Chasing...

Posted in By Jordan 1 comments

These days are tricking me. They fall down on me like heavy boulders, threatening to break my back. But just when I brace myself and duck my head, they make contact and pop like bubbles. Where has the time gone, friends? Throughout my pregnancy and the months following Chase's birth, days seemed suspended and stretched and soft-edged. I floated from one day, one hour, one minute to the next for what seems like an entire year just waiting and watching. I waited for the birth of my boy...dreaming a new world every single day. I wasn't just pregnant, but the whole world was pregnant with the possiblity of this new life. And then he came, and time stopped meaning anything. The universe began floating around a new center of gravity...it pulsed with Chase's moods and needs, and it changed with Chase's growth.

But sometime, in the midst of Summer School and my Gran's illness, time chased me back down, and ever since it's been taking those stretched moments back from me, shortening days and minutes. And the faster I run from it, the more of these precious moments I seem to chase away.

This semester has been Hell. HELL. I have never given more of myself to something that feels so useless. Teaching Basic English, under the standards and circumstances that I am now working with, is the most disillusioning thing I have ever experienced. Amongst a whirlwind of trying to teach these people essential(ish) grammar rules and the process/method of composition, I have come to stop seeing a piece of writing for its potential, instead seeing it as a living thing to be gutted and torn apart, limb by awkward limb. Perhaps that's what has made posting any little bit of my own writing seem almost impossible for the last three months. Perhaps, on the other hand, it is just my literal lack of time that has stopped me. These days I am a mad woman, juggling like I've never juggled before (but when wasn't I??? And who isn't??? It's time to stop making excuses and string up a few lines of words, even if they do appear raggedly stitched together). Aside from teaching two sections of Basic, I'm taking two classes, one of which is Truth, Order, and Beauty, which, for those of you who don't know, is the equivalent of running an English major marathon. Plus, I'm the mommy to the most curious, stealthy, and all-around wonderfully exhausting baby this side of the Mississippi. Oh, and did I mention that I get paid Jack. Diddly. Squat? I've never worked so hard in my life to be so broke and worn out.

But, like I said...these days that seem like rocks practically bounce off me, for the most part. I honestly love my (work) days - not quite as much as I did last semester, but I understand that it's all just a big fat learning process...and Oh, how I've learned.

I've learned what I'm capable of...and, as it turns out, it's pretty astronomical. I've learned how to navigate many truly ridiculous professional situations. I've learned about teaching, and English, and tutoring...And, of course, I've learned about my son - his emerging, brilliant personality. I've learned about how much one person can love another one...so much that it's terrifying.

And now here I am again at a crossroads...wondering where this little engine that could is planning on going...wondering what I want to do with my life...wondering how to get there. I find myself needing to reevaluate and redefine my priorities and my projected path. It is an exciting and somewhat scary task. There aren't many certainties.

But there are a few: 1. I love these shoes I'm walking in. 2. I have been given many most spectacular gifts - the best being, of course, my Chase. I can't believe I get to be HIS mom. 3. I've got lots of love to give away. 4. This blog is in for some major changes 5. Life is good.

Time isn't stopping for me, so it's time for me to hang on and embrace scary and welcome change. Here's to today...