Great Video of Marcus, age 5

Don't Read This if You Don't Like the Word Pee

Okay... so I think I nearly broke the toilet from plopping down on it so hard to go pee. WHY did I plop instead of coming in for my usual graceful landing? Because my best friend encouraged me to go to the gym and take her weight lifting class... and because I did it... and because she's so darn encouraging that I tried to show off how MOST people who don't go to the gym for four months would really stink their first time back... but not me! I decided that I should prove that I am a superhero who can skip the gym for four months and come in looking fresh and fit and strong as an ox... okay, okay... an ox that can lift a 2kg dumbell. I decided that these sleeping muscles could SURELY do just as many squats as that cute 60 year old woman in the front row whose gluteus maximus muscles look nice and bouncy. I'm just going to have to be deliberate about which chairs I go to sit in today. Spindly antique ones are definitely NOT my best option. ...

Undivided Self

Palmer describes two teachers, one who found joy and success in his career, and another who did not. He attributed the joyful teacher's success to the idea that he taught "from an undivided self." He says, "In the undivided self, every major thread of one's life experience is honored, creating a weave of such coherence and strength that it can hold students and subject as well as self." The other teacher, on the other hand, projected his inner warfare onto his students. The joyful teacher enjoyed craft, while the sour teacher enjoyed nothing. The joyful teacher was "enlarged" by his teaching. The sour teacher was diminished. As teachers we are either the joyful teacher OR the sour teacher. We have days, maybe even weeks, of being the joyful teacher and days of being the sour one. In my personal experience, when I am actually in the room teaching students I am the joyful one 95% of the time. When I leave the room and enter the rest of...

Trying On Hats of Our Heroes

This summer on our road trip, one of our adventures was visiting my brother's fire station and letting the boys try on the hat of one of their heroes. I like these photos because Jackson's nearly third grade face says, "Yeah, I'm just trying it on." Marcus' face, though, says, "Right at this moment, I AM a firefighter." He looks to me like in his mind the helmet fits him exactly and that Uncle Will's bunker gear has shrunk down to be fire-ready just for Marcus. He BELIEVES. As I'm adjusting to life with several new hats, I'm struck by how much more fun it is to BELIEVE. I love the hats of mother to elementary age boys and teacher. I also love the old hats that still stick around, like director of doing-stuff, cooker of healthy foods, wife and best friend of Tom. The stress I feel today is in the realization that I have to quickly shift from hat to hat about five times today. So, at this moment, I'm going to take a lesson fro...

The Days of Day

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