Pivot Point

There was a thread of anxiety that ran through every single one of my meetings today. Even as we work to organize the end of this pandemic-interrupted school year and scramble to plan the next amid so many variables and uncertainties, our nation is in turmoil. Whether or not a straight line can be drawn from the unrest to our personal lives, no one I spoke to today was not unsettled by the events unfolding a few miles away and all over the country.

Everyone's a total wreck.

Personally, I feel weighed down by a heavy, heavy sense of history. I imagine how future documentaries will breezily summarize these days, these very days, 10, 20, 50, 100 years from now, and while I am still around to watch them, the lump in my throat as I relive them 60 minutes at a time.

Will I feel distress, disbelief,  renewed outrage, nostalgia, or all of the above?

Honestly?

I don't care, as long as in the end I am happily reminded of all the lessons we learned and the positive changes we made as a result of our this trauma.

I Feel You, Kid

During this time away from the school building, our team has been vigilantly tracking student engagement through participation, and last week we all noticed a precipitous drop in assignment completion. Our principal assured us that all the other teams at all the other grade levels had documented the same decline, and it's easy to rationalize:

Memorial Day, warm summer weather, distance learning fatigue,

and just a strong sense that this?

should.
all.
be.
over.

We know, because we feel it, too.

Neighborhood Watch

This gorgeous weather has all the windows and doors open wide, not just in our house, but in all the neighbors' homes, too. The sound of laughter, music, snippets of conversation, and dogs barking floats in on the fresh breeze. With the exception of the pool, this complex is usually a bit of a ghost town, especially on a sunny summer Sunday. But not these days: with everybody home, fine weather, dog walking, food trucks, evening parking lot parties, community gardening, and all these open windows have turned this place into a proper neighborhood.

Z is for Zazen

As I walked through this beautiful afternoon I felt nothing but restless. I opened my arms, took a deep breath, and tried to embrace the blue sky and sunshine moment, but I wanted more: a purpose, a destination, something new to engage with. I felt bored and irritable.

The nine days left in the 100 day writing challenge for my students meant that I had been meditating for 91 days, and I felt discouraged that I didn't feel better today. Fortunately, there is a lot of information available to those of us who are new to a mindfulness practice, and a little research revealed that irritability like that I experienced today is common. Some attribute such uneasiness to stirring up stagnant apathetic, energy that can eventually be released; others hypothesize that it is a sign that your brain chemistry is changing, ultimately for the better.

But perhaps the advice that resonated most with me was that being mindful means noticing the good and the bad feelings, and then developing deliberate strategies to address negativity, rather than escape into distraction or lash out. That is a profound lesson, indeed.

Life Lesson: "Mindfulness is simply being aware of what is happening right now without wishing it were different: enjoying the pleasant without holding on when it changes (which it will),
being with the unpleasant without fearing it will always be this way (which it won’t)." – James Baraz

Y is for You're Not from around Here, Are Ya?

I may not be able to identify all the trees or flowers I see when I'm out walking, (although I am working on it, thank you iNaturalist!) but I can name almost any bird I that catches my eye as it flits from perch to perch. I know what's common around here, and it's hard to get excited about robins, blue jays, mockingbirds, cardinals, sparrows, crows, grackles, starlings, house finch, mourning doves, pigeons, ducks, Canada geese. Sure, there's still a thrill when I spot an eagle, or even a hawk. Vultures? Creep me out; blue herons are cool.

And then there was the pale blue and green parakeet I spotted on a telephone wire tonight, still easy to identify, but so obviously out of place. Before I could pull out my phone to snap a photo, it few away with scissoring wings and tail, nothing like the flight of those local avians.

"He doesn't want to get caught!" Heidi said as I lowered my phone in disappointment.

"Free at last!" I agreed.

Life Lesson: "If you think happiness is a rare bird, you won't see much of it." ~Marty Rubin

X is for X?

Traditionally, in the Alphabiography Challenge, X is one of the harder chapters to write, mostly because there just aren't a lot of words that begin with X! Even so, I think I've found some pretty good topics over the years:

X is for X Xing Xs

X is for X-men

X is for eX-tra Sensory Perception (and X-ray)

X is for X Marks the Spot

And this year, I was especially impressed with a couple of my students' ideas, although clearly it was a challenge for many.

X is for Xenodochy

Xenodochy is the extending of hospitality towards strangers. It really isn’t common to see xenodochy today, but it was quite common in Ancient Greece.

AND

X is for Xantus’s Murrelet

I have never seen a Xantus’s Murrelet because I have never been to California’s southernmost waters.

Life Lesson: Do what it takes to get it done.

W is for Walking

I have filled my gas tank once since March 1. On average? I get about 375 miles per tank in around town driving. For comparison's sake, I have walked 549 miles in that same time period.

(I wonder how far Martha Stewart has walked!)

Life Lesson: "It's your road, and yours alone. Others can walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you." ~Rumi