as the world seems more and more unhinged and the weather climate-change-crazy & crazier, we are better & better. i know there's no relationship, not indirect, not inverse, none at all. i limn the basics of the messed-up events of politics, environment, world health, & more, but mostly i just see my little life, my james & our pet children,my family & friends, students, female drunk people, other humans in our tiny mountain town...
today i talked at length w/my zoom students about them being the future of the world. fifth graders are so different than even kids one year older, still concrete thinkers. one asked, "what do you MEAN we are the future of the world?" so i blabbed about that for a bit. he replied, "oh, that makes sense." :) lovely, their innocence. it reminds me i need to be ultra-responsible, care for their developing intelligence & social awareness like the soft, fresh little eggs they are.
on zoom, i can wear all the makeup i want & over-gesticulate, which is a SEMBLANCE of the stage performing i no longer do. in fact, being a painted up ham actually heeds a teacher's conveyance of message. we are trying to get kids stuck at home to enjoy school, already a tough sell, so playing to the back row is a good thing!
i like that i get to know more kids more closely, but that one-on-one time spent also makes socially distanced teaching so difficult. so many children need direct tutoring over & over just so they can understand how to access their lessons! the "high" students thrive, as they would in any environment, but the rest... more problems: we can't have discussions, really, or do group projects; we can't take breaks all together or do the impromptu things i enjoy. i can't even turn on chat due to some kids' immaturity. it doesn't feel much like school, with the lack of exchange of ideas, but i guess it's the only semblance possible right now.
plus it's better than not teaching at all... and it won't last forever.
the california fires have been bad, so bad. everywhere we go, the air is like "LA in the 70s," james said. or bakersfield in the 80s. ironic we go to bakersfield some weekends to escape the smoky wildfire smog of frazier mountain! how horribly unhealthy it must be closer to these gigantic fires! mom & dad have forced air, so they seal up their big house, crank down the thermostat, & we all breathe freely.
during our most recent visit, mama handed me down some dresses, so once home i asked james to take pix of me wearing them to send to her. he snapped these of us both, too, so here you go if you've missed seeing james's face. such a mug, such a handsome, talented, big-hearted mug. <3
we're not doing so bad for two oddball humans seasoned by life. the older i get, the more good i try to do, & he's doing that, too, so i'm certain that's why Life is better, even with external conditions what they are...
i hope the music comes back sooner than later & that the skies clear so i can run again without having an asthma or hay fever attack (which happened two times lately), but if not, this life is good as it gets. we are really dang lucky & that's all it is. not fortune, not the hand of god, just goddang lucky.
