A sigh for England.

(Disclaimer: this post was written about three days ago, but I was lazy about uploading pictures to go along with the post. So, read this like it's actually Tuesday.)

I woke up this morning with a massive case of the blahs.

More specifically, I had a dream about being in Europe...and damn it if it didn't throw me into a funk for the entire day. I miss that place, those adventures, more than I can ever describe. I go through this about once a year, and feel the same way, and just ache and ache for youth and wildness and adventure and freedom. I don't know if it's because I was at a personal low before I went and it turned me around, or because everything felt so exciting all the time, or because the people I met there remain, to this day, some of my very best friends on the planet, but I would literally give everything, anything, to get back there and feel that way again.

Maybe it's also because the summer is winding down, and I don't want it to end. Life feels like it's changing a lot around here. I'm back at my job (thankyougod) in September, but I'm giving up coaching cheer. It was time for me to step away, for a whole big list of reasons. I'm feeling a little sad about the end of a chapter, but for the most part, the sadness has been overwhelmed by a giant sense of relief. Doug and I are coming up on our one year anniversary, and we're talking family and babies, which is thrilling and terrifying all at once. Can I be brutally honest? There's a huge part of me that feels like life just ends when you have children. I don't mean that in a horrible I-hate-babies kind of way, because the truth couldn't be more opposite. I love children. I desperately want to have children. I have awful child-envy for my friends' little ones. But then, I think to myself: I didn't get back to Europe (though I should be grateful I got to go at all). I didn't finish writing a book. What about driving across the country? Seeing California? What about living a big life filled with adventure? What about all those things that I promised myself I would do, see, be, experience? Does anyone else feel the same? Advice?

Sometimes I think my dreams of what I want to happen are hindered by my need to over-plan everything and my raging jealousy of what other people are doing with their lives. I gave myself a big long speech on this blog about living in the moment and being grateful for what I have a few months ago. Yet, here I am, wishing for the life I haven't lived yet. Sigh. I'm hopeless.

In productive news, I managed to tackle some of the summer list I posted about a month ago. To date, the vines are out of the front (huzzah!)
BEFORE:

DURING:

There's an after that I'll add once I actually take a picture, with flowers and mulch...but again, sheer laziness has set in. Moving on...

I'm winding down on my statistics course (and pulling down a 100 average, heck yes!). We've gotten in touch with a contractor and should be moving along with the basement repair soon. The organization...well, I planned to do that today, so you can see how well that's working out for me (side note: it's now Thursday. I still haven't touched it, though I have read two books this week. Priorities!). We got Oscar a bark collar that literally changed him into the dog of my dreams overnight. It was miraculous. On the baking front, we're booking a table at the CV Craft Show and plan to debut some new delicious treats there (Maybe with a new business name. Thoughts?).

As for writing, I've been failing at that. I don't know what my roadblock is, but every time I sit down to do it, I find something else to do. Same with exercise. Oops.

I'm hoping before the summer ends, I can get to NYC to see a long-lost friend, plan a trip to see my bestest long-distance girl in the G-Raggedy for sometime before 2012 and the end of the world, pull myself together and WRITE already, and really, truly, get rid of the junk in our house.

For today, I'm doing really well at #8 on the original list...and maybe checking out airfare to England.

Sweet summer

Sigh. So this is summer.

It feels like a long time coming, after the tumultuous last few months. This is my first summer not working, which is a pretty odd feeling considering I've been working/volunteering over my summers since the 7TH GRADE. I didn't know what was happening to me next year, so I didn't job search. Oh, well. (I sound pretty bummed out, right?) Last week, we went to the beach with my parents and brother, and we threw a little 4th of July BBQ yesterday.

I have clean up ahead of me (unpacking and de-partying our house) but it's the first real day of nothing important to do, so instead I'm sitting in bed, at (gasp) 10:30 am, listening to Oscar snore and thinking over my "to-do" list of things to accomplish before September rolls around.

Here's what my summer looks like so far:

1. Clean/organize/sort the unbelievable amount of crap we've accumulated since moving into the house,some of which was accumulated and left by the previous owners. The general plan is a garage sale sooner than later, and renting a dumpster as a last step for finally getting rid of some of the nonsense that we just don't know what to do with. We currently have 4, count 'em, 4 extra couches (one  is currently on our curb if anyone is interested), chairs galore, knickknacks beyond measure, and tchotchkes beyond your wildest dreams. If I can clean out the garage/attic/basement this summer, it will be a success.Which leads me to....

2. Hire a contractor to fix up our monstrous basement. We were flooded earlier this spring, thrice, and now we are the proud owners of warped, nasty, rotten paneling. So, we've gotta get that taken care of, stat. We fixed up the non-flooded side of the basement just this weekend, with some new Berber rugs (which, by the way, were a total steal at $300 for two 12 x 15 bound rugs from Warehouse Carpet). Doug also set up his new music room/ man cave/jam space. I was feeling a little grumpy about giving up the space that used to house a card table and some other odds and ends, but I have to admit, it looks pretty snazzy.

3. Go through all of our papers and file them. We started this process, but haven't finished yet. Since moving in together and getting married, we sort of just kept shoving any papers that seemed mildly important into various drawers in the office....which made doing our taxes and my FAFSA (I started classes to earn my second Masters in Ed Admin) this year a total, all encompassing nightmare. So, we've started filing, and I'd really like to get that under control asap.

4. Tackle the ugly green on green on green front landscaping. I've been saying this since we moved in. I hate, hate, hate the front of our house. There's the grass, which is fine, but that melts into this awful tangly ground cover vine thing, which borders an equally unattractive line of hedge. I'm not sure if I have it in me to rip out the hedges, but those vines are going, going, gone if it's the last thing I do...and given how many of them there are, it just might be. I did some work in the back garden, and I'm really, really happy with how it came out. I'm hoping the front will be as successful.

5. Take my statistics course that I am not loving, but am happy to be starting. 1 course started, 11 more to go!

6. Keep baking.

7. Work on the novel Doug and I started over two years ago. Like, really work on it. I don't even care about it being published, I'd just like to say I did it and it's done.

8. Sleep.

9. Possibly do something with our pink and gray bathroom of ultimate heinousness. Maybe. Doug thinks it's better left alone. I totally disagree. I mean, look at it. Gross.

10. Fix the scrapes in the wood floors that came from moving furniture without pads. Oops.

11. Break Oscar's will to bark at everything, all the time, to the point of ridiculousness.

12. Exercise. A lot, to make up for #6.

OK, maybe I'm over-planning. I do have the tendency to do that. But, that's the plan for now. I might be singing a different tune in a week or two.

For now, I think I'll start cleaning...but then again, maybe I'll just go back to bed. It's summer, after all.

Secrets Kept Secret.

I am writing this post almost a full month before I can share it. It was hard to keep it a secret for so long.

On Friday, May 13, I got a visit from my Superintendent. He sat down in front of me, and told me he was recommending my job be reinstated at the June 9th Board Meeting. I almost passed out.

He told me that they recognized everything I've done this year and the past three years I've worked there. He told me they value me as an employee, and that I'm an integral part of the goals of the district. He told me they may be moving me. He told me I was employed if the Board passes the vote on June 9th.

Let me say that again: HE TOLD ME I'M EMPLOYED.

He also told me I needed to keep it quiet for now. Out of the 22 teachers still being laid off, there is only myself and one other person being saved. We are the very, very lucky ones. It's simply not fair that so many talented, smart, amazing teachers will still be facing what I was facing. It's not right that they could only save a handful of us when every single teacher being let go deserves their job. I am blessed in a way that I can't fathom to have been given my job back.

I had to close my eyes when he was talking to me so I didn't throw up on his shoes or start crying. I am so relieved, so grateful, so happy I have my job. I had hit my worst just a few days before. I was in despair. I was lost, directionless, hopeless, worried. At that moment, when he told me that I could work there again, I felt...sure. I was back to where I thought I was before this all started. My life was on track. I knew what I was supposed to be doing. I am meant to be in a school--this school.

After he left, I had to sit down on the floor and take it in. I told my clerk and we celebrated together. My principal came in and hugged me. I ran into the computer lab and called my husband and my mom as the weight of the past three months lifted off my shoulders.

You know what's strange? I'm happy this happened to me. It was good for me. It woke me up and made me realize that I'm content to live in my small hometown. It made me realize I'm ready for a new challenge, so bring on the middle school if that's what's supposed to happen next. It certainly made me more resilient, so if (and when, because there's a good shot that it will) it happens again next year, I think I'll be better off than I was this time. It brought out my creative side, started a new business in baking, renewed my need to write, and made me take stock of my life.

At the same time, I'm a little melancholy. I was geared up to go do something wild and reckless. I had a vision of staying home with babies, or working at a college, or becoming a full time writer, or moving to a new place. There's a huge part of me that wants to always be on the move, trying new things, seeing new places. I am endlessly restless. I have to balance that desire for change with the realization that when I was being forced into a drastic situation I wanted to stay where I already am. I need to remember to value what I've got instead of always wanting something else. This is enough, more than enough.

So, here comes another year....and who knows what the next few weeks will bring. Who knows what the next year will bring? I'll keep blogging, though the original theme of the blog will change. Life keeps moving, and shifting, and changing. Though I may not be totally starting over anymore, I am starting something new. I can't wait to see what happens.

Sunshine and pastry

Today has shaped up to be such a fabulous day.
It started with a trip to our favorite diner and then the farmer's market, which is my all-time favorite Saturday morning activity. Doug and I bought some new herbs for the garden (lemon basil and parsley, to join the sweet basil, sage, lavender, and mint), some amazing raw milk cheddar, and eggs. After coming back home to laze around in the sunshine, putz in the garden, and plant our new goodies, we came inside to cool off. Too keyed up to take a nap, I decided to bake something new while Doug snoozed.

This is what I came up with: Homemade. Pop. Tarts.
I saw the recipe a few months ago on Smitten Kitchen, and have been itching to try them since. I followed the recipe fairly closely, subbing out 1/2 cup of whole wheat flour for part of the white, and I used Sarabeth's Strawberry Raspberry jam for the filling. I'm toying with whipping up a quick glaze to finish them off, though I think that might defeat the purpose of making a healthier pop tart. They are soooo fabulous, and I don't have a total guilt trip about shoving them in my mouth because the ingredients are 1. recognizable 2. pronounceable 3. as healthy as you can get with a pop tart (flour, sugar, salt, eggs, milk, butter, jam) Yum.

I hate to waste, so with the leftover dough and jam mixture, I decided to make some pies on a stick, another venture I've been dying to try. They were so easy! I just rolled out the dough, cut it out with some sweet little cookie cutters, brushed it with some egg, placed the stick, and put a little dollop of filling in the center. Then, I covered the bottom portion with another cutout, sealed and pressed with a fork...baked for about 20 minutes and...voila! I think next time I might sprinkle with a little sugar or try a different filling (like, oh, I don't know...an actual pie filling?). I like my pie to be sweet, and these ended up tasting a little understated using the pop tart ingredients. Still, they were super tasty!

I was so pleased with how they came out, and I'm dying to make another batch soon.
At this point, I just can't wait for summer so I can bake my little heart out. This is the first summer I have no plans to work (I'm usually holding down about 3 jobs a summer) so the game plan is to bliss out with Sarah doing DIY projects, remodeling the bathroom, and cooking up a storm...while figuring out what next year will bring. Sigh. It's so close I can taste it.

This makes my heart hurt

Please read this heart-wrenching post from Mizz Murphy at The Library is Not a Fruit.

While you're at it, read this one, too, from one of my all-time favorites, Joyce Valenza at her blog NeverEnding Search.

And this news article, by Hector Tobar at the L.A. Times, details the situation even further.

What's happening in LA a complete and total mockery of logical decision making, and it makes me fear for the future. It seems the LAUSD is subjecting their teacher-librarians to trials in order to prevent them from transitioning back into a classroom. TRIALS. What the heck is this about? Does this sound totally insane to anyone else?

From my understanding, the LAUSD is cutting their librarians. According to the system of senority and tenure, those with the most seniority are allowed to stay. Librarians are required to hold teaching certificates in addition to their librarian certificate, so they are, by right, qualified to be placed in a classroom, and should have seniority over some of their colleagues if they have several years in the system. And yet, they are being told they are not qualified to teach, and interrogated in the most disrespectful of ways to try to prove they are not qualified. Hence the trials.

It gets more complex. According to their current system in place, if a teacher has been out of the classroom for more than 5 years, they aren't allowed to return, despite seniority. According to Mizz Murphy's blog, the original intent for this was to prevent near-retirement, long removed teachers from returning to a school environment that had become foreign in their absence.

She says it much better than I am able...

"The logic behind the recency rule seems to be based on poor decision making from last year. LAUSD sent scores of people into classrooms who had been sitting in cubicles for ages. These were people with dusty old teaching credentials, waiting for retirement in the cool, air-conditioned Beaudry building in downtown LA...When layoffs began, these educators were saved because of their time served, but their office positions were cut and they went back to school for the first time in who knows how long. This did not go well.... So this year, LAUSD got wise. Make a rule that says that if you haven’t been in a classroom for five years, you can’t be in one ever again. No more problem, right?"

Except, well...BIG problem, as she goes on to elaborate. This has swiftly mutated to something very much other than the original reasoning: In the eyes of the LAUSD, the library is not technically a classroom, and librarians are not technically teachers (although according to Mizz Murphy, their contracts say otherwise). What a disgrace. This is a perfect case of how standardizing a rule to the extreme can swiftly spiral out of control when we stop thinking about what the rule was intended for in the first place.

To make things worse, the questions they are asking the librarians to answer are unbelievably asinine. To assert that the Dewey Decimal System is numerical, so librarians couldn't possibly have adequate knowledge of ELA is laughable. To imply that librarians do not teach is grossly disturbing.

It seems that they are creating a bunch of B.S. to reach an end goal of getting rid of librarians. They're hiding behind this crazy process of discrediting a whole group of people, forcing them to defend their competency, so they don't have to come right out and reveal their motives. Haven't they been observed by administrators? Haven't they been doing their job, and doing it well? If this is a question of meeting a bottom line, or balancing a budget, then please, do them a favor and be honest. To do otherwise is scary, and in the words of my husband, "dangerous thinking". I'm inclined to agree.

It seems the plight of the library media specialist is growing exponentially...almost as quickly as new technology explodes on the scene. When will those in charge realize that library media specialists hold the key to harnessing the power of new technology? When will it become clear that we are discrediting these invaluable resources of information literacy when we need them more than ever? I was devastated over my job, but at least I didn't have to endure this.

My heart goes out to you, colleagues. Chins up, stay strong. My thoughts are with you.

Life off track.

I am at a total, complete, all-encompassing crossroads in my life.

This weekend, we went to Boston to celebrate Allie's graduation from Northeastern. It felt so good to get away. I think I'm a lot in love with that city, mostly because it reminded me a little of Europe and how I felt when I was there, full of promise. Boston is clean, and historic, and exciting.

It feels like opportunity, vibrancy, potential. Seeing those new graduates, fresh-faced and ready to take on the world, felt like that, too.

It made where I'm at right now even more poignant.

In the past few weeks, I've come to realize that I'm teetering on a very precarious edge. There are days when I come home from work and simply cannot stop crying. There's also days when I can pretend that June isn't imminent, and I'm OK. I think if I wasn't an innately positive person, I would be in a full-blown depression. That's pretty scary for me to put out there. When I say I'm worried about the future, that's true, but I think it's more than that. I'm afraid that I'm not living up to my potential. I'm afraid that I've sold myself short by opting for safe, predictable routes all my life and now the universe is figuratively shaking me, urging me to wake up. I opted to take the route of school librarianship because it seemed interesting and I like children, and it was supposed to be stable, afford me a great schedule, and let me proceed in a nice orderly fashion possibly to a job in administration someday. It was easy. It was non-threatening. There were no big risks involved. And what the hell did it get me? Certainly not stability. Certainly not predictability. Please don't mistake, I LOVE my job right now. But is it what I'm meant for? Could I seek it out to do all over again somewhere new? I just don't know anymore.

In short, I have absolutely no clue what I'm supposed to do with my life. I've completely lost my purpose.

Sometimes I think I should try to write for a living. Sometimes I think I should bake, or paint, or run away and backpack across Europe and do odd jobs for money. At this weekend's graduation, the president of the college said something to the effect of, "You're young. Now is the time to take risks. What is there to lose?" What is there to lose? Doug and I have no children. We are 27 years old. We have a house, sure, but it can be sold. We have possessions that can be stored. We have nothing tethering us except our families and our friends. Maybe we should move away, live in a city, scrape by for awhile but do something we're passionate about and have some fun. Maybe we should drive across the country. Maybe we should join the Peace Corps. Maybe we should do something, anything, that we can look back on and say, "Now that was a grand adventure. That was living."

No matter what I do, I don't think I can work another school, at least not right away. The thought of setting up a new library, meeting new students, working and trying and building relationships with an entire school of children breaks my heart. I just know that I will see the faces of the little ones I've come to adore in every new face. I know I cannot replicate the  lessons I've worked on with a whole new environment. It's almost like I have to put my time in the elementary library into a sort of shrine, to look back and admire and reminisce but not to try to duplicate. I applied for a school library job, but I don't think I want it, even if it's the smart thing to do. I just don't have it in me.

For now, my safe, smart, predictable side is at war with my desire to run away for awhile and do something crazy. I'm so afraid of living in regret. For now, I've made the decision to stop applying for jobs. I need to step away. I need to take some time to reassess my life goals, to realign my inner compass that's currently spinning wildly out of control. No matter where it lands, it will be a change...and a change is what I need.

Holy whirlwind, Batman!

Wow. The past two weeks have been n.u.t.s! What started as a whim as quickly evolved into a non-stop cake baking frenzy. On April 19th (I can't believe it's only been since then!) Sarah and I got together to play around with some cake pops. We baked, we crumbled, we mixed, we frosted, we dipped.

The first few were just....okay. We worked from 4-11pm, and made 110 pops. Talk about diving in headfirst!

So, I brought a few in to work, and my sweet, supportive co-workers immediately jumped on board. I had orders for Easter bunny pops due the following day:

Then came a birthday party for that Saturday:

We could barely catch our breath. Our life became consumed by cake...but it felt good. Over the next few days, we booked a wedding for Memorial Day, two baby showers in May, and made a three layer "farewell party" cake. We create a new round of samples...

 

...that looked and tasted a heck of a lot better than our first attempt...and started to think that maybe this is something we could really do. Last night, we got together and made cupcakes for a first communion, and talked business. We figured out how much each item was costing us...and what we need to try to find online to save on supplies. We talked about new options, testing out new recipes, trying our hand at bread and muffins and brittle and fudge and booking craft shows and dreaming big. 

In the meantime, between and during all of that, our basement flooded...

...twice. Which was awful. We have to call the insurance company next week because a LOT of things are ruined. I also had the health inspector approve our kitchen (but only for non-chocolate, non-dairy goods, which is a long story for another post...if we want to be truly legal we need a commercial kitchen), I stopped sleeping so I could cook and clean and fret... and I totally stopped paying attention to job applications...which I need to remedy, right away. I don't harbor any illusions that I'm going to not have to work ever again and can just bake my life away...although that would be a dream, because I love it so much.

So, that was my whirlwind two-ish weeks. Today, I'm trying to recover and become a human being again, instead of a walking zombie. Tomorrow will be dedicated to the very-important task of job applications...and maybe, thought I should really be taking a break from it, some baking. I just can't seem to stay away.

On resumes and new beginnings

Today was a day of contrasts.

To start, I called about a job I had really, really been hoping would come through...and was told interviews had already been conducted. I opened my e-mail...and saw that I had been rejected for yet another job that I really thought I had a chance at getting. It was a big time blow, one that I should probably get used to after hearing some serious horror stories about extended unemployment in the current economic climate. But oh my, it hurts. I've never had trouble finding employment in my whole life. I've always gotten the job I wanted, nailed the interview, got the callback. Now, I can't even get my foot in the door. To date, I've applied for 5 jobs and been rejected 5 times. It seems like a very small number in comparison to people who have been unemployed for weeks, months, years even. At the same time, I have a sneaking suspicion that that number isn't going to stay small for long. Things are rough and getting rougher, and it's high time I start thinking of some new tactics, because what I've always relied on doesn't seem to be working anymore. It's time for a new game plan--and the name of the game is being aggressive.

I'm going to start by seriously tearing apart my resume and cover letter. I'm not applying for K-12 jobs, because frankly, they don't exist. So, I'm planning to downplay the "elementary" portion of my resume and highlight the "media" angle. I am technologically savvy, and I know I have transferable skills, but something about the image of a primary-grade librarian isn't doing it for the private companies and higher ed positions I'm targeting.
Probably because they're thinking of this:

Storytime, anyone?

As opposed to this:

Hello, Web 2.0!

Not that there's anything wrong with storytime...it's just that it seems to be conspicuously missing from job openings of late, and I've got many other skills to offer. The second thing I'm going to tackle is my reluctance to follow up. I waited almost a month to call on one of the jobs I applied for...and when I finally did, I didn't like the answer I got. I think I was afraid to call because I was afraid I would be told exactly what I ended up hearing today--I didn't get chosen for an interview. But really, what would the harm have been in hearing that a heck of a lot sooner? And even worse, maybe the answer would have been different had I stepped up and been a little pushier than I've been in the past. The squeaky wheel gets the grease, right?

Tonight feels particularly sad because I know as of this evening's board meeting, I'm officially unemployed next year. My position has been abolished. Gone. No more K-3 library media specialist. Sigh.

On a happier note, Sarah and I got together on Saturday and decided the best way to solve our problems is to make cake. What problems doesn't cake solve? (Well, maybe weight problems. Anyway...) We're really interested in exploring making some baked goods as our livelihood. It started as sort of a joking "wouldn't-this-be-fun" idea, but the next thing you know, there's a few people interested in the possibility of our services, I'm calling the Department of Health about approving one of our kitchens, and we're meeting tomorrow to practice making cake. I promise to post pictures of our adventure tomorrow.

There's something very exciting about the idea of self-sufficiency, especially in light of the seemingly never ending stream of discouraging news. The mental image of a cozy kitchen filled with baked goods lifts my spirits in what has otherwise been a pretty dismal stretch. I'm not delusional enough to think it will replace the income I'm going to be losing, but it's a start....and I'm in control of the decisions I make regarding it. Right now, that seems to be the best feeling of all, when so many things that affect my life, my future, have been largely taken out of my hands...maybe for now, it's exactly what I need to feel okay.

Photo Credit here and here. 

The sound of the other shoe dropping is a sob.

Well, I got what I was asking for: an answer.

"It is with great sadness that I must inform you that at its next meeting the Board of Education will be presented with a resolution to abolish your position for reason of economy."

So there it is. It looks somehow less scary typed out here than it did on the letter in my shaking hands. Now, it really begins. It's real. No more hypotheticals, no more what if, no more "maybe this will happen."

I am unemployed.

I am so freaking scared.

It's an ice cream kind of day.

We had a union meeting this afternoon at school, where we went over the proposals that have been presented on both sides of the negotiation. Although I can't go into details because we were asked to keep things quiet and "membership only", I will say that I am probably the same level of deep-depression-upset that I was when I first heard my job was on the chopping block.

To put it simply: things are not looking good.

Right now, the gap between what the union presented and what the district presented is vast. It's hard to see where the two parties can meet in the middle...and I am terrified where that leaves those of us that are already living in a daily state of limbo. One of my biggest hopes was that concessions by the teachers would help save me. If we don't reach an agreement, and can't agree to concessions, and no contract is decided, where does that leave the jobs that could have been saved? Do things just steamroll ahead and the layoffs go through?
I'm not surprised by the tone of today's meeting, though I am disappointed. Not in the teachers, because they are willing to concede, but the things being asked of us are asinine and a slap in the face to the hard work we do every day, unless everyone is willing to make the same sacrifices, top to bottom. I think if I had to pinpoint a reason why I'm so upset, it would be because I have been hoping so hard that things would start to look up and that the initial announcement would be nothing more than a small, unpleasant blip on the radar. More and more, it seems like that's a bunch of wishful thinking without much solid evidence to support it. I have this rosy, childish (waning) belief that if I want something hard enough, believe enough, wish enough, I will always get my way. Maybe that's the lesson in all this--you can't always get what you want.

My dad thinks I'm being a drama queen and that I should have faith that things will work out in my favor. He gets very angry when I get worked up about my situation, and tells me to slow down. My mom just sighs and reminds me that I'm not dying and I'm certainly not alone in this area. And she's right. She also brought me home for dinner and some good old fashioned family time with her and Dad and my brother, which made me feel so much better. Doug has been a rock throughout, telling me that no matter what, we'll be OK. And he's right, we will. I just can't get past the devastation of losing a job, a family, that I've come to care deeply about and really value as a part of my life. I know I don't have to make decisions now, because, as usual, nothing is set in stone, but a major internal debate I'm having is whether to be loyal to my position and consider moving to take a school library job, or to be loyal to this town and take whatever comes locally. Doug and I have debated this over and over, and neither option seems particularly nice.

On a side note, the detox officially ended tonight when I decided to drown my sorrows in peanut butter pie frozen yogurt. Oh, that dairy and sugar soothes the soul.  I felt randomly more empowered to stop than I did to keep going, in that I could recognize that I was miserable and it just wasn't worth it. It did introduce me to some new, healthy options, and helped me reconsider how much salt/sugar I need to add to things to make them taste good. So, it wasn't a total loss, and the carby, sugary, tasty consolation dinner I had tonight was all the better-tasting for being deprived.


Photo Credit Here

Detox rox.

In the spirit of starting fresh, I've decided to do a mini-detox. Inspired by the fact that I've been steadily gaining weight since the wedding, and have been eating some really unhealthy crap lately in an attempt to drown my sorrows, I thought it would be a good way to kick off spring and to keep my mind off the fact that the budget is being presented to the Board of Ed this week. I think I hit rock bottom right before the detox began, in the form of a half-pint of Boston Cream Pie Ben and Jerry's. Oy.

So, Doug being out of town for the week, I began a pretty intense detox. No cayenne pepper-maple syrup-water business for me, but I am eliminating sugar, wheat, and dairy for 5 days. I'm two days in, and so far, it's not as terrible as I thought it might be, but it's also very distinctly not. fun.
I've been using the Clean detox as a sort of spring board, with some internet recipes mixed in. So far, I've discovered the following:
1. Frozen fruit + unsweetened almond milk or rice milk=amazing. Really yummy, which surprised me. I'm a fan of almond milk, but I've always bought the sweetened vanilla kind. It's amazing how simple and good the combo of the unsweetened non-dairy "milk" and fruit is. My favorite combo so far is raspberry and rice milk. Awesome.
2. Although the inspiration for my daily recipes was a pretty specific detox from GOOP (Gwyenth Paltrow's blog, she can be snarky but I like to live vicariously sometimes) I've found I could substitute quite a bit of what I had at home for some of the more expensive things I will never use again (hello, tub of miso paste? I don't think so.)
3. I have never peed so much in my life. Like, ever.
4. I epically failed at making a buckwheat crust. It tasted like dirt. The rest of this quiche was good though! (I'm not quite sure why they called this  quiche. It was the least quiche-y thing ever. Wishful thinking, maybe?)
Check it out:

Looks good, right? Let me tell you, the white bean garlic paste in this is crazy good. I would just eat that straight up. I modified a little, specifically in that I used chicken breasts, not ground chicken/no cranberries/coconut oil in place of shortening in the buckwheat crust (oh man, it was so yuck.)/and I bought the beets "pre-pickled" at Wegmans. Minus the crust, it was muy delish.

So, that's the plan for the next 3ish days. I've had a dull, continuous headache since Monday, but I'm not sure if that's because of the weather, or the crazed children at school, or because sugar/wheat/dairy is like my crack and I'm going through withdrawals.

Tomorrow, we have a union meeting, so I'm hoping I have some answers about next year. In the meantime, I'm off to drink herbal tea and try not to dream of grilled cheese and cake.

This is big.

Breaking news as of 5:26PM: Cuomo and the Legislature have agreed to a tentative budget.



When I saw this, my stomach went into an immediate knot. I started to read the (very short and not very informative) article. When I came to this sentence, my heart sunk: "But the 2011-2012 budget that Cuomo, Senate leader Dean Skelos and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver stood behind Sunday would be nearly identical to the proposal Cuomo presented Feb. 1".

Pardon my french, but this is the truth. My instant reaction: Oh, shit.  Shit, shit, shit.
Literally, out loud. Very loud.

What I would have preferred to read is something like this: "This tentative budget addresses the public outcry to restore some of the proposed cuts to education, and redistributes the disproportionate percentage of cuts to Upstate school districts".
Yep, that sounds much nicer if I do say so myself. Not being one to rely on a single source (hello, librarian here!) I went farther, straight to the mouthpiece. I found this article on NY.gov. I took a deep breath. Okay, I thought, this seems a little better:
"Recent changes to the budget include an additional $272 million in education which includes restoration of funding for schools for the blind and deaf (4201) and summer school special education. Human services funding of $91 million was added and $86 million for higher education including SUNY hospitals, SUNY and CUNY community colleges".

So, restoring funding is good. But what will the funding be used for in education? Are there restrictions? How much will each district get? Is it weighted differently for Upstate versus Downstate? CAN YOU PLEASE JUST TELL ME IF I HAVE JOB NEXT YEAR FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!?

Whew. That helped a little. 

But then, there's also this from the same article:

"The approximately $132.5 billion budget will reduce spending overall by over 2 percent from the current year, eliminate 3,700 prison beds, establish regional economic development councils, bring performance funding to education, redesign Medicaid, and cap next year's education and Medicaid spending."

So, are we a little safer now? Are we safer just for this year? Or what?

Once again, what appears to be a step toward clarity leaves me more mystified than ever. I think the big answer is still "we don't know for sure"...so the waiting, and hoping, and praying continues, and the big questions are left to be answered another day.

Photo credit here.

Nothing soothes the soul like beer.

Well, technically, beer bread. I'm not nursing a solo beer at 11 am. Promise.

It's another March snow day today, this time with a little less panic and a lot more ho-hum. We'll be going to school over two days of our spring break now, to make up for an excess of snowy days. I really should be using this time to do all manner of things, like sleep, or catch up on laundry, or clean my bathroom, but instead...
I'm baking. So far, cheesy beer bread to go with seafood chowder tonight, and more grahams (I am obsessed. Omg, with cream cheese slathered all over them--magic). I'm thinking I might attempt another batch of homemade crackers (those are crazy easy).

I love to bake. This small fact is completely and utterly surprising to myself and to those that knew me when I was younger. "Domestic" and my name did NOT belong in the same sentence...probably not even the same paragraph. I was the girl that could not boil water and regularly created small fires in the kitchen. I almost burnt down my dorm one year trying to make my roommate birthday fried dough. (Turns out plastic utensils do NOT work well in lava-hot oil. Who knew?)

Then pagach happened.

My grandmother has always made pagach--this dense, chewy, buttery,crispy potato-filled bread. It is our quintessential family heirloom food, thoroughly Slovak, served with the Polacheck specialty--sugar on top. Yum. I have so many fond memories of my mom excitedly announcing, "Grandma made pagach!" and off we'd go for tea and sugary butter potato bread, fried in a pan and eaten hot.
Then one year, Grandma didn't make it. The arthritis had gotten the best of her hands, and the intense labor required to roll out that dough paper-thin with just the right amount of potato just wasn't in the cards for her any longer.

Another year. No pagach. No one stepped up to the plate. I was heartbroken. It felt like a family tradition was being left behind, and I'm strangely attached to tradition. So I decided to take it on.
After several lengthy phone conversations and step-by-step directions, (maybe I'll post a pagach-making post on here as Easter gets closer) I tackled it. Holy crap, you guys, it was almost a disaster. But then, it wasn't. It was good! The next year got better...last year was perfect. The baking bug had bitten.

So now, I bake. My love for all things anal-retentive matches beautifully with the precision needed to bake, and my total overestimation of my ability to try new things and succeed has allowed me to dive in head-first to layer cakes, advanced decorations like from-scratch sugar leaves, nut brittles, quick and "slow" breads, cookies, crackers, whatever I feel like making....and pagach. Always pagach, twice a year. Sometimes it's a tragedy, but surprisingly often, it's not. There's just something soothing about dough on your hands and the smell of a hot oven. Bliss.

So, what's the point of all this? Firstly, it makes me happy to share what makes me happy. But also, maybe that's how I should look at the year coming up. Dive right in, and keep overestimating that everything will work out for the best. What's the worst that can happen?

Letting go

Ever since finding out about my job for next year, I've been dealing with quite a few issues of control: control over my future, control over decisions that affect me, control over my emotions. I've been realizing with greater certainty that I'm not someone that deals well with change unless the change is enacted by me, myself, and I. I do not easily relinquish control and let things flow.

In the same vein, I've started taking yoga. Tonight's class struck a particular chord with me. At "the church of St. Anne", as I like to call my class, our instructor spoke to us about letting go. "This is life," she said, "This is waking up on Monday morning. This is the second day of spring, and it's snowing." Her message tonight was that we cannot control very much, really, when it comes down to it. We can control our bodies and the way we treat them, we can control our reactions to the external, we can control the way we treat one another. And in the end, shouldn't that be enough? The universe holds us in its hands, and we are alive for a reason. We should welcome change in its myriad forms, live in the moment, and face each day with the knowledge that although we may not be able to control, we can accept. You can call this God, or the light of the universe, or a life force, but there is a bigger power at work than our small, human plans.



Tonight,surrounded by candles and the faint smell of essential oil, in the darkening room of an old local Church, I felt more spiritual, more connected, than I ever have before. I grew up Catholic, and have always struggled with my personal beliefs. Church has often been more about the routine and the tradition than a living spirituality. Tonight, feeling my breath and listening to the breathing around me, hearing the words of our instructor, letting go of all the worry and fear, I knew that there is more to this life than the small daily stresses that have been getting me down. The universe will unfold the way it will unfold. I cannot control it,but I can accept it, and welcome the exciting change that is coming my way.

And that brought me peace.

Photo Credit Here

Not so much, Gov.

This made me scream in my car on the way to work today:
Cuomo: School aid advocates making bogus threats (from the AP)

Is he serious?
Um, Governor Cuomo? Is it politics that I have a letter saying I don't have a job next year? Is that a game to you? Because to me, it's very, very serious, and very, very worrying. By all means, if you think it's a big joke, could you let my school in on the punchline? Because they showed us our budget, and we have to make up a 3.5 million dollar deficit under your budget....and while it's nice to think that reducing administrative salaries would fix that, sadly, they do not make in the millions here in Upstate, NY. This is not Westchester. This is not LI. This is Binghamton, NY, and these are the cuts we're facing:

Chenango Forks: 41 positions
Owego: 45 positions
Binghamton: 47 positions
Johnson City: 48 possible positions
Whitney Point: Rumored 15 positions (no documentation available)

...and the hits keep coming. If only our silly, politically-motivated schools would stop "playing games".

All I Need

Homemade graham crackers (thank you Smitten Kitchen!), ugly and tasty:

(This is pre-oven. Post-oven, they were gone.)

A good book:

(I have this weird habit where I always take off book jackets. I also fold down page corners...and I'm a librarian! For shame.)










Some Kindergarten compliments: "You look exspecially beeeutiful, today! I love you and your the very bestest liberry teacher in the whole world!"

The people who love me...
PS: Happy early birthday, Pops...thanks for always taking care of me. 

...and everything will be OK.

Get it together, girl

I have a confession:

I have a complete and total mental breakdown every time I submit an application.

I'm talking blubbery, messy, blotchy, crying mess...and I'm not sure why.
I'm good-to-go looking at job postings. I even get a little excited when I find one that I think might fit. I get immersed in the cover letter, and the crazy "I like my folders and notebooks and pens to match" part of me relishes the look of neatly stacked papers with matching headers. I call up my mom, gush about how this job looks like it might be a good one, this job is something I can do, this job sounds like fun. I ask Doug things like, "Can you picture yourself living here? This place might not be so bad! It's kind of cute!"

Papers in hand, protected by a laminated folder or a neatly addressed envelope, or maybe just in a perfectly-saved PDF, I take the final step, whether it be dropping the letter in the mailbox, hitting send on the fax or sending an e-mail....and then it starts.


First, I start to snap at my husband, who is doing nothing more than standing in the general vicinity and probably being more patient and supportive than I deserve with the way I've been acting. Then, my voice starts to catch. There's no stopping it now: I'm driving in my car/standing in the parking lot/sitting at my desk full-on blubbering, wallowing in self-pity and despair.

Life stinks, guys.

My husband asked me today, "What makes you so upset? I thought you said it would make you feel better if you were applying for jobs...but it seems like it makes you feel worse."

This is what he got:
There's a part of me that wants to do this. I want to be proactive. I want to feel like I'm in control of my own destiny. And the really crappy thing is, I'm not. At least, not right now. There's a whole bunch of other people that have more information than me, that are working toward making the decisions that will affect my livelihood...and they're not telling me what is going on. Maybe they couldn't tell me, even if they wanted to. They might not even know themselves. Is it Albany? Is it a bargaining ploy for our contract? Is it hard times and sacrifice? Is it even going to happen? The not knowing is brutal.
I mean...I had plans! Plans to be a librarian, go back to school and get my administrative degree, seek out a job as a school library system director or a director of technology. And now they're ruined! I just got accepted to go back to school. What was the point of all that work and time and money to apply? I'm smart and capable. I'm good at what I do...and now I can't do it anymore. I feel like my future is derailed, and it's making me crazy. So, do I sit and wait it out? What happens if I let the universe unfold and it turns out badly?  I don't want to look back and say, I should have taken that opportunity when it presented itself. At the same time, I don't want to do something rash, and look back and say, I should have waited.

And then I cry until I'm cried out and done feeling sorry for myself and my temper tantrum is over.

That's really what it is. I am acting like a small child that isn't getting her way...and I want to get my way! But, there are much, much worse things in the world...and life is a lot longer than what happens next year. I know it will be OK and that I'm being a big baby and I need to (as my friend Kaycee would say) "Put on my big girl pants and deal with it".

So, this is my new mantra: Life isn't fair. Grow up. I hope I can listen to my own advice.

Photo credit here

Why cancelling cable made me a better person.

*Title courtesy of my lovely husband. Isn't he clever?

About a month ago, my husband and I decided we should cancel cable. We rarely watched anything on the 9 million channels we had (just flip-flip-flip-flip), we were spending hours zoned out in front of the TV, and it was getting progressively more and more expensive.

So, after much debate, we called up Time Warner, and did the deed. On Monday, we had an incredibly epic snowstorm, so I braved steep hills to turn in the cable box. Doug was out of town for work. I came home and automatically turned on the TV for comfort. Static. Instantaneous cancellation, like ripping off a band-aid. It was too quiet and I felt a little creeped out. And then I thought about that: I was totally uncomfortable without electronic noise filling the house. That's probably not a good thing.

So, for the first few days, it was no TV at all. I got comfortable with the natural soundtrack of my home--the groan of the stairs, the click of the washer, the echo of the pipes. It was much, much quieter...and more peaceful.

Then, we went out and bought antenna to catch some basic channels. They were dirt cheap--I think the "good one" set us back about $20--and the "old-timey-ness" of adjusting the rabbit ears appealed to my nostalgic sympathies. We can catch a few of the major stations (CBS, NBC, Fox only upstairs, PBS channels, and a very fuzzy but highly entertaining religious channel).

Our media deprivation didn't last forever. We have Netflix and our TV has a computer input option, so our gaming systems and an old refurbished laptop became our new "cable boxes" for when we want to watch something specific on Hulu or streaming video.

So, did anything change? Yes and no. We still watch TV with dinner most nights (shame, I know) and watch a lot of movies. We have a few select shows we try to catch (Bob's Burgers,The Office, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia). I miss Food Network sometimes. We watch a TON of PBS(and secretly love it: Create channel, you complete me!)...but most importantly, we watch less. We talk more, read more, think more. Our house is quieter, slower, more relaxed. We broke free of the cable chains...and best of all, our wallets are thanking us.

Jon Stewart is my personal hero.

This just about sums it up:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Crisis in Dairyland - Message for Teachers
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog The Daily Show on Facebook

This, too:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Crisis in Dairyland - Angry Curds
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog The Daily Show on Facebook

And while we're at it...

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Crisis in Dairyland - Apocalypse Cow
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog The Daily Show on Facebook

How dare we.

Rainy days and Mondays

There's so much in the world right now that just makes me want to bury my head under my pillow.

There's small things, like the fact that my cat puked on my comforter this morning. I could just punch that stupid, jerk cat. Look at his dumb face:

There's close to home things, like this article. 
OK, fair warning...here comes a mini-rant. I have nothing against Catholic schools in general. However, I went to one until I was in 8th grade, and let me tell you, they are cost-effective in part because teachers do NOT need to have a certification to teach. I went to college for 6 years to be a teacher and I'm better for it. It was valuable. On-the-job experience is valuable, too...but that mindset, that teachers are nothing more than glorified babysitters and don't need to have a degree or state certification, is (in my humble opinion) one of the MAJOR problems of society's perception of education. There's a huge disconnect between what we are really doing, and what people think we're doing. That's not to say I didn't have great, inspiring teachers in Catholic school--what's up, Mrs. Weston, Mr. Weston, Mr. Lurenz--but I also had some teachers that had NO business having even a small hand in the education of children because they were incompetent and mean, and no amount of being a good Catholic made them a good teacher. End of rant.

There's also big, national things...like this. 
What the heck is going on? Since when did the lowest levels of state and public workers become the enemy? Especially with crap like this still happening, even in light of the dire financial straits we're in. Really, guys?

I mean, I get it. State workers and teachers have really, really amazing pensions. Our health care is unheard of these days. Don't get me wrong, I love what I do, and I'm in it for the kids, but I would be lying if I said those things, that reliability for the future, didn't play a role in my career choice. But isn't that the point? I opted to choose a job that didn't pay a dramatically high salary so I could raise a family with a steady income, great schedule, and security. Some people opt to be in riskier careers to make more money, or travel, or rise up the corporate ladder. Others may not have the schooling, or opportunity, to even have those choices, and that's terrible, but should I be punished for that? I remember being in college, and friends giving me such a hard time about being a teacher. "Oh, you won't get rich doing that!" and on and on. Now, everyone is up in arms about how teachers are these "fat cats" living off the public dime. What changed, besides perception?

Sure, maybe the system isn't realistic, and very likely, it's unsustainable. We might have to re-think, consider the greater good, give back. But why the vilification? Why can't we all act like grownups here? And why are the wealthy getting tax breaks and raises? Am I crazy?

So anyway, burying my head under the pillow seems like a good option these days. Wake me up when it's over, when the world stops being mad in both senses of the word.

When it rains....

...it snows so much that we have a state of emergency.
...on the day we have an author scheduled to visit.
...and we have no more snow days, so we're going to school over spring break.

This is what I woke up to:

So, our poor visiting author is holed up in the Red Roof Inn. He drove up from Maryland, and is booked the remainder of the week at other schools. Thank God we had him booked for two days, so I can re-schedule everyone into a single day. I've been up since 5am calling people, creating new presentation schedules, sending e-mails, and trying to stop hyperventilating.
Maybe one of these will help:

Yum. Adapted from a Nigella Lawson recipe, the last time I made these I substituted greek yogurt for almost all of the oil in the recipe (I put in about 2 tablespoons before I changed my mind), dropped the temperature to 350, and cooked until they were tall and gorgeous. They were less sweet, and very moist.

This time, I used melted butter in place of the oil, and added peanut butter chips. (Sidenote: one of my new "frugal" initiatives is to cook with what I have, instead of running out to the store whenever the fancy to make something strikes. Triple points for saving on gas, being resourceful, and learning more about baking in one fell swoop. I digress...)
These were not nearly as healthy, or gorgeous...more flat and crunchy, but very, very tasty. Double yum.

I'm thinking of trying other add-ins, like coconut, cranberries, pecans...maybe even frozen blueberries. The options are endless with chocolate...and it always makes you feel better, even when it seems to be the year when nothing goes right.

Sunday Morning Bliss

Rain against the windows, coffee in my (disposable) cup, a warm house, a sleepy dog, and my favorite Sunday morning activity:

I even had a coupon for the coffee!

Later today, I'm planning to put together and send out another application, this time to a downstate college. There's two open positions, so I hope that doubles my odds of getting an interview. Hopefully, since it's an electronic submission, the process will be a little faster than my last attempt, when I burned through about 5 envelopes due to extreme anal-retentiveness (I just could not get that address to be centered correctly!) I  should also be seriously thinking about finishing the SLJ book reviews I neglected since the due date just so happened to be the day after THE news. Oops.

Have a lovely Sunday morning!

Life Revamp

One of the toughest parts of this whole "job loss" thing is being in limbo. Nothing's set in stone yet, so I sort of feel like this:



At this point, I'm not really sure if I'm going to be plummeting into an unemployed abyss, or if I'll make it across to the other side...aka, another year of employment.

Regardless, I've had to really start evaluating my spending. My husband Doug and I have been living a free-wheelin' lifestyle the past few years. We have no kids, our bills were comfortably within our means to spend, and we were saving, but not with the kind of fervor that we probably should have been. It was classic "this will never happen to us" behavior. New DVD out? Let's go buy it. Don't feel like cooking? How about dinner out tonight. New clothes, new shoes, random crap we didn't need....there wasn't much purposeful thought behind our spending. I didn't use coupons--what was the point of a few extra cents off? I'm a bargain hunter for clothes and love a good clearance rack, but I would never have called myself "frugal". My, how things have changed.

Now, I am in panic mode. I think long and hard about every little thing before spending. Is there a cheaper option? Do I really need this? Can I go without? Not to sound like a spoiled little baby, but I think the hardest thing has been trying to cut down on my clothes shopping. Darn it if I don't love a new outfit. Sigh. However, I just keep chanting "mortgage, loans, electricity, heat" and the moment passes. Plus, it's forced me to use what I've got and try to put together new looks with old stuff.

To be fair, we had already started to seriously think about making some changes to our spending habits before the bomb dropped. I signed up for an account on Mint.com per my friend Sarah's recommendation...it tracks your spending, helps you set goals, etc. I highly, highly recommend checking it out.

I also signed up for the Sunday paper, and subscribed to CouponMom.com. This might be a huge "duh" moment, but you can actually save money with coupons! I'm being sliiiiightly sarcastic, but the point is, I never realized what a difference coupons can really make. Plus, Wegman's (my all time favorite grocery store) doubles coupons to up to dollar. My new favorite activity is to pour over the Sunday paper, clip coupons, and strategize a grocery list. It's funny how your perspective changes. Some other great coupon sites are RedPlum.com, Coupons.com, and SmartSource.com. Again, kudos to Sarah...as I clutch my little plastic coupon holder, I remember when we had a conversation about coupons a year ago. I was telling her that I didn't bother with them, and she pulled out her own plastic holder. She shook it at me, and said, "This is MONEY in here!" Amen, sista.

So, what are your favorite ways to save?

Photo Credit Here

Social media, I love you.

As a librarian, I hear a lot of social media horror stories. Like this one.

Oh, girl.

But maybe instead of costing me a job, facebook might just get me a job.



Love this:
I Need a Library Job.

The search continues.

Photo Credit Here

The job hunt begins...

So, I've started looking for a job. To sum it up, the market is slim pickins, chickens.

So far, most positions have been waaaaaay far away. Kentucky. Texas. Connecticut. Yeeesh.
In an ideal world...well, in an ideal world I wouldn't be job searching. But, in an ideal world in which I have to job hunt, I would be able to find something nearby. It's funny, prior to this whole business, my husband and I used to look up exotic sounding places and dream of moving away from where we grew up. "Oooh, how about Vermont? That sounds lovely," and so on.  I'd play on Sperling's Best Places and look at real estate. Now that things are getting real, the idea doesn't seem so fun anymore. I'm doing the mental equivalent of laying down in front of traffic and crying, "Puhlease let me staaaaaaay!"

The fam is here. The husband's fam is here. Friends are here. House is here. The life we built is here. Stupidly, just a week or so before this happened, I made an offhand comment to my husband,"Maybe a job cut wouldn't be bad. It would force us to have an adventure," and then I laughed a flighty little laugh. Oh, what a lark being unemployed would be! Until you're unemployed. Man, be careful what you wish for. Seriously. 

I applied for a few positions already, didn't make the cut for a few already, too. I'm really going to have to think about my cover letter, and how to apply for jobs that I don't quite fit into on paper but I know I'm capable of doing. I'm tech-saavy but something about "K-3 Librarian" doesn't exactly inspire confidence for an academic position labeled "Instructional Materials Design Specialist". And yet, I think the skills could be transferable. The trick is making the hiring committee think so, too...and beat out the qualified competition. Tall order.

So, as I write, I keep Googling and Monster-ing and CareerBuilder-ing and praying for some miracle job to appear...preferably in a school. Preferably in a commutable distance. Again, tall order.

However, to be fair..I have to chill out. And remind myself...it hasn't even been a week yet. Yes, yes, I know, I'm being a little hyper-paranoid. I like to have a plan...and when I don't, overdrive kicks in--my omg-its-3am-I-have-to-change-the-wording-on-my-resume-right-NOW-and-then-since-I'm-up-I-might-as-well-search-for-anything-new-that-could-have-been-posted-between-11pm-and-now-I-hope-its-OK-that-my-resume-paper-is-ivory-and-the-envelope-is-white-should-I-have-handwritten-the-address-I-should-have-typed-it-oh-god-the-world-is-ending and on and on and on. But, in my defense, it feels like forever since that bomb dropped, even if in reality it's only been about 6 days.

The kids at school know something is wrong...or I'm extra-sensitive to their sweetness knowing it might be gone next year. They've been really huggy and clingy lately...not that my little ones don't love a good snuggle on the regular...it just feels different.
Today, a little guy in 2nd hugged me supertight and said, "You're the bestest library teacher in the whole world." True story. If that's not a punch to the heart when you know it might be the end, well, I don't know what is.

The grownups are acting strange, too. There's a weird combo of shock, hurt, anger...denial. BIG time denial. Many people keep assuring me: This won't stick. Things will work out. There's no way you're really gone next year. Others are mad as hell. Others are feeling hopeless. There's lots of talk about the future...and it doesn't look bright.

One of the best, and nicest parts of all this (hey, I'm trying to catch that silver lining) is the crazy outpouring of love. So many coworkers and parents have stopped me and told me how much they appreciate what I do...how they'll miss me...how it's not right...how I'm the best. All these nice words could go to a girl's head, you know what I mean? Maybe things will change. Maybe the community will rally and all this love and support will turn the tide. Maybe not.

Either way, everything is so up in the air. That is just not a nice place to be,especially for Little Miss Type A like myself. So, I'm sending out another application tomorrow....and looking at new towns and real estate...and hoping I don't really need to go any farther than that, in the end.

The first day of the rest of my...

Today, I was told my position has the very real possibility of being eliminated for next year.

The long version: my position is abolished unless some kind of miracle happens where the district finds some money. Which probably won't happen. But it could. Maybe.

I had sneaking suspicion this was coming--I am one of the last hired, my department has been largely untouched by cuts in other years, it was feasible, if not desirable, to run the school without me in it.

I know that my school needs to make cuts, I get that we can't continue the way we always have. But oh my...I never thought I would be doing this, feeling this, dealing with this. It's a unique feeling, being told you don't have a job. It makes you feel helpless and lawless and panicked...and then the denial sets in...and then the despair hits. It was like going through stages of grief.

In short, I am freaking. out. I had a good, long, hard cry today. Many of my colleagues came up to me, hugged me, cried with me. Their support means so much, but it's hard to hear "everything happens for a reason". I'm sure it does. I just can't see it right now. 

I went to college for four years. I earned my Masters degree--I have the loan payment each month to prove it. I got a job before I graduated near my hometown, then moved to a better, closer position the very next year. This year is my tenure year, that special status that doesn't mean much, really, but makes you feel secure. I love my job. I love my co-workers and the kids. I feel comfortable at my school. I am a "yes" girl...name the  committee, I'm on it. I come early, stay late. I coach a Varsity sport. I'm passionate about what I do.  I won a grant for this summer, to implement next year. I don't want to sound like I'm bragging, but the point is...I feel like I did everything I could to prove the worth of my position. So how did this happened to me? And even bigger, scarier, worse: What the heck am I going to do now? 


I am scared. I'm a kind of scared I've never been before. I never, ever, ever thought that I would be here, with a mortgage and a college loan and bills and facing the idea of unemployment.What if I don't find a job? What if I don't have insurance and something happens to us? What if we have to sell our home? How will we make ends meet? My husband and I are responsible. We work hard, and save money as much as we can. We plan for the future, don't live outside our means. Yesterday, were talking about planning a trip to Canada and starting a family. Today we're talking about how to make ends meet with over half of our joint income gone.

I hope this blog makes me feel better. At the least I don't feel as helpless. I know it could be worse--it is worse for many of my co-workers that got the same message I did. For now, I have to just wait and see...and start job hunting. I'm not sure what I'll find in this area, everyone's in the same boat. Layoffs are everywhere and my position isn't mandated by the state. I won't know for sure until April, and in the words of a smart co-worker, "You're young. Keep your chin up.". But it doesn't look good.