Life.   This past week my friend Amy sent me a link to a web site called 750Words.  The founder of the program writes about the site saying this:

I've long been inspired by an idea I first learned about in The Artist's Way called morning pages. Morning pages are three pages of writing done every day, typically encouraged to be in "long hand", typically done in the morning, that can be about anything and everything that comes into your head. It's about getting it all out of your head, and is not supposed to be edited or censored in any way. The idea is that if you can get in the habit of writing three pages a day, that it will help clear your mind and get the ideas flowing for the rest of the day.(...)

I've used the exercise as a great way to think out loud without having to worry about half-formed ideas, random tangents, private stuff, and all the other things in our heads that we often filter out before ever voicing them or writing about them. It's a daily brain dump. Over time, I've found that it's also very helpful as a tool to get thoughts going that have become stuck, or to help get to the bottom of a rotten mood.

 So, he developed the site to inspire writing 750 words every day.  It uses a motivational point system to encourage you to write every day.  You get badges for writing days in a row, for writing without getting distracted, etc.  It is also private so, it lets me get back to just writing because I enjoy it not worrying that people might end up reading it.  It's interesting because getting out some of the mixed up ideas that I've had has made it easier for me to want to come back to my blog again to chat with y'all about life.

The other thing that has helped is that I've finally received my dad's old computer.  My computer died a while back and since I couldn't afford to get a new one my computer time was a bit more limited.  Since I've received my dad's I have a bit more comfort using it to write.  The other thing is that we went back to school after Christmas break and then had to get back into the routine of school.  I've also been trying to make some major decisions about what I'm going to do next year (work related) and I've spent a lot of time thinking about that.  Now, I think I've made a decision and I think that I'm back.  I hope that is true.

Priorities and limits

En estos días he estado aprendiendo una lección en cuanto a prioridades y limites.  Es injusto pedirme a mi misma que trabaje a tiempo completo (y a veces el trabajo requiere más que las propias horas laborales para estar preparada) y después escribir miles de palabras en las pocas horas que me sobran para leer, hacer ejercicio, cocinar y disfrutar de estar con Ariel.  Algunas cosas, creo, que tienen su momento y debo ser realista para no volverme loca.

I gave up on NaNoWriMo because I'm trying to do too many things at the same time (it's kind of like giving up training for a race, it's not that you're not going to exercise any more, it's just that you've adjusted your goals to your reality.)  I'm trying to write every day and with our blog, Global Voices, the Literary Workshops and preparing for school... it's a bit much to try to do any more writing if I also want to read, get some exercise, and enjoy some other things.

Ariel is still at it...we're having fun, even though I feel a bit disappointed with myself.

Writing and friendship

I've had lots of ideas in the past week of things that I wanted to write on my blog.  Ariel and I have been doing a lot of writing recently and it feels great!!  Slowly (or quickly, depending on how you look at it) we're doing things we've been looking forward to doing for a long time.  We became writers for Global Voices and the official blog for the Literary Workshops that we're a part of in one week!!  That was pretty exciting.

This week I got to spend some time with Janice and that was really great as well.  It's been a while since we'd spent any time together and it was good because I was reminded that I have a girl-friend here in Panama that knows me well, that's always an important thing to have and really, in spite of the distance and time, we haven't really grown apart, I think that we've grown closer in our way of seeing the world, which makes it all that much better!

The other day I discovered a really interesting theology blog and he was talking about John 15.12-15:

My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.

In his article he was reflecting on the fact that Jesus talked more about being friends than being family.  Which might be an important thing to keep in mind since, often we treat our friends better than we treat our family.  We choose our friends and even if we feel super comfortable with them, we don't take them for granted the way that we do with our families sometimes.  I thought it was a very interesting thought and it made me feel very happy that Ariel and I are friends first and then we get to be family after that!

just another Sunday

Last week felt like a very long week.  School seemed to just drag on and on.  I'm very happy for November and our all of the days off we get for Flag Day, Independence from Spain, Separation from Colombia, etc. etc.  I need a different pace to get excited about work again.  I also have a book or two that I'm working on that I really just want to get into and enjoy for a longer un-interrupted period of time--oh!  and I'm going to participate in NaNoWriMo and try to write a novel on a month... crazy, but it should be fun.

The past few days it has been raining like crazy but, that means that it's nice and not too hot outside.  Yesterday, we went to our literary workshop and it was great.  It's fun because one of my friends from my childhood is also going to the workshop.  I like that.  Yesterday it was funny because Ariel and I had a conversation in the morning that turned out to be part of what the speaker was going to talk about...we feel like we have our own pre-workshop before the official workshop.

I'm busy with teaching but, Ariel and I are also enjoying looking for opportunities to continue writing more, so that it will be more of a habit and potentially something that one of us could do more formally sometime.  

Enjoying it in the midst of it

This was a hard week for me at school.  One of my co-workers was gone because her father passed away so, I had to try to help the substitute (who was amazing, by the way) and then, there was a situation with a family that I had to help with and it took so much emotional energy that I couldn't sleep.  I was so worried about the situation that I was awake almost all night long.  The next day, I was exhausted.  By Saturday, I was very tired.

Even so, Ariel and I got up early and headed to our Literary Workshops.  We had both done our homework.  We wrote a character sketch and came up with a "challenge" for our character.  We enjoyed the workshop, even though there was this one participant who couldn't stop talking.  That was a really fun time.  When it was done we headed back across town.  On days like that we both wish that we lived closer to the center of the city.  

Today is our 3 month-aversery so, yesterday we went and ate at a favorite restaurant to celebrate.  After eating we headed home.  I was exhausted and fell asleep.  It felt like such a waste of a beautiful day but, sometimes you just have to do what you have to do.  We went to the grocery store to pick up a couple things we needed for dinner.  Then we ate pancakes and I tried to get some work done for school this next week.  Planning is like a second full time job.  This is our last full week before we start to have days off left and right in November.  

I was thinking a few days ago about how this is one of those seasons that even though I'm tired a lot, I feel like I'm enjoying it while I'm in the midst of it.  Sometimes, it seems that I only realize how fun or special a season of my life was when it was all over.  

Talleres Literarios

If you spend very much time with Ariel or with me you'll find out that we love to read and write.  Ever since I graduated from college I've had a lot of "I wish I had studied English" thoughts because there were so many literature and writing classes that I would have loved to take.  No, I don't regret what I studied, it was perfect for me at the time but, ever since then I've been a sponge for literature and writing.  Ariel and I both hope for formal opportunities to study in order to improve our skills and open up opportunities to teach and share our love for words and ideas.

So, when we got the news about the Talleres Literarios en Panama, we were ecstatic.  We had heard about these Literary Workshops over a year ago and were waiting anxiously for more information, when a couple weeks ago we finally got news that they were accepting applications for the Talleres Literarios en Panamá.  These are going to be a year of weekend classes taught by Panamanian, Latin American, and Spanish professors and writers.They will do a survey of Spanish-American literature and provide writing workshop in poetry and prose. It's fantastic.

It's being sponsored by the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation and Development.  This sponsorship makes the program very formal.  Three Panamanian universities and the National Institute for Culture are also involved, all these institutions make it a potentially fantastic place to grow and learn about other opportunities.  One of the goals of the Spanish partners in the program is to present the participants with opportunities to study in Spain and hopefully remain involved in promoting literature and writing after the program is over (that is something that interests Ariel and me very, very much).

Something that makes it even better is that the coursework follows the literature content that I'm supposed to be teaching to my 9th graders.  This makes it a perfect way for me to be better prepared as I teach my students.  I'm really excited about starting this tomorrow afternoon!

One month...

As of last Tuesday, I've been married for a month.  It has been a busy, exhausting month but, when I think about all of the things thay we've done this month I think that getting married and living in Panama are two wonderful choices I've made in life.

Let me see, in the month of August I started teaching Spanish to 4th, 5th, 7th and 9th graders at an international school here in Panama city (less than two weeks after getting married).  I've partially moved twice this month and this week will move (hopefully for the last time) into a more permanent house.  It should be a great place to live.  I've also purchased a car and started driving in Panama city.

If you've never been to Panama you will not be able to grasp the significance of some of those acomplishments.  Driving in Panama city is one of the scariest things I've ever tried to do, I have to admit that I feel quite proud of myself for even being willing to try.  It also opens up the possibility to do a lot of things that are just impractical without a car.  We even discovered a fantastic coffee shop relatively close to my work, a great place to meet up, chat and read a book.

I've started teaching and that is a responsibility that I love.  I am thrilled to be a teacher.  This week something very exciting happened.  The International Book Fair of Panama.  Ariel and I were in heaven there.  The greatest thing that we discovered was a new literary non-ficcion journal that is starting up.  It is called El Guayacan.  I'm super excited to see something like that happening here in Panama.  I want to figure out how to be a part of something like that.

I am excited about what is happening in Panama culturally and I'm excited to maybe get to be a part of it!

telling stories

Today, my brothers and I headed over to the American Art Gallery and saw the new Norman Rockwell exhibit.  The exhibit is called, Telling Stories: Norman Rockwell from the Collections of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. 

I love Norman Rockwell probably just as much as the next person.  His paintings are warm and personal.  You feel like you could and would like to know most of the people in his paintings.  He gives you a sense that things are well or that they will turn out well. 

It was interesting to look at the collections from the perspective of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg since they are such successful film directors.  The emphasized that one of the things that they love about Norman Rockwell's paintings that he tells a story in one frame.  He captures details, emotions, and even action in a single picture.  

I love that idea and as I think about storytelling and wanting to be a better storyteller myself, there is a lot to learn from the idea of storytelling being like taking or painting a picture.  The writing of the story requires adding all of those details, the emotions, the movements, and the colors that make you feel like you know those characters or you have been in that place.  

I'd love to be as good of a storyteller as Norman Rockwell.

hello storytime!

I am about to leave Washington, DC to embark on a new chapter of life.  I'm going to get married and will be learning to live life together with Ariel.  It's not surprising that I'm feeling introspective and re-visiting my sometimes neglected blog. 

I have a feeling that I'll be writing a bit more frequently for a while.  I'll have so many exciting new things to write about!  Getting married, living in Panama, starting a new teaching job, making new friends... I'm sure the list will be endless.  

To make things even better, I'm marrying my best writing companion.  We have always enjoyed writing together so, this space and others will probably be kept up with more diligence since it's something that we both enjoy and want to do with our time.  This will probably make my mom very happy, since recently I have not been very consistent in telling the stories of things happening in my life.

Needless to say, if you read my blog... welcome back.  =)

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.

the fun part is now

I just started reading this book called The Happiness Project and even though some people might find it kind of formulaic, I love it.  It fits my lists and checklists kind of personality.  Or maybe I think that some great advice seems SO old fashioned that we overlook it.  I love that kind of thing.  So, I might mention a few of the things I enjoyed from my reading in the next few blog posts. 

"If I can enjoy the present, I don't need to count on the happiness that is (or isn't) waiting for me in the future.  The fun part doesn't come later, now is the fun part."

That advice fits with one of my current major goals in life, which is to enjoy the moment that I'm in.  I have some big exciting changes coming up and I don't want to short-change the present because of my excitement for the future.   It is hard to remember sometimes that the "fun part is now" even though I'm sure I'll look back on these days with fondness.

what type are you?

I just took this witty test called "What type are you?"  It turns out that my type is Archer Hairline "a modern typeface with a straightforward appearance with tiny outbreaks of elegance and tiny dots of emotion".  Maybe there's something to it!  

This week I've been thinking about "outbreaks of emotion" and have found myself faced with my humanity and my inability to communicate well the complexity of my feelings.  I can be irritable and inconsiderate in ways that make me feel ashamed and yet, I admit that these are certainly areas where I've seen improvement which is at least a little bit comforting.

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.

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.

Today, I taught my first writing lesson at school. I was so nervous! At the same time, I was super excited. I am so excited about watching the students learn to see themselves as writers. I made a couple mistakes during the lesson but, I think that as I teach I'll do a better job and the students will do better as well. I'm still nervous but very excited. I've been thinking about the fact that I have so many interesting stories to tell from working at my school and I've also been thinking about how much I am in need of writing to process my internal messiness. So, once again, I'm resolving to write more.

The last writing unit that the students were working on was all about "small moments" it is that idea of writing about a moment that was significant in some way and describing everything, absolutely everything about it. How it felt, looked, smelled, sounded, etc. I loved that writing unit and have been inspired to take up writing again, as a student, not as someone who thinks that they can write but, someone who needs to write to be sane and is still learning how to do it well. It is a freeing thought and I think I'm going to try to do more writing.

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.