I know this place too well.  All of my doubts and my mistakes haunt me.  Whispers of heartbreak and ambiguity follow me everywhere.  Songs and memories decide to arrive at my doorstep at this moment of uncertainty, taunting me, reminding me of possibilities lost.  These ghosts precede every step and echo every word.  The strength that defines me is draining out of my core.  All of the certainties are broken into a million shards of worry and doubt.  

Who is this person?  This timid, meek girl?  Who is that?  Part of me knows that all of the decisions, all of the mistakes, all of the hurts have made me stronger, have made me more ready for the future that awaits.  But loneliness and guilt are tough adversaries.  They seem to have taken up residency in my brain, and they are going to be difficult to eject.  

I know this place too well; it feels like home to me.  

But I don't want to live here.  This won't always be my norm, my touchstone.  This won't always be me.  

In another moment of weakness, one of my other weaknesses said, "You have more going for you than anyone else in this room.  At least you have options."  Then he asked me, "How can you regret a decision that was right for you?"  Out of all of the things he's said to me or not said to me over the years, this was one of the most poignant.  

I think he's right.  At least, I hope so.

I've been trying to sit down and write, for days and days.  

Some part of me is stopping the other part of me that wants to get. going.  

I'm sick of that part.  She sucks.

Free-writes with my students....

In preparation for their college essays, I spend a class period offering free write topics, encouraging self-reflection and exploration.  This semester, the activity fell directly in the middle of my own personal disaster.  In some ways, I feel like I am at a similar place as many of them, on the horizon of a change, of a new direction.  Through this brainstorm, I reminded myself of some key elements that comprise who I am.  I'm not sure exactly what I will do with this information yet, but I'm thankful to have generated a beginning of a new direction.  

____________________________________________________

What is your strongest personality trait?

• My go-to attitude.  I am a doer.  I don't sit around and wait for things to happen to me.  And when problems occur, I like to think I jump to action and help drive a situation to its conclusion.  I believe I get this from my mother.  I get much of my drive and determination from her.  I am the living, breathing result of a 1970's feminist child. 
•  (Interesting, I now feel frozen and indecisive.  Will I be able to make a change in career?)

How would your friends describe you?

• She is driven.  She is a bubbly person.  She always tries to do what is right and helpful by everyone else, which can sometimes be detrimental to her sanity.  In the process of doing what is expected or asked of her, she sometimes loses sight of her own needs.  She is someone who has a lot to give, but sometimes doesn't know how to balance the pieces of her life to allow for that generosity to truly take effect.  She doesn't know the meaning of the word, No.

What is a favorite book, movie, piece of art, etc?  Why?

• Barbara Kingsolver's Animal Dreams.  I'm not really sure why this is a favorite.  Maybe I just read it at the right time in my life.  Maybe I liked the relationships between the characters, the sense of loss and rebuilding of a life.  I also really love the importance she gave to the place, its healing properties and magical, dream-like qualities.  
• In general, I love things that make me look closer, once, twice, or twelve times.  I love pieces that have an immediate but lasting emotional effect on me.  Sometimes these effects and these pieces are unexplainable.  I just want to be made to FEEL.  I want my gut to respond.

Have you ever reached an epiphany in your life?

• Yes.  RECENTLY.  I realized that I have a tendency to get stuck in INERTIA, in a pathway that was my choosing and is respected/supported by everyone in my life, but then I realize that it may not be the right pathway for me.  This is true in my professional and personal life right now.  But at the same time, these questions fly through my mind:  How dare I stand up for me?  For my feelings?
• I must begin paying attention to me.  NOW.  Or forever hold my peace.

What are your greatest accomplishments?  Why do you consider them so highly?

• Being a part of Samantha's life (my little cousin who ended up spending a year with my family, in a time of turmoil for her)--and I regret not being as strong presence in her life currently.
• Helping my grandfather and grandmother during his illness--I was able to be useful and caring and use my strengths to help them with things they struggled with.  And I regret not spending as much time with my Grams now that she is alone.
• Going to school and doing well.  High school, undergrad, and graduate school.  For so long this was all I knew or expected of myself, and I committed to doing well.
• Creating groups of friends and communities in various facets of my life.  I regret losing touch with some or many of them.
• Right now....the fact that I am actively and verbally admitting unrest.  This is a first for me.  I hope that I take this beginning and create the life that I really want.  The time is now.
• Next...I hope the next big accomplishment will be making the change.  Or, at the very least, beginning to make the change that I know I need to make.

What activities do you do outside the classroom that define you as a person?

• Directing/choreographing plays--I see these as vehicles for mentoring kids in an arena sometimes more meaningful than in a traditional classroom.
• ABC House--I am daily helping five boys in a very real, very tangible way.  I am helping to provide comfort, family, and support to inner-city kids trying to find A Better Chance than they might find in their home neighborhoods.
• Ballroom Dance Club 
• Advocating for a Theater and Dance program in a public high school.  
• (......all of these activities are directed towards populations of kids who don't have an existing outlet in their communities or schools)

In what areas have you struggled and succeeded?  Struggled and failed?

• BEST portfolio--to be certified to teach in CT, second year teachers face UNREAL pressures.  I passed this portfolio, but not without much turmoil.
• Directing my first musical at this high-powered public high school.
• School, through all the levels.

• I don't have as many failures, but I think this is because I've played it safe.  Maybe I need to stretch out of my comfort zone.  For once in my life.  

What are some difficulties you've had to endure and how have they changed you?

• This might be one of the most difficult things I will have to do--to break from INERTIA.  I fear that this decision will help define me and my life hereafter.  I just hope I make the right choice.
• I am proud of the difficulties I faced with Sammi and my Gramps--I love myself most when I do the right thing by me AND others.  

Where and with whom would you like to be?

• Outside, walking or running with my puppy, with a notebook and my ideas in tow.  Then, I would take a break, a long one at that, to play, bound, rest, and let my words flow.  I want to let the writer's life take over.  I want to commit to it, in combination with some yoga and dance.  The more I think about it, the more I realize it could be. the. most. perfect. and. powerful. scenario.

How do you define success?

• Happiness.  For me and for as many other people as possible.  In thirty years, I don't want to doubt my path.  I think I might if I staid in teaching.  At least in an artist's life or a writer's life, I would have the opportunity to change and develop my focus, what I am working on.  Could I go freelance?
• Success, to me, equals me as an old lady, sitting around a porch surrounded by my family (blood and gathered), laughing, telling stories, and loving life.  
• I want a world of options and inspirations.  A wealth of interest and knowledge and curiosity.  Always.  For my whole life.

The Pro-Con List

In trying to decide what is causing my discontent at work, I came up with the following list.

The positive parts of my job--

• Helping kids, being a positive influence in their life.
• Supporting a life of thoughtful consideration and curiosity, of awareness, of creativity, and of self-expression.
• I have the opportunity to participate and facilitate theater and dance, and to advocate for the arts in public schools.
• I sometimes have the opportunity to share and be excited about my passions and my concern for kids with like-minded people.  This is limited, however, due to the normal stresses of the job.
• The people in this working community are wonderful and supportive, interesting and challenging.  They never fail to bring a smile to my face, even when that might be a hard thing to do.  They have become a second family to me.
• I have a consistent paycheck with benefits.  I am putting money away for retirement.  This is stable.

The negative aspects of my job--

• The correcting load, in addition to the other responsibilities.
• Because I am overwhelmed with additional activities (by choice, I admit), I feel like I'm not being as good or as clear in the classroom (and out of the classroom).  What good am I if I am letting my students down?
• While the possibility for a theater program exists on the horizon, I have no idea how long it will be before it materializes.  
• I am supporting the students' creativity and self-expression, but I am stifling my own!
• I've been questioning this career path THE WHOLE TIME I have been on it.  I went into it wondering, and it hasn't stopped.
• Leaving would be a huge monetary risk.  And I have my Dad's voice in my head...
• Teaching English was always the choice I made to be logical (here's that theme again...), responsible, to bring together pieces of myself.  But.  I am lost.  So I am worried that this is not working....................

Do I have the guts to do something about it?

Sometimes silence screams.

I could feel the anger and the sadness reverberate through the car.  Thank god I stopped to get a coffee…at least I had something else to do with my hands than grasp the wheel and the stick.  I could engage the sense of taste to distract from the other senses, shrieking with his pain.  

I knew this wasn’t going to be easy.  I sat there and let him go through his motions until we got home.  

I quietly got out of the car after his not-so-quiet door slam.  I stood in the grass, under the clear, starry sky, and watched as he tossed his bags into his car, took his parents' air conditioner from the house, said C-ya, and tore out of the drive-way.  

I stood there for a few more minutes, letting the cooling humid air swirl around me.  I listened to the sound of his engine get quieter and quieter in the distance.  Until it was gone.  He was gone.  

I could finally take a breath.  And I made it count.  I took a deep breath in, held it there, carefully, mindfully, and then slowly let the air seep out through my lips.  It seemed like I had air for days.  

My stomach churned a little bit.  But the tension in my shoulders went away.  The tears hung in the corners of my eyes, but they did not fall.  I looked down at my dog, who stood still at my side, staring up at me. 

“Come on, Sid,” I whispered.  He wagged his tail slightly and trotted, carefree, into the house.  I took slow, deliberate steps inside, turned around, and gently closed the door.  

I sat down in my satellite chair, hugged my knees to my chest, and let the silence ring in my ears.  I did it.  I just broke a good man’s heart.  

And here I am, sitting still, in a space somewhere between tears, nausea, and relief.