This is the first full week of Autumn that we are entering, here in the northern hemisphere. I'm writing at 7:12 on a Sunday night and the sunset (already) is yellowy-orange. I love autumn: leaves falling, pumpkins, Halloween, crisp air, all that stuff. Still, however much I love autumn, I always feel a tinge of melancholy at its onset. I've already made my list of things I love to shore up my sagging mood. I have been told that cultivating gratitude helps in this situation. And I have to admit that at my core I'm self-centered (aren't we all?). I'm wont to complain about the problems I have. Yet I if I can be honest with myself, I must admit that any trials in my life pale in comparison to what 90% of the world goes through. I'm more blessed than cursed. Here's a list of why I know that I am lucky:
1. I have people who support and love me.
Any time I have problems, I can talk to my husband, my mom, my sisters, my brother, my in-laws, my brothers and sisters-in-law, and of course, my friends.
2. I have NPR
When I feel lonely, sad, irritated at having to enter grades into the computer at work, I can go online to NPR's site and find something interesting or enlightning to listen to while I toil (no, this is not a pledge-week testimonial).
3. I have the job I was born to do:
I love Spanish; I love doing creative things; I love kids; I love to sing. How lucky am I that I get to teach Spanish with all academic freedom I need while also doing music at school masses?
4. I am no longer doing a job that I hate:
I am thoroughly convinced that there is no good reason to hate what you do for a living. Well, maybe that's easier said than done in a recession. But I so don't miss being a planner in zoning services. Three years away from my time as a planner, I have to laugh at the crazy idea that I could have ever been successful in a job that entailed measuring the area and height of proposed signs and counting trees and parking spaces on a site plan (and, look, I don't want to cast aspersions on anyone, but what kind of person a) enjoys and b) is good at this?)
4. There is more than enough water to drink in Northern KY:
Ask people from Colorado, Florida, Montana, California about how great it is to live in a state that doesn't have a lot of water. It may not be a normal thing to bring up, but I used to be a planner. I think about these kinds of things. Most of the rest of you don't think about signs on buildings or billboards, I'd bet.
5. I lived in Paris for awhile when I was in my twenties.
6. I lived in Florida for three months and went to the beach whenever I could.
7. I am grateful for the collosal errors in judgement I have made:
These may be too numerous to count. But I believe in a song I used to listen to, from a nineties-alternative band called Poi Dog Pondering. One of the lines in the song went, "Would our paths cross if every great loss had turned out a gain?" If teaching had worked out for me the first time I tried it, in the nineties, I wouldn't have gone to UC for planning and met all of my friends from planning school. If I hadn't spent five years in a job that made me miserable, I wouldn't have had to courage to go back into teaching. If the principal at my urban junior high school had decided to let me come back for a second year, I wouldn't have found my dream job. The chorus of the song goes, "Thanksgiving for every wrong move." Amen, I say to you!
8. I am grateful that neither of my children is at an on-site child care facility with me this year, for the first time in three years.
I like having some time to de-compress after I'm done with work. My paid employment and my unpaid employment leave me frazzled and hassled. I'm so glad to not have to move jarringly from one into the other. The other benefit to this is that I have the drive into school in the morning. Covington is its prettiest in the morning.
9. I am grateful for the fact that I'm finally being to feel comfortable with who I am:
You know, for the most part, anyway. I mean, there are still moments of doubt and panic, moments when I'm embarassed with who I am. Yesterday, for instance, I felt one. I went to Barnes and Noble at Newport on the Levee to kill some time. I was reading aloud to Vincent. The book was making me laugh, so I was laughing. I don't laugh quietly; I'm a loud person anyway. So this European-accented woman stage whispered to her daughter, "Let's go outside. She's too loud." This threw me into some junior-high-ish crisis of self-esteem where I felt vaguely Roseanne Barr-ish. In social situations where I feel that I'm floundering, I see myself as fat, loud, and embarassingly working-class. Of course, none of these is bad, actually. Now that I think about it, what's wrong with being fat? As for loud, yeah, well, I can probably outsing that snotty Eurowitch any day of the week. I have a phenomenal speaking voice, and I'd lay odds I'd read any book with more dramatic flair than she and her bland, non-specific European accent could do. And as far as working-class goes, too bad for you if you disdain people for working honestly. Maybe your lazy European tuchis doesn't have to work, but I WORK FOR A LIVING. AM I LOUD ENOUGH FOR YOU NOW, YOU PRETENTIOUS SNOB? IF YOU WANT QUIET, DON'T GO INTO A BOOK STORE ON NEWPORT ON THE LEVY, STUPID!!! AND STAY OUT OF THE CHILDREN'S SECTION.
10. I am grateful that I am not saying this things in real time to Eurowitch:
I am still a chicken. All I said to her in real life was, "Sorry."
I am still a chicken. All I said to her in real life was, "Sorry."
11. I am grateful that you all like me despite my neroses.
12. I'm grateful that Luke, my amazing husband, took me and the kids to Natural Bridge in Kentucky for Labor Day weekend:
It rained the whole time we were there. Here's a picture of all of us together. We look like drowned rats. There were only camouflage rain ponchos in the adult sizes at the gift shop, so I look hunter-ish.
13. I am grateful that the folks at Blogger let me do this:
It makes me feel better to be able to write.
Happy first week of autumn, everyone!
