hangman

lately:

I have no idea what I am doing next summer. or next fall. or anytime after that. Its all a mystery to me. There is the inevitable and ever present right now, "Soooo, are you going back to camp????" The answer is: mmmrrrmmmpffffhhh?? Right now I'm trying to first figure out where God wants me next fall, and then let summer plans fall into that. If possible. The difficult thing is I feel God pulling me away from my comfort zone at Pine Cove into a completely unknown challenge and it scares me to death. My comfort zone is looking better and better with each leadership person added to the team. I want so badly to join in, I really do, but I don't think I can. I miss the quad so very badly and I worry about being disappointed in new things. My constant downfall is expectation. I hate having expectations in this life. Too often I go into situations with an expectation, a scenario I've created in my head, and when it doesn't go quite that way I end up disappointed. A major flaw in my thinking... I've GOT to put expectation and hope in the Lord and rely on that consistency alone.

I'd love to do other things with my summer honestly. I really would love to travel with my brother and just go discover things together... he such a cool kid and I'd really love to just invest some time with him. Who knows, maybe we'll just pick up and hang out in another country for the summer. ha.
and there's the weddings. Abbey and I have a running list of all the engaged couples we currently have in our lives. Its at least to 65 couples, but thats probably missing a few. I really want to be able to just go enjoy all my friends weddings that are happening this summer. I want to go be with my bestie before she gets married....! I'd really love to get up to Pittsburgh and see Julie and Ted get married. Everyone keeps telling me to not plan around weddings, but really I would much rather plan around weddings. Its such a big important day, albeit only ONE day, but still! I want to be there.

plus. my most favorite post-grad option is a huge financial mountain and it would be good to get a "real job" to make some money. maybe summer school teaching? These are the thoughts of summer.
Thats all on that for now. I've worried about it far too much this week already.


I have now begun the great adventure of substitute teaching, and let me tell you... today was a great entrance. All semester long I've tutored at Brazos Middle School, a self-proclaimed "ghetto-school, miss Lacey" I quit tutoring there that way I could have time to sub at the end of the semester without worrying about getting out to Brazos on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Of course, my first and ONLY job opportunity today was as a 6th grade science sub at Brazos Middle. I laughed and accepted the half-day job thinking, "6th graders. Half of them know me anyway.... it'll be tough, but a great experience. no biggie. done." SO WRONG and SO RIGHT at the same time. People, let me express to you how very very very wrong it is to put one 22 year old first-day substitute teacher in a room with about 50 sixth grade students who have been taking a practice TAKS test all morning long, with NOTHING TO DO.
Usually hangman is a winner.
not today.
I knew that I was doomed when the students came in from their lunch break screaming and running into the room with a really pudgy old teacher yelling behind them. Once they were all in the room after flipping over a few desks and making sure to note that I didn't look like any of their other subs, OldPudgy began to yell at them to sit down and shuttup. Oh good. This is going to be happy day. He looked at me with a small grimace of pride and then started to walk out the door. Before he escapes out the very poor excuse for a door I stop him. "Um. Excuse me, sir. What do I do with them? No one has given me any lesson plans, or movies, or... anything."
His brillant reply: "Well. Right now, see what they're doin'. Make 'em do that the whole time and whenever you get another, tell 'em to do the same."
"Well.... okay. How long are we in here for?" (Me, thinking this must be a ten minute transition time or something)
"Weeeellllllp.. Lemme seee (looks at the $2 walmart wall clock)... probably another hour or so"
An hour. of sitting in total silence. Did he think I was an idiot or something? These kids were not going to sit in total silence with their heads down. Get. Real.
OldPudgy leaves and I turn to the room of currently 30 sixth graders. okay.... channeling my inner Heights. but these kids make our Heights kids look like kittens. They are already about to pounce on me, "MISSSSS can I go to the bathroom? MIISSSSS can I go get my backpack. MISSSSS he hit me. MISSSSS why are you wearing purple boots? MISSSSS this is dumb. MISSSS do you got kids? MISSSSS do you go to Bay-lahhh? MISSSSS...."
I hate being called "MISSSS" without my real name behind it. ugh. Already, 30 seconds into it, the room noise level has skyrocketed. In walks two more sixth graders who look me up and down and try to find a seat. Not gonna happen, all the desks are gone. So now every students that walks in the door has to sit on the floor. SUPER.
I hate yelling, I really really do. It doesn't accomplish anything and only makes the kids happy that you are clearly frustrated. but when there are that many kids in one room, all with the same goal of making sure I wasn't heard, yelling was the only was I was going to be heard. Oh I was so happy to get out of there after TWO HOURS. On my way out, as I was packing up all of my things to move upstairs to 8th grade math (eeep!) I notice E.T. (the movie not the actual Extraterrestrial) sitting on a back shelf in the classroom. Of course, my salvation was in the room with me the entire time but I was too frazzled to even get a chance to look for it. Next time someone needs to leave a post-it, or something.
I NEVER thought I'd be grateful for 8th graders, but I sure was today. These kids were like a deep breath before diving in the deep end. I only had this science group for 20 minutes, but they were kind and quietly talked while I hooked up the computer for them to watch Alvin and the Chipmunks. I was relieved to know that I would be in a room with a projector and a movie to watch the rest of the day since apparently none of the teachers left lessons plans for any substitute that day.
WRONG.
Right before the bell rings one of the administrators comes into the room heralding, "Mrs. Law's sub, (I'm glad my name is valued by all) you are going to be in Mrs. Aguilar's room next door for the rest of the day. Good luck."
oh thank you HeraldOfDoom. luck, thats all I need right now.
Mrs. Aguilar's room looks like prison. And my nightmare is complete, no lesson plans, no projector, no computer and definately no movies.... hangman anyone? Five really sweet 8th grade girls walk in the door next, they are the upper level spanish students who apparently don't get along. Long story short, we read in Spanish for a while and then the HeraldOfDoom calls again and asks if there's a sub in that room. Well, yes.... seeing as you asked me about 30 minute ago to come here, I would hope that I'm here. Being the HeraldOfDoom that she is, I am informed that she pities me because my next class is huge and horrible. thank you HeraldOfDoom for that lovely message. I remind her that I have no plans for the upcoming Horror and would love some ideas of what to do with them. She suggests having them list things that you find in a kitchen in Spanish. hmmm... sounds good to me. While I was on the phone apparently two of the girls got in an argument and one is crying and the other is cursing her in Spanish. Don't mess with me woman, I've take 7 years of español and I know whats up. Crying girl won't even look at me, I think she probably started it. Bell rings. Drama leaves. Deep breath and I wait at the door.
Horror begins to arrive slowly... but really picks up when the three amigos get to the door. I ask for their names and the head honcho looks me up and down, smiles smugly and tells me his name... but his eyes tell it all. As he heads to his desk he said something about me... I'm not really sure what, but I know that I didn't really want to hear the whole thing. about a minute later he was already sent down to the office.
"Anyone else? Anyone else have anything to say about me being your sub? NO? I know I may look young and I may look nice, but trust me. Do not for a second underestimate me. I have NO problem sending your butt to the office. That being said, are we ready for a competition?" As I packed up my things to leave that morning I grabbed a huge bag of Starburst that I used for rewards during tutoring, best decision of the day. I made their assignment a competition to see who could list the most words and it surprisingly kept them occupied for the whole period, with a little Starburst convincing every now and then. No major issues with the Horror once HeadHoncho was gone.
However, one kid did get up and move to sit right next to the teacher's desk by my bag halfway through the class period. I told him to move and he questioned me... I responded, "I don't like how close you are sitting to my stuff... your hand could slip into that bag really easily."
His retort as he moved back to his desk: "Man.... you're smart. Figured me out...."

We finished out the class period with a little hangman in español.
Horror complete.

I practically sprinted out the front doors of the school, hopped in my car, locked the doors as fast as humanly possible and got OUT of there.

The rest of the evening has been just lovely: Cinnabon, coffee, GLEE (more on that later), making Christmas presents and setting up a Twitter account. I've decided that I love blogging, but my little daily excitements don't always warrent a whole blog post. Along comes Twitter. Mainly for my Mom.... she like the daily updates. Shout out to Mom (love you... don't worry I survived the ghetto, I'm not going back).
find my twitter if you feel so compelled: @laceyfelis

I leave you with this thought from tonight's WONDERFUL epsiode of GLEE:
"You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometimes you might find
You get what you need"