Got To Get Ready

I got one big thing off my plate for school and now I really need to concentrate on the time I will be away. I am looking forward to it. I know I will miss Max and James. It will be nice to be away from school for a little bit and do something in science. I hope it all works out on the school side of things. I want the kids to get something out of it.

I also need to buy boots and pants.  I was looking at some of the pictures from the group that is out there now and there are really really huge spiders( the largest I have ever seen) and alligators on our trek to collect the caterpillars. Should be a fun experience and I hope to have many adventures to tell my students and James when I get home.

Tactile And Noise

This weekend we went to the energy festival in Kempton. It was unique in any festival because there were lectures there that you attended all day in addition to the exhibitors.  James got to go to a ton of lectures. There were a few that I attended. I was looking forward most to the one on population challenges but the person never showed that was speaking. Right next to the lectures was this huge playground where all the kids congregated and they had a ton of activities going on like puppet shows, playing with clay, face painting, spin art, chalk drawings etc.

I was in between lectures and watching Max at the playground. i was watching him play with the other kids and also play with clay. In a world of tactile and noise, Max fit right in.  There was no one to go around telling him sshh…. and he didn’t have to sit still for eight hours a day.

These past few weeks at school I know have been trying for him and his teacher and we met with her last year and are trying a few things to keep him settled for school. One thing that doesn’t help with the end of his day is that he basically has his special class which is all tactile and sensory and then is expected to come back for the regular classroom for an hour at the end of the day and do work. This is the hour he is having the most difficulty sitting for and also the most difficulty distracting the other kids.

But over the weekend he played at the playground for six hours straight and to look at him you would think he was a normal kid. He is socially gifted and was able to focus on what he was doing. He was also really happy.  Sometimes I think we expect too much from the kids these days.

We expect them to be quiet for too long…..

Busy Busy

I can feel the chill of fall in the air and i’m not liking it. I hate fall because winter is coming. I’m not wowed anymore about the change of color in the leaves because it means that soon they will look like dead sticks. There is so much going on but I guess having no down time is who I am. Someone asked me a couple of days ago if I ever thought I had adult ADD, I don’t think so, just think I have a lot of drive and determination. Plus keeping busy has been a livelihood for me. Trust me I have moments, days where I do just retreat to the bedroom to take a nap or just to veg out. Its rare but it happens.

School has been so busy, frustrating too. A lot of middle man stuff with me and the administration. I hope that all ends soon because its starting to get annoying. The teaching side of things( when I actually get to be in the classroom) has been great, lately though I have been pulled out for all kinds of reasons and my kids have had to have substitutes.

Max has been having a hard time adjusting to first grade and we are trying to get his behavior under control. We already met with the teacher who I think now knows how to handle him. It has been worrisome because we want him to succeed and if we have to just accept what he can do. Hopefully it gets better. The bugger has been trying to outsmart us and last night he’s up a point. He’s been staying up all night and we haven’t noticed. This has been an ongoing roadrunner wylie coyote moment….and I thought we had it solved. Now I’m looking into a motion sensor for his room.

I had to come home yesterday in the middle of the day to arrange some things for Max in school that somehow could only be done in a very narrow time frame. I was running around on a time crunch and realized I was locked out of the house. James instructed me how to break in ( which I’m not sure is all that comforting) and I did only to practically do a front flip onto the couch. It was a very seinfield moment. I picked Max up at school yesterday and he had a great day. In my mind I already knew how to reward this. Six flags was open last night according to my coupon book for season passholders only.

So we didn’t tell him and headed out for the 45 minute drive. We get there and the woman at the parking booth looks at us really weird and then hands us a flyer that says ” Come out and Play” flier. It had the intitals LGBT ( which I now realize that it stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transexual). I am trying to read the flier and I’m starting to make the connection when I suddenly see all these people in the parking lot that do not look straight. They switched the dates and if we were Lesbian, Gay , Bisexual, or Transexual we had to pay and couldn’t use our season pass. To be honest thankfully max didn’t question because I would have liked to try and explain that one, we just told him it was a private event and we weren’t allowed in. Geesh of all nights to go.. and it could happen only to us.

Sometimes I think heterosexual people should have a night.  I guess I just wish that who you are as a person isn’t defined by your race, nationality, gender, religion , or sexual orientation. Its weird that people cannot discriminate against you in an employer setting for any of those reasons,but people discriminate themselves for those reasons.  What I am saying is that people will automatically cling to their race or sexual orientation.  I really just care about the person and not any of those things and anyone drawing attention to themselves for one of those reasons makes me question their motives.

This weekend we are off to Kempton for an energy festival. Looks to have a lot of interesting lectures and classes so I think it should be fun, and I am glad to be away from the farm for a week.

Trying

I’m trying not to complain because we got the best news of our life last night. Saying that it seems that I am about to unleash a huge array of complaints and to be honest I think I am just plain frustrated of dealing with other people.  I feel I have way too much responsibility at my job and even when I try to turn it off they are piling on more or refusing to meet with me ( Perhaps they know that I am going to turn down a position).  So instead they are letting me carry the position and letting me grow more anxious over it.  I hate for things to fail and this one is going to because I am the only one running it. Confusing I know, but just plain frustrating.

In other news Max is back on the farm tomorrow. Last week was a pretty dull week because it rained but also I just realize that I don’t really like making small talk with new people and I’m not all that much into monotony.  James and I were separated and not that it was a huge deal but when your grinding corn in 90 degree heat, you want to be next to someone who is not complaining that she can’t do anything with her life because she choose to have five children.  Everytime the woman I was with would ask me about my life and I would tell her something I was doing, she would reply with oh I could never do that… because I have little ones at home. Eventually they grow up and go to school and even I say if they are carryable that you should be porting them around and doing something that is important to you.

I don’t think I could ever stay at home and if I was blessed enough not to have to work, I would be out there working or at least volunteering.

But I’m not complaining because right now it could rain for the next 40 days and I wouldn’t care, because we beat the cancer dart for now.

Hurricanes and Celebrations

The past two months and particulary the past two weeks have been stormy.  School started and so far so good, but I have too much responsibly right now and too much stuff going on. I love the stuff going on but it is overwhelming at times and I am trying very hard to keep the stress level down and prioritize and cut back on some of the stuff we were doing so I can focus and keep my head straight.

In July after we came back from Maine, James had a checkup and was referred to a urologist because of some abnormality felt. He took the famous PSA blood test which came back compeltely normal, but they ordered a biopsy because the prostate gland felt firmer one on side and could indicate cancer.

We then had to wait another month for a biopsy which happened at the end of August just when I was starting school.  James felt a lot of discomfort in the biopsy ( we both missed two days of work afterwards) and it was something that really just rattled both of us but especially me because I was imagining scenarios and was just so worried that he really did have cancer.

We had to wait two weeks for the results and this was the most difficult time. I tried to forget about it, I journaled about it here privately, but to be honest I had some pretty bad days with it.  We tried to call them on Tuesday for the results and they refuse to give us the results over the phone and insisted we talk in person. This heightend the anxiety.

Last night James had his appointment and I reluctantly went with him, but we both knew I had to go because I had done so much research and was ready to ask the questions.

So James’ biopsy was cancer free and in all of the samples they have taken none even looked suspicious. If you knew about this I thank you for all your prayers and support. If you didn’t know, don’t be too upset. We told a handful of people and I finally made James tell his own mother last week.

This whole experience I hope no one ever has to go through, especially the two week waiting period. But it has made James and I realize how important we are to eachother and how precious life is and I’m not sure even if I tell you to reflect and think about the people in your life, that most people wouldn’t just go about their business and keep on moving.

Its only until something happens and we stop and think about what we have and what we don’t want to give up.

So hopefully in the hurricane you can find something to celebrate about.

I know I will be.