"My Word" -- 10 Questions

The topic for today is to make a list of ten things I would ask one of my ancestors and then choose one question to answer myself. I thought a lot about who I would want to ask questions. Would I choose Grandma Hazel whom I loved so dear? No, I was lucky to have many years of quality time with my grandma. Although I would love to relive one of those days spent watching Days of Our Lives, eating junk food, and playing Scrabble with her again, I know that she will always be alive in my heart. So, maybe I would talk to my dad who died too soon; we had so much unfinished business. I spent a lot of years working through all that, and I've come to terms with it all and have learned to forgive. That was such a valuable lesson that he taught me, so I think I'll choose someone I never had a chance to know. I'm choosing Grandpa Robbie.

1. What made you want to become a judge?
2. What was the most interesting case you tried?
3. Did you ever regret any decisions you made?
4. Did you love all of your kids the same?
5. Or was Bobby always your favorite?
6. What did you love the most about my mom?
7. What did you find funny?
8. Did you smile much?
9. Laugh often?
10. Was it the stress of your job or of your life that caused your heart attack?

"My Word" Week 1--Assignment A

The first assignment for the week is to look at my oldest album and analyze my journaling. I created my very first album in the late 90s and it was completely devoted to my "kids"! These pages tell the story of how we found and eventually decided to adopt the cats. These pages feel like ones I created when I was in high school! The text is in shapes and wraps around the photos. I probably thought it was cute at the time, but now it annoys me because it isn't easy to read. I did add a bit of emotion to the story as we adopted them right around the time my Grandma passed away, but it is lost in the "creative" shape of my journaling. I got over that fairly quickly...of course, I just stopped journaling throughout the rest of the album. I have one page that has the penciled in journaling guides that are still blank. I started my bad habit early in my scrapbooking career! LOL!

By looking at these pages, I've come to the realization that I haven't scrapbooked about my cats in about 8 years! I take hundreds of photos of them...especially with my new camera...but those photos remain on my computer. They are getting older, and I don't want to lose the stories of the things I love about them. It isn't enough to simply have the photos, I need to remember the details, because I know they won't be around for much longer. Honestly, I thought Tanis was going to die a few months ago, so I need to get on top of this right now! The good news is that I bought some cute cat paper from CTMH, so now all I need to do is print the photos and start telling the stories of my "babies"!

Once more unto the breach...

In December, Neal and I made a deal to blog each day; the goal was to be more creative...I failed! LOL!

If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly. ~ C.G. Chesterson

Well, if that is the case, then perhaps I succeeded brilliantly! I heard this quote today in the class lecture for the BPS My Word workshop. This workshop is what is inspiring me to jump back into blogging. As many blank journals and partially used composition notebooks I have at hand, I'm fairly confident that I will write more and more often if I type my entries. So, here we go...even though I'm starting the class a day late! ;-) So, my assignment is to respond to one of the quotes that Amy S e-mailed to us.

The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt. ~Sylvia Plath

Self-doubt is the worst enemy period. I've dealt with this a lot in my life, and I still struggle with it a bit today. Although I don't spend as much time comparing myself to others as I used to, those thoughts of inadequacy tend to surface from time to time. Instead of using it as a motivator to get better, I shut down and either eat or sleep...or both! I need to learn to channel those negative thoughts into something constructive. Yet, it is so much easier said than done.

For instance, JC's daughter, D, just auditioned for the musical. She has a great voice, is a talented dancer, and a creative young lady; yet, she let her self-doubt get the best of her at auditions (in her opinion). Instead of attacking it with confidence and energy, her nerves took over. I know she was cast in the show, but I don't know if she got a major role or not. I'll find out on Monday. The point is, here is someone who should have all the confidence in the world, but she doesn't. We can all build her up by pointing out her strengths, but, in the end, she is fighting against herself.

This is the battle I've been engaged in all my life. I do well for awhile, but then I sabotage myself and end up miserable. I have opportunity every day to express my creativity, but I let life get in my way. It's not self-doubt all the time, usually it is laziness. So, this is where I need to work it out. I'll begin with the mundane, and eventually I will delve into the realm of creativity. The added bonus is that I think this course will also make me a better teacher!

Future...where do I go from here?!

I spend a lot of time thinking about the many interests that I have and about my lack of expertise in any of them because they are so varied. As I near 40, I feel like I should be making a plan for the next 40 years of my life. If I'm going to work for another 25 or 30 years, I need to make sure I'm doing something that won't drive me crazy! I can't see being an English teacher for that length of time. Most kids don't enjoy English and society in general seems to be moving away from reading for pleasure. Even business communications seem more tolerant of language inaccuracies. With whole generations being raised in chat rooms and on IMing, I don't hold out a lot of hope for the progression of the English language. I'm tired of seeing chat room abbreviations in homework assignments! Needless to say, this is not what I want to do for the rest of my life. So, I look at my options and wonder where I should go from here.

• Obviously, I can always leave education. I would love to work for a magazine, but that would most likely involve relocation. Thinking about where I live now, I don't really see anything that is better than education.
• All of my dream jobs require relocation or extensive travel. For instance, I've always loved the idea of being an educational director for a theatre company, preferably a Shakespeare company.
• Another dream job would be as a Shakespeare consultant where I would travel to conferences or school districts to teach teachers how to teach Shakespeare through performance. I would also do residencies and help students mount Shakespeare productions.
• If I'm being more realistic, my two main interests are becoming vocationally certified as a CTE teacher and obtaining my National Board Certification. I want to gain my CTE certification as soon as possible, because we have a teacher retiring in the next couple of years. I would love to step into his position. It would also give my video production class state funding immediately, and THAT is a HUGE plus! Once I start teaching CTE, I may decide that I don't want to get my NBC. Of course, the down side to all of this is that I would no longer be teaching Shakespeare, so what would that do to my dream of being a Shakespeare consultant?
• Conversely, if I pursue my Shakespearean interests, will I miss my opportunity to become CTE certified? For instance, I REALLY want to apply for the Shakespeare: Enacting the Text seminar this summer. Although they only choose 15 participants from over 100 applicants, I feel fairly confident that I would be accepted since one of my referees worked with the seminar director last summer! If I do this, that means I can't take summer school for my CTE certification. It's such a conundrum...I really don't want to have to choose between the two.

With all this being said, I haven't even discussed my varied interests outside of school. I want to spend more time on my website, scrapbooking, photography, podcasting, reading, writing...heck, I would even like to strap on a pair of rollerblades once in awhile. Then there are all the things I NEED to do (in addition to grading papers...yuck!): exercise, clean my house, do laundry. Then there are things I SHOULD do: help Neal with weeding, cooking, paying bills. But, when it comes right down to it, I don't get everything done because I'm lazy, spend too much time on the Internet, and watch too many TV shows. At least I don't play WoW anymore!

Well, I'm sure I'll write more about this in the weeks to come, because I need to make a decision soon.

Call backs

I went into call backs with a strong opinion about who I wanted to play Romeo and Juliet. Both of the kids are seniors and strong actors. I was sure they would bring their A-game to the call back, but I was wrong. We called back 18 kids and had the stage manager start them off with theatre games to warm up. I walked into the PAC as the warm ups were underway and made a really interesting observation. The younger kids (primarily sophomores) and kids with very little theatre experience were going full out on the games and having a really good time. My R&J "shoe-ins" were barely participating. I asked the SM to have them do something where they would go full out...again...nothing from the so-called thespians in the group. I was disappointed. The disappointment continued throughout the audition. I will say that they gave us an incredibly passionate kiss during one of the scenes, but the rest of the scene lacked any kind of emotional connection. It's too bad, because I always thought they were strong actors. I guess they entered the audition process with too much confidence. Well, I guess this will be a lesson learned...hopefully.


On a completely unrelated side note--

My friend who shot and is editing ST:OGAM sent me a link of some asshats on a Mac board dissing the movie. I've been avoiding all the message boards lately--primarily because I don't have time with the play starting and grades due next week. I'm sick of negative people who are so quick to judge the creativity of others. It simply amazes me that they complain about the acting, script, and special F/X from a 6 minute trailer. Some of them said that they only watched half the trailer...WTF! Yeah, I'm sure their lives are so important that they can't spare a few minutes to watch the entire thing. People like that make me sick! And they wonder why the majority of the computing world thinks Mac users are idiots...excluding the creative individuals who use it to make awesome fan films! LOL! I still want to bust out MACO-style on all the idiots who complain about things they know nothing about. ARGH!!!

It has begun!

On the opening night of Grease 4 years ago, I had a panic attack. It was one of the most frightening experiences I have ever had. The only other things that come close are the car accident I was in with my Dad when I was in high school and the fever I had last winter. Although those experiences were bad, they truly don't compare to the fear I felt that night. In fact, I think I had less intense fear when I got news that I had cancer. The cancer fear lasted longer--to this day as a matter of fact--but that night was something I can't really explain. I called Neal for comfort, and that really helped, but I wasn't myself until the next morning.

I recall swearing that I was done with theatre forever. The panic attack was my wake up call to quit...at all costs. I was ready to lose my job if they wouldn't let me out of my contract. I had tried to quit for a year and a half to no avail, but this time was different. My principal could tell, and he didn't argue with me. Well, it didn't take long--only 3 years--for me to break down and direct again. LOL!

I held the first set of auditions for Romeo and Juliet this afternoon. My co-director and I went out to dinner afterwards and determined who was on our call-back list for tomorrow. I just finished finding the scenes for the second round of auditions, and I must admit that I'm excited! Unfortunately, a Romeo and Juliet didn't pop out at me, so the selection will be tough. I'm disappointed that we didn't have a better pool of performers, but I guess that just makes me all the more important! I am the Queen ShakeGeek after all!

Breaking My Rule

Yeah...so...my head is killing me. I'm exhausted. And, frankly, I need to pee. I know I should spend a 1/2 an hour in word vomit mode, but I just can't bring myself to do it right now. I will make a couple of comments:

• I will never get my grades done on time if I don't start kicking kids out of my room during lunch. I don't want to hurt their feelings, but enough is enough.
• R and J auditions begin tomorrow...I hope that I just know when Romeo and Juliet take the stage. They hold the entire show together. The line load is incredible. I know these kids can handle it, I just want to make sure that I choose the right ones. The sucking up is going to end on Friday...I need to start milking it! LOL!
• I'm pissed that I have to wait for over a MONTH for Heroes to start again. Argh! Well, at least that will give me time to focus on R&J, Sci-Fi, scrapbooking, and...dare I say...exercise!
• I feel feverish. I need to go to bed.