♥

Sometimes the planning and the grading and the long days completely kill me.

But the kids--I adore the kids. All the tedious parts of teaching are worth it to know these kids. They say there are things about love and children that you can't understand until you're a parent, and I'm sure that's true, but here's what I do know: I'd do anything for these guys.

Great Opportunities

It is heartbreaking, this work of loving other people. But in the end, it is work worth breaking a heart over.

One of my kiddos is transferring schools on Monday. It was all very last-minute and purely financial, and this intelligent, disciplined boy will find chances to try things our small school can't offer. I asked him on Monday how he felt about the move. "Well, it will be sad to leave here."

"Yeah. It will. And it's okay to be sad about it. You've been here a long time."

"Yeah."

"Your new school, though, it'll be a great opportunity for you."

"Yeah. A great opportunity." The words flopped out of his mouth and slid halfheartedly toward the floor, and I reminded myself that this was a great opportunity to stop talking. How many times has he heard that phrase: a great opportunity? How often have we posed it as the perfect solution, as though its greatness trumps the pain and the uncertainty, the awkwardness, the letting go?

Some of my students believe, at twelve, things that will follow them into adulthood: I'm not a good student. I'm not a reader. I'm too shy. I'm too spastic. So much insecurity rests next to the lie that whatever you are at this moment is, will be, has to be what you solidify into for the rest of your life--and I don't just mean for middle schoolers. The ones who believe that they lack something will likely spend much of their lives trying to gain it. But there's another shade of insecurity that will crop up for kids like the boy who is leaving today: they will constantly see opportunities fold open before them. Their struggle will not be with a lack of options but with knowing what option to take, or even when to choose none at all. Great opportunities are great, but not only great.

I watch them, even now, beginning tender steps forward and back between what they are and what they will be, and I can't navigate this for them. Sometimes I can't even navigate it for myself.

We drank Coke floats during 5th hour and said goodbye, and he handed back the books he's borrowed from me this semester. He's become a reader this year, devouring stories like a rabid bat eats flesh (that's sick, I know; I'm in Lord of the Flies mode from 4th hour still). When the kids had gone downstairs for gym class, his mom thanked me for keeping her son stocked with books. Her husband told her to thank the English teacher for making him love to read.

I can't make anyone love something, no more than I can make someone's choices for them. Still, I love books and I've tried to love my students, and I didn't expect myself to spend 7th hour in tears because one of my crazy boys is leaving.

Teaching, like loving, can be so, so hard. But it is a great opportunity.

Teoline

My great-grandma, Anna Teoline, once substituted grape wine for grape juice in my mother's drinking glass. This was before my mother was even my mother, before (I think) she was even my dad's wife. I've heard the story a thousand times: my mom kicks back her beverage, then leans forward with eyes burning while my dad and Grandma Anna just laugh and laugh and laugh.

I went on a Chinese checkers kick during elementary school. Everyone told me that Grandma Anna was the world's best Chinese checkers player, that she'd let you win every now and then so you'd keep playing with her.

This grandma that I never met--I always thought she was amazing.

In North Dakota, it's not uncommon to have the fire and ice of Norway mingled in your blood. We host the world's largest Scandinavian festival (which, to my surprise, always draws Bill Cosby and large numbers of legit Scandinavians), we eat lefse and krumkake and lutefisk at Christmas, we say "uff-da" in honor of the forefathers who moved onto the prairie and were told that only English will be allowed from here on out.

There's this ever-growing itch I have to see Norway, even though I know I'll get there and realize: I'm not one of you. I am not Norwegian to the core, not even blond. I'm Norwegian-American, raised in the New World on old Scandinavian values. The Norwegian in me is the Norwegian of a century ago, of floor-length practical dresses and plowing fields by hand.

And yet, I want to see it, the land of Anna Teoline and Carl, of Elisabet and Sakarias and Christina, of Peter, Paulyne, Jens, Aase, Anders. I want to step into the Romanian land where my great-grandma Louise grew up, the girl who ended up in a place in America with six months of winter, missing the fruit trees from her old front yard. I want to see Germany the way Gustave saw it; I want to know the Sweden of Oscar and Franz.

I live so, so close to all the places I come from but have never, will never, really belong to. Because I am an American no matter how many percentages you break it into. It always sounds more exotic to belong to anywhere else, especially when you see the Americans pushing their way through the metro station, loud and fanny-packed. You think, "These are my people?" and you are silently thankful when someone mistakes you for Dutch.

But there's a beauty that I'm starting to see, too. Because "I am American" means that someone I do belong to was brave enough to leave what they belonged to and start over completely, to give up everything in order to give their children anything. It is a dance between the Old World and the New one, three months at sea and signatures at Ellis Island. It is great-aunt Lena and her coffee cup full of "Norwegian black blood plasma." It is Anne taking up a homestead in Montana as a single woman. It is Aase giving birth in a covered wagon. It is houses tripping across the borderlines between Russia and the shifting eastern European boundaries. It Anna Teoline from Lyngdal filling my mother's cup with grape wine and waiting in silence as she takes the first gulp.

The Key

In the final throes of student teaching, I was scrounging through Macbeth lesson plans I'd created the semester before. Ah, yes, that breezy semester of methods class, when we made all sorts of perfect, beautifully nuanced lesson plans for perfect, imaginary students. Knowing that I'd round out my year as a 12th grade teacher with Shakespeare at my side, I'd stuffed a binder full of Macbethian assignment options.

As I sorted through the million papers, my cooperating teacher said, "There is one trick I've learned in teaching."

She leaned over me, nearly whispering, preparing to dispense the secret. "Variety," she said, "is the key."

"Variety," I repeated. Yes. Variety. What did that mean? I held out the Macbeth binder, pointing to several activities, and asked, "Is this what you mean? I've tried to vary their options with projects and things. But...do you think I need more?"

She glanced at the binder. "Oh, yes, this is all very good. You have a lot of good ideas. But variety is the key."

"So...I should try something else?"

"Here's what I do," she began. Back to that life-giving-secret voice. "I always copy the worksheets onto different colors of paper."

"Different colors of paper."

"Yes. Variety."

"So...I should make my Macbeth worksheets on different colors of paper?"

"Yes! Different colors! Everything else looks great."

There are many things I learned during student teaching which have resurfaced now, nearly six years later, to light the way through the semester. This secret, however, is not one of them.

But perhaps that teacher would be glad to know that I am now spending my afternoons teaching middle schoolers how to do origami.

Comment party at my blog tonight!

Dear reader:

I don't know who you are.

That is, I don't know who all of you are! A lot of you are friends and acquaintances and coworkers and people my mom has bullied into reading this because she's my mom and that's what moms do. (I'm kidding, mom! I know you only give suggestions. :)

 

Some of you are here because you googled "size 11 shoes" or "james caviezel," and that's just funny. It makes me want to write about completely random things to see what kind of audience they could attract. Honeybees! Giant paper clips! Drain-cleaning solutions, Pinterest, getting mold out of curtains, and Lois Lowry! (I hope this works. Also, I don't know anything about getting mold out of curtains, but I do know that if one builds a shower over an existing window, one should remove that window's lace curtain before it turns into a black film of shower scum. Not that I experienced this in my current living situation.)

 

Friends, even you friends I haven't met yet, today I want to say thank you for reading this blog, for validating the fact that maybe words can mean something to more people than just the one writing them. (If you don't think that, I'm not offended. Just don't tell me. :)

Now I have a favor to ask. I'm always writing about myself, because it's the only thing I know well enough to write about. Today, I want to hear about you. 

 

So, would you please leave a comment on this post? Yes, you! Let me (and all of us) know who you are! How did you end up here? Where are you from? What's your best story? It's fun to connect these dots, to see who is part of the story other than me (and Sarah, who has been getting mentioned a lot lately. Hi, Sarah!). And I'm curious (especially about you, Mr. or Ms. 33-Pageviews-in-Germany). After all, you are the reason I'm here: you the teachers, you the friends, you the supporters, you the encouragers, and yes, even you, the googlers.

 

Like a chain letter or Amish friendship bread, this is only fun if everyone participates. 

 

Kidding! Actually, slightly kidding. Those who don't participate may find a bag of Amish friendship bread starter dough in their mailbox soon.

 

Ready? Comment away! 

The moment when nametags would really come in handy

Remember when Ruth and I got the manly cologne and the perfume, respectively?

And remember when we found out it was for the headmaster?

And remember how we returned it to him?

Five seconds ago, the landlord and his wife rang our doorbell. I, of course, was looking totally fit for company in my barefeet and smelly sweatpants.

He handed me a package wrapped in Disney princess paper (after scolding me for not wearing shoes). And then he apologized for giving us the Antonio Banderas man fragrance--and added that the perfume was for one of us, and this new box is for the other.

In other words, Scot gave us his gift, I gave him mine, and now there is an identical box sitting on our living room table for my roommate and I to split.

The Residency Process: Part IV

I left school early (again) to catch the bus and the train and then Julie's car. After Monday's mostly fruitless meeting in Madrid, we were headed to Aluche, which looks like a circus tent and processes the resident fingerprints.

I asked people to pray.

I don't know how prayer works or why, but I know we're asked to do it. To speak to God through Christ, to keep this relationship from settling into the dusty corners of brittle religious ritual. To ask Him to make changes in this world, to hear Him when He asks us for the very same thing.

But I wouldn't be honest if I didn't admit that there are many times when I skip the praying. I was taught to believe that prayer makes a difference, but sometimes, my heart is too weary to trust that my questions are valuable enough to prompt God to do anything on my behalf. "Ask and you shall receive." There's also the converse: if you do not ask, you will never receive. Sometimes it's just easier not to ask. At least you know what you'll get.

The middle schoolers have a prayer breakfast each month, and I wish I could teach them to pray outside of the typical monotone "thank-yous" we dish out when public praying gets awkward. Some of them pray so sincerely, hands wide open to receive what they're asking for. Some pray because it's an obligation, parroting the nice, Christiany things they've learned to say out loud. Some are too embarrassed to pray; some can't wait. I don't know how to teach anyone to pray because my prayers are just words fumbling over each other, desire and questions and cliches, sincere feelings that try too hard to avoid all the "insincere" phrases everyone else uses. Too much thinking sometimes, and at other times, not enough.

I asked the kids to pray for the day's trip to Aluche. "You don't have residency? That's illegal!" one said gleefully.
"I have a number. I just don't have a card."
"You've been here a long time! That's totally illegal!"
"It's not illegal. I just don't have a card."
They've all been through this visa/card/Aluche business ten times over, so as we bow our heads over churros and chocolate, a 7th grade boy asks God to help me with the paperwork stuff today.

And I want to believe that He will, but I also know that God works within the parameters of society and culture. There are ten thousand layers of Spanish bureaucracy to climb through, not to mention the fact that my fingerprinting appointment came five months too late. "Well, it's happened to other people before," another teacher reminds me. The family where the wife and dependents were granted residency years before the head of household, for instance. Or my friend Caitlin, who was told at Aluche, "Es imposible!" Friends who've lived on expired visas, friends who have had to leave the country and start over. I think about all the people who have gone through this before, and I'm encouraged and discouraged all at the same time.

I ask my facebook friends to pray.

Meanwhile, Julie is navigating Madrid traffic. We are parking near Aluche, passing our purses through the security scanner, filing into an unbelievably short line. A squat bald man stands sentry at the door, and Julie explains to him that I've got a summons but it's from August. He shakes his head and tells us to come back next week, in the morning. She holds my letter out to him, explains that there was an appointment, and he tells us to get in line.

When I came here with the Smalleys in July, the line snaked back through the heat for what seemed miles. The kids were sweaty and sad; my skin had started melting off my bones. Today, it's overcast. There are maybe ten people in line ahead of me, and we're ushered into the building long before the expected 4:30.

The line moves fast. Some of the people ahead of us are being turned away because they don't have proper documentation. My heart is beginning to race because this feels wrong. How did we get in here so fast? Doesn't God realize it's me, Shar, the one whose paperwork is hated in both Spain and the States, the one for whom these things never go quickly and smoothly? The one who, well, doesn't have because she doesn't ask?

But a 7th grade boy asked. And so did several facebook friends. And so did all the friends and teammates who have been praying about my residency since I set foot on this continent.

We sat down at a table and handed a lady my forms. She looked at the outdated summons letter, smiled, and told us to get into line.

We waited in another line.

At the front, the man behind the counter grinned, "United States?" The other asked for my passport photos. "The United States is very big, and so is this photo," he smiled. Then he took my fingerprint. And told me to come back in forty days.

That's it. Forty days to residency. Forty days until I can stop carrying that ragged piece of paper in my wallet, the one with the number on it, the one that proves I'm in the process of becoming legal. Forty days until I have the little plastic card that allows me to renew my residency for next year. Forty days of not worrying secretly that I might get sent home to collect another stash of paperwork and visit a consulate and make new travel plans.

I don't know why I expect this to be so much harder than it is. Maybe because it's just always been hard. Maybe because I expect God to speak to me with discipline and refining fires and life lessons, because I'm used to fighting for things instead of just asking for them. Maybe because I have a hard time trusting that He actually enjoys giving me these things: a residency card, an easy finale to the world's longest process, an afternoon with Julie.

There are some things I'm going to start asking for more frequently: The desire to pray. The residency card in hand, no final hoops to jump through. The faith of a seventh grader.

The Residency Process: Part III

As it turns out, the landlord doesn't think my roommate is a man.

I guess he dropped off the gifts with our headmaster, who assumed they were for us. When the landlord stopped by the school to pick up our rent the other day, he asked about the presents. The headmaster explained that he'd distributed them to us, and the landlord replied, "Those were for you!"

I slipped my box of floral perfume into the headmaster's mailbox this morning.

---

The residency appointment in Madrid went something like this: We drove around trying to find this hidden little office, paid for parking, took a number, and waited 45 minutes for our number to be called. When it did, Dan explained that I had all the paperwork, that I got my summons five months after I was supposed to get fingerprinted. I couldn't really understand what the lady was telling us, though she kept repeating the word "situation," which did not give me much hope. In the end, we were told to go to Aluche (the fingerprinting place) and talk to them.

So, tomorrow afternoon, I'm skipping out of afternoon prep hours with Julie to see, once and for all, if the Spanish government will ever let me become a legit resident.

Speaking of residency, the hamster will be taking up a new one. Out of the fireplace and into the home of one of my dear students. And the second semester planning is going more smoothly than the first. And I'm teaching an origami class next week. And...spring semester seems infinitely more full of possibility than the fall one. Footloose and hamster-free, or at least on the fast track toward that!

The Residency Process: Part II

Our landlord must've brought our Christmas gifts to the school while we were gone, because I found a wrapped box on my desk tonight when I entered the classroom. Inside: a box of nice lotion, perfume, and moisturizing cream. This is, I think, the first gift I've ever gotten from a landlord.

Two seconds ago, Ruth walked in the door. "Did you get something from the landlord?"

"Yes."

"What was it?"

"Lotion and perfume."

She held up a black box with a picture of Antonio Banderas on the front. "I got something, too. I'm pretty sure this is for men."

Judging by the scent now wafting past my face, it's definitely for men. Baha!

In other news, tomorrow is the first day of the second semester. And I am skipping out halfway through because I have a residency appointment in Madrid. Yeah, remember that stack of papers I had to bring to Chicago, then drop off at an office in Madrid in June? The first step in the process is the dropping off, the second step is getting the fingerprinting appointment, and the third step is waiting forty days for a residency card. All of these steps should have been completed within 3-4 months of my arrival.

Today marks month 7.33, so a lawyer made me this appointment to go down and file something saying that I never got a fingerprinting appointment. One of my field leaders is driving me into the city to help me sort through all this.

He just called a few hours ago to let me know that a piece of mail came, in my name, to the other field leader's house.

It's from the government.

Telling me that I have a fingerprinting appointment.

In August of 2011.

Oh, Spanish paperwork.

Mi vida es una aventura muy grande.

Whatever it takes, people. Whatever it takes.

Several of the 9th graders commented that they were more motivated to study for finals when I handed out a study guide illustrated with stick people.

My new teaching philosophy? STICK PEOPLE ON EVERYTHING!

2011: The Top 7 Untold Stories

7. "Hola, pajarita."

In July, Caitlin, the Welsh men, and I decided to visit the rose garden on the edge of Casa del Campo. It was evening, and the garden was empty. When we tried to leave, we found that the gate was locked. No, both gates were locked. The fences were too high to scale, and even if we had tried, we'd have had to get over the hedges first, and then over the giant metal spikes at the top.

Near the entrance was a walled-off area that looked like someone's front yard, and in that front yard was an old man wearing a button-down shirt and boxers. He was filling water bowls for the birds. Assuming he was some sort of park employee--since most public gardens do not allow men to take up residency, especially just in boxers--Caitlin asked if he had any keys. He ignored us, instead cradling a bird in his hands, cooing, "Hola, pajarita." He turned then, holding the bird out toward us in a horror-movie kind of way where it got all fluttery and his grin became frenzied, and we shrieked and ran away until, seeing no other option five minutes later, we had to ask again. He grunted this time but made eye contact--and pointed us toward another gate on the far side of the garden, where a man with a whistle scolded us for not hearing the signal.

On the way to the bus station that night, Caitlin and Michael would also walk past a man who would lift his shirt to reveal the large sword stretching from his chest into his pants.

Ah, welcome to Madrid.

6. "Twas a pleasure."

There were all sorts of men making eyes at adorable Sarah during our trip to Marseille, but our favorite occurrence was at a bus stop. We were sitting on the bench; an older lady stood near us. A man came jogging up, stopped to peer at the bus route map, and asked the lady some questions in French. After a minute of talking, he turned to us, smiled widely, and said, "Bye, ladies! 'Twas a pleasure!"

Runner-up: The man in Lavapies who, upon spying our pod of young women, called, "Hello, woe-man. Check eet out." We did not check eet out.

5. The Great Toledo Caper

Sarah and I visited Toledo over Thanksgiving break. Toledo is bursting with beauty, from the stained glass in the cathedral to the old man in the souvenir shop who told me to just read the children's version of Don Quijote--same idea, more pictures.

Toledo's only a half-hour train ride from Madrid, but getting there proved interesting. When we left that (early) morning, we went all the way to Chamartin, waited in line for a very long time, and finally learned that we could only buy tickets from Atocha (which is several stations back). Oh, and while we were waiting in that very long line, an old lady asked, "¿Es el fin?" She just wanted to know if we were the end of the line, but I thought she was talking about the end of the train line and began rambling on about how we were headed to Toledo but weren't sure if we were standing in the right line! She, kindly, said nothing.

At Atocha, we were gently reprimanded for approaching the ticket desk without first taking a number; then we were smirked at for doing it right.

Once we got there, things went smoothly, except for the part where we ran down the hill so we wouldn't miss the train and sweated all the way home.

Runner-Up: The day before the Toledo trip, when Katrina and I chased a bus for several blocks in Segovia so we wouldn't miss the train home. The last time I ran that hard, I was in 5th grade.

4. The German and the Goat

Street performers are abundant in Madrid. On a fine summer's day, several of the performers had abandoned their costumes in Plaza Mayor. The shiny goat, which usually sits upright and clacks its wooden head, was flat and listless on the cobblestone.

And there was a German man, camera in hand, who kept feeding coins to the goat's bucket, hoping that enough money would cause the goat to spring to life. Caitlin finally went over to explain that the costume was empty, and we watched the man move to the next photo opportunity: a table with holes cut for three heads to pop out. Unfortunately, the man didn't seem to notice that two of the heads were fake and the third one was missing. I'm not sure how much money those performers made that day, but considering they weren't doing any performing, it was quite a deal.

Thank goodness: as we left the plaza, we noticed our German friend in the far corner, feeding coins and snapping photos of (another) working shiny goat!

3. A Hello Kitty of Questionable Gender

Of all the characters you can find parading through Sol, Hello Kitty is one of the rarest. But we saw her one day--rather, we saw him.

Hello Kitty had taken its paws off to use the cell phone, and the hands poking out of that costume were large. Meaty. Hairy.

"Hello Kitty is a man!" Sarah shouted. And Hello Kitty, from ten feet away, cried back, "Is not a man! Is a girl!" before swatting Sarah with a balloon sword.

2. Dyeing in the Dark

The bathroom lights have been working only sporadically this week. So, of course, just as I started dying my hair a few nights ago, the lights went out, and I had to finish the job by candlelight. Baha! This story isn't really that great. It's just how my life works.

1. Confirmation

Before all these Spain stories began, I was still in North Dakota, still working with a darling little boy. I came into the room after lunch break one day, and he looked up from his coloring to greet me: "Hi, Shar."

"Well, hi," I said back, and then, jokingly, "Did you miss me because you just love me so much?"

He threw his arms above his head, caught my neck, and cried, "Love you!" Then, just as quickly, almost embarrassed, he went back to coloring.

And I knew for certain that every minute we spent agonizing over flashcard words and talking about how it's not nice to run people over with bikes had been worth it.