attempt #334567

every so often I decide to really dedicate my self to keep a consistent blog about my first/second year of teaching. so I am off again in order to keep a record of all the craziness/fun/fantasticness of teaching six boys with autism. so I'm off...

today we spent the day at van courtland park. with sprinklers and a huge playground. overall it was a fun day despite three out of four of my kids crying. lets see kid #1 cried because hes turn on the swings was over, but then continued to cry because he was rubbing his eyes so hard that had now smeared sunblock into his eyes. He was crying, repeating "eyes, eyes, eyes." So I sort of cornered him on a bench and quick dumped so water on his face and washed his eyes off. Despite his scrambling to escape I managed to wash his eyes off. kid #2 cried because well, i don't know, he cries immediately between bouts of laughter. I really couldn't explain it, however I can tell you it took about ten minutes before it was really bothersome. kid #3 sobbed because his turn on the swings was over as well. With thirty kids on the playground and four swings, threes a limited amount of time per kid.
However a certain teacher decided that she was literally going to fight with me over a swing. I put my kid on an empty swing because he was waiting for an empty swing, as I put him on it she decided to tell me she, yes, she was next. I told her he was already on the swing and I am not going to make him get off, you'll have to wait. If i pulled him of the swing, he would have been on the ground stamping his feet in a tantrum is that worth it? not so much. She continued to tell me she told me she was next and I heard her, it was HER turn. Really? your turn? I didn't realize the swings were for adults. confused. its not like I didn't hate her already... because shes a psycho. I know she stole my markers. yea i said it. I want them back!
I went out during lunch to get a latte from DD and when I came back two fellow teachers were sitting outside on a blanket having lunch. I just thought what a fantastic idea. It is a beautiful day. I sat with them for the rest of my lunch. Tomorrow is definitely a picnic lunch. :)

life is about the choices you make

the choices that we make bring us to where we are today. i think it is more interesting how the choices that seem to be insignificant can make such a impression on your entire life. even more so, when you begin to regret that choice, how do you live with the choices you make. I must have been about 13, completely fabricated that age but young, when i decided that regretting is a waste of time and effort. Every decision, experience, or lesson, even those who seem to have negative consequences have value and contributes to the person and life you have now. Not to say, that I have been happy with everything I have ever done but that I would not take one thing back. I am here because of the choices I have made and the person I have become. Surely, at the time I thought certain experiences were difficult and challenging but because of each experience I try to learn something. I guess it is even more difficult when you end up in a devastating situation and you wonder how you ended up there. How could it be resolved or avoided? In the mean time, I just try to make good and thoughtful decisions, and hope they are for the best. this reflection has no bearing on my own life, I am in no devastating situation, just thinking......

google is my friend

so i am basically obsessed with google, i google all my random questions and find that other people are just as scattered as me. I wonder things such as, which is the most populated city, which is Mumbai, why my cat hates my boyfriend, which i still don't know, how to read Tarot cards, which I had a moment where i was interested, and so so much more. In addition, I will google my name to find out what comes up. I have diminished nearly all the postings which I didn't want associated with me, such as the facebook listing and silly comments on book and cds on amazon. Anyway, I have basically boiled my google search down to a random course listing (which I am strongly considering emailing the professor so he removes it) and my linked in profile. However, I was strolling through the pages of other Marguerites, like Marguerite Duress and so forth, to find about five pages in, a link to this poem site I used to belong to. OK background, back in 2004 (5 years ago) I was in high school: board and miserable, therefore I wrote "poetry," some of it is more poetry like then others having a rhythmic beat, others are just borderline scary, I must admit. I have not looked at these in years. It gave me a rather disturbing glimpse at how distraught I really was. Some of them I favor more than others, but overall I was impressed. I feel like now i lack that sort of passion to write in the same manner. Which is true, the passion was misery and now I am happy. I don't think I realized how unhappy I was. Most of the poem are centered around a person, who I know effected my life but I think I forgot/repressed the degree which he effected me. In hindsight, i know it wasn't just him, there were other things going on, I guess? Nonetheless, I was devastated. I have never been the person to sit around and mop, which is why i cannot recall being upset to this point but I think many of these writings demonstrate how I was really feeling despite everything else, I was just going through the motions. I see that now and it disturbs me. here, let me find one as an example.....

Death's Warm Arms

I want to drown myself in a tear filled puddle,

Slit my wrists with lover’s dagger,

Crush my skull with hatred’s words

And prey to die, escape this evil world.



I’m tired of playing such dangerous games,

With heart and life as lowest bid,

And winners are all soulless traitors.



I’m here alone, empty pockets and a vacant chest.

Because I gambled my heart and lost it all,

I’m left to wander empty shadows and broken memories.



There is no escape except death’s cold arms,

To carry me away from malicious matters,

But I stay here in a endeavor to be strong,

Yet I hate myself for being alive.




uggh. rough..... i haven't decided to delete them or not. Do i care if someone searches my name and then finds 5 pages in some random poems written when I was 17. I don't think so. If you want to search that hard, you deserve it.

is your heart healthy enough for sex?

hm. i just spent hours dying my hair, to have the slightest bit of red that I may just be so desperate to see that i am imagining it. so sad.

I am not going to lie and say that I cannot wait to get the twillight dvd that i preordered from amazon.

btw my cats are fucking crazed maniacs.

tomorrow is the trip to the hall of science. thursday is my second parent teacher conferences. crrrazy. too bad i am sititng on the computer instead of doing the number of things i should be. oh well. need to get laundry. then sleep.

i love cran juice & red peppers. not together. ewe.

multi tasking.

i must multitask at all times. for example, as i type away i am listening/watching the late Randy Pausch's lecture on time management. I just finished his book, the Last Lecture. I'd like to add, that in addition to listening to a lecture and typing a blog, I am now talking to my mom.

ok well i won't like i had to pause, because my mom started asking me a hundred questions that required me to search online for random addresses. Anyway, back to my point i must multi task. I remember back in the old days when we hooked up to the internet through dial up, I always have to be doing at least two other things or I would lose my mind and throw the computer out of the second floor window, which it was conviently sititng in front of. Things I used to do, were draw all over the table cloth and then table, play random games on the comuter, push bottons, chat on the phone, or, my favorite, play grand theft auto and kill random poeple. this was my favorite becuase it consumed my mind, while I waited the never ended loading but I got much of my frustration out of killing random characters.

I will continue to multi task by making this a two in one post and address my day yesterday as well.

rosa told me that yesterday was a "terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day" much like Alexander had and she too was moving to austrilia. I realize now that I am doing something that i hate, by addressing something that may only be known to elementrary school kids and their teachers. However, i assume at one point everyone was a kid and may have read Alexanader than very bad day, and i'll leave it at that.

my assitant principal told me that one of my paraprofessionals would have to be switched out for another, becuase that one cannot be around another student for any longer. the worst part about it, that we really do work well together, we accomplish a lot. everyone gets a long very well, I know she is very close to the other paras and its unfair to her that she should be displaced becuase of the accusations of crazy woman. Sadly, as i told them, there is absolutely nothing i can do about it. I feel like the expected me to change it, but I have not even been there a year and i have NO say. Even if i did, the ap doesn't care, me fighting her would only make it worse. she could careless about my feelings on the matter. all i had to say was, it is what it is.

yesterday, we went to an assembly. I used to love assemblies, yay! no class! I thought it would be pretty similar as a teacher, yay! no class! FALSE. maybe that would be true, if i went without my class, but its seems that they follow me wherever I go, seriously, one kid asked me if he could go to the bathroom with me. If this kid had the option he'd follow me home, except I told him I live at the school.

the assembly was a belated black histoy month celbreation with an african music and dance show. It started with Evan, he was all hyped for the show. If we could go to a show everyday, he'd be pleased, well until we got there and then he'd lose it. my kids have difficulty with waiting periods, especially Evan, wait is something he doesn't entirely grasp. So as we were waiting he was grabbing and scratching me, his mom was there also to see the show, was telling him to stop from down the asile. Then a kid behind me, in a friend's class, started to get anxious. His teacher referes to him as a "bulldog" or the "protector." He doesn't appreciate student on teacher violence. He was beginning to get agitated with Evan's abuse and in one quick motion, took his book and smacked Even in the back of the head. It was so fast no one could stop him and Evan didn't even have an idea of what happened. His mom was in hysterics, not in the overly concerned "is my child harmed" way, but that dying of laughter way. She is oh to aware of Evan's behavior and found it down right amusing that he got a taste of his own medicine. Soon enough, Evan was wrapped up against my arm, calm as a cucomber.

Next, Juno (I can never keep track of the fake names i give the kids, so Juno it is) Juno, a boy, is a big baby. He is ten and crying every single day should be far beyond him, but at home he does what he wants when he wants and at school its slightly a different story, which he really doesn't appreciate. Everyday he tries to tell us no school, and then breaks and cries. To me and the paras, his crying is built into our routine, we move on with our lives and push him along. However, at assembly people think there is something genuinely wrong with the poor boy crying. I want to say no, he's crying becuase he is a spoiled brat. I adore him, but he is a brat. So now on one side, I have the scratcher on the other Juno is off and on weeping.

is it beginning to be clear why assemblies are less than fantastic?

Then, oh no it doesn't stop. some "selected" students were invited to go on stage and dance with the performers. I'd lke to preface this part of the story with, there were about 500 people there including all the units, principals and parents. I'll contine, John wanted to go on stage, however no one "selected" him to go, so he couldn't just walk up there. I had to no voice in the selection process, but John did not care. He was giving the para next to him a hard time, so i squezzed my way down the asile to assist in a discrete contaniment. I'd like to also add, we were sititng dead center in the front. I attempted not to make a big scene, as I did that my lovely student was continously throughing his elbow into my chest, body weigh behind it. Then I finally got him to sit down next me, and he continued his fit unitl he bit me! yes, i said it the little fucker bit me. I couldn't belive it. See, I had a seweater and long sleeve shirt on, so i didnt feel it right away until the pinch. my response: oh my god, he bit me. he's out of here. I had a male para from another class help me escort him out. I got outside and told him that I was going to tell the police if he didn't behave, there were about 6 security guards there and I used them in my ploy for him to knock his nonesense off.

then i had an iep meeting for an hour in a hot, stuff, tiny room with 6 people scrunch into. :(

things you may not no about me.

tv shows/ commericals always make me cry. i remember the red cross commerical for katrina, made me cry every time. the pet shelter commerical with sarah mcglaglican with the yellow lab at the end is a consistent tear starter. various commericals, documentaries and so on will make me cry like a small child. somehow these stories, even when they are poorly told, just touch my soul and make me so sad.

i will watch almost anything on tv. anything. i should never be in charge of the clicker, becuase i will literally stop on something in another language just becuase it sounds interesting. for example, now i am watching a documentary on two svant twins with autism. huh?

fuzzy animals make me really happy. When I lived in nc, and I wasn't allowed to have a pet, I would go to pet stores and shelters and just look at the animals. so sad.

when i was 5 i had a pet guinea pig, candy, my parents told me that she was lonely and needed to go back to the pet store with the other guinea pigs. I was devasted. i mean devasted, but i understood that she needed friends too and let her go with my best wishes. I was 16, driving in the car with my mom when i realized candy had died. ha.

i am ridcioulsy random.

i also wish i could speak in all alterations all the time, but i am not that skilled.

today, it snowed, a lot. it was aweful. you'd think i'd like snow more becuase it is really pretty, its almost glittery but i don't. it stabbed you in the eye with its icy litle tenticals. i got my pretty suade boots all wet. so sad.

oh, i am also terribly curious. I need to know things. If i may be obessesed with google. I am also a collection of random facts like blondes have more hair strands than any other hair color, cats sleep up to 14 hours a day, and from pointer finger to pointer finger is your height. see why are those things important? their not, really but the randomly interesting.

i am board.

obviously.

Extraverted iNtuitive Feeling Judging

somehow i found myself taking a personality test of sorts, i began searching for a free myer-briggs, or somthing to that effect, test and stumbled upon something else. I discoverd the aforementioned title is what I apperantly am, which somehow based on agreeing on disaggreing to several statments the system has been able to completely and adequately described me. Even more so, it easily outlines jobs that I either currently have, teaching, or those I am/was interested in, counseling, pyschology, etc.

it is kind of incrediable that by taking some test it can outline my personality. jung was truly an inspirational. I think its interesting from a serious of statements, that a test can identify me. pyschometrics can be really interesting, at times at least. this makes me miss actually learning, which is something I absolutly do not do at my current "masters" program.

btw. motion city soundtrack is fantastic.

today was a long day. I am trying to make a real effort at accomplishing the things on my ever expanding to do list. I spent time after a long day at work trying to do so. However, i was exhausted by the never ending chaos in my room. One of my students has been on a rampage the last few days, this is only made worse by the usual antics my children are into. One is screaming at this point, another is throwing something around the room, another is repeating everything I say, one is talking to himself and the last is trying to pull some control into the room. Ugh. Sometimes I have to laugh and other times its hard to find the smile. Back to the student on a rampage, we'll call him Jorge. Jorge has been in a very hostile mood lately. He is the one who was kicking me with his snow boots, until I took them off and throw them accross the room. Today he nearly kicked another, much smaller student, in the head. Lovely. He has knarled the hands of my paras, and ruined my sweater my pulling until it strectch nearly 5 times the orignal size. sigh.

Today was no different than the last few days for me. He is hitting, scratching, pinching, screaming, and kicking all day. Sometimes, I just do not know what to do. There are weeks where he is doing so much better. My hands have remained scratch free for weeks. Then all of the sudden he is out for blood. There is nothing I can do to stop him. Today he was so upset, he went on for twenty minutes until he could hardly catch his breath. I know I only have six kids with three paras, but these six kids take at least four of us to handle. I so much want to help them make progress, but sometimes I lose sight of how to do that. I try.

At the end of the day, Eric was listening to the morning meeting music with headphones on. He was so cute I nearly exploded with laughter. He was standing, weaving back and forth to the music while singing. He was singing "Simon Says." He was terrible, off beat and tone deaf, but just so cute. I was convering my face in hysterics. Kids are too much.

I am drinking wine and it tastes good.



p.s. this was super random, goes no where entry. lame.