Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Really Starting

Tomorrow I embark on the start of a process I have been on since the second grade.  Tomorrow I will officially be a teacher!! It's been a long hard road to get where I am but I am so grateful for every step it's taken for me to accomplish this goal.  I have been all over the country, working all sorts of jobs from Subway to a law firm in the heart of downtown Chicago.  I have worked at nearly 6 different scrapbooking stores, and Best Buy and my aunt and uncle's campground.  I spent four-and-a-half years at Colorado State University, and then moved to California only to find out I still had to take more classes to completely get my B.A.  Then I failed a class I was taking to finish my B.A. so I had to retake it.  So my degree says I graduated a year and a half after I actually walked across the graduation stage.

Then I got a job as a mail clerk at a law firm, and was managing a scrapbooking store.  Sometimes working from 8 a.m. to midnight (or later).  I certainly don't miss those days.  I got promoted at the law firm and laid off at the scrapbooking store, so I was working at normal 9-5 for about a year. 

Then I decided I still wanted to live a little so over a year ago I moved to Chicago on a whim and thought I might pursue my teaching career there.  It seemed to hard so I went back to working at a law firm and a scrapbooking store for fun.  I gave up on pursuing education in Illinois and focused on coming back to CA because I knew that's where I wanted to be.  I was torn because I would be leaving my boyfriend of a year behind. 

Not but two weeks after I returned to California, I started a credential program that was 5 hours a day, for six and a half weeks straight, while working two jobs.  My brain was running on overload for more than most of the summer.  Although I couldn't think straight I knew I was on the right path because I would stay up til 1 or 2 or some nights until 3 a.m. just thinking about all the information I had learned that day in class and how I could apply it in my own classroom.

Then two weeks after my intense summer school program was over I was offered a job at a middle school that I happily accepted. 

Granted, this is the abridged version of the story.  Through all of these experiences there was much heart break, and there were times of immense laughter and joy.  While I was grateful for the friends and family I had, I was always missing some one or something from some other place I once knew.   I had to face choices and decisions on my own that I knew would change my life forever.  There were moments where I didn't know left from right or up from down.  There were times when I cried myself to sleep and then there were days that felt like I was overcome with joy at the opportunities I was given the chance to see and be a part of.  I can't say it was a rollercoaster ride for me to get where I am, I would refer to it more as a season of changes, seasons of love and heartbreak, seasons of growth and rebirth, mostly what it took me to get where I am is strength and hope and faith.   Strength that my dreams were achievable.  Strength to overcome to hurdles that life through in my way.  Mostly my journey, thus far, has required strength to believe in myself.  And although strength was enough to get me through some of the harder moments it was really hope and faith that the desires in my heart were real and true and honest and that to deny these stirrings and gifts would be a waste of God-given talents and treasures.  There are some things I know I cannot do well,  they mostly consist of all things science related, and or anything that requires spelling (I don't know what I would do without spell check).  I also am terrible at the following things: running, working out on a regular basis, being subtle, and lying.  Did I mention I am terrible at running?

Regardless, I know without a shadow of a doubt that I was born to be a teacher.  I have had the desire since I was 8 years old and it has only grown stronger with age.  I am 100% blessed to have had this calling since I was so young.

Hopefully I don't screw up too bad tomorrow.  :)  I am just glad to really be starting what I dreamed so long ago.

Here's hoping.

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