Life grants nothing to us mortals without hard work. (Horace)

Lately I’ve been thinking about work and success.  When trying to be a successful teacher, and a success at eating healthy and exercising and losing weight, how much work do I need to do to be successful?

As a teacher who cares about her job and her students, I feel an obligation to grade papers, and plan, and teach, and provide support, and keep organized and do all the other things a teacher has to do.  And because I do all these things, during the school year I never check everything off my “To Do List”.  There is always something I should be doing or something I haven’t done yet.  I skip household chores or errands or time for myself because I’m working.  I see other teachers who seem to go home without bags of papers to correct and don’t seem to spend hours planning and don’t seem worried about not getting things done. (I know I don’t go home with them so I don’t really know what they do but I get the feeling they don’t spend the majority of their weekends working.)  Am I working too much?  Or are they working too little?  Or do we just work differently?

And it isn’t just teaching.  What about eating healthy and exercising and losing weight?  Can you have a treat once in awhile and still be successful?  Can you skip a day of exercise here and there and still lose weight?  Is it obsessive to worry about every bite you take or is it necessary if you want to lose weight?  Again, I have to ask, am I doing too much or too little?

Life shouldn’t be just filled with work but without work nothing gets done.  I don’t know how to be a good teacher without spending most of my weekend working.  And I don’t know how to lose weight without spending a lot of time preparing foods and exercising. Is there a way to get what you want without working at it? 

I get the feeling that some people think I work too much, and sometimes I think I work too much too, but I can’t figure out how to work less and feel good about what I’ve done.  This week I went for a walk in the gardens on Tuesday after school.  Someone was filming a scene for a movie there.  The whole left side of the parking lot was filled with white trailers and trucks.  The place where they were filming was filled with people, and equipment, and trucks, and wires, cameras, lights, and a generator, and a young man with a walkie-talkie – who needed me to walk quickly so I didn’t get in the way of the filming.  So much work had to be done to film a scene or two for a movie.  If it takes that much work for a single scene in a movie, I guess it isn’t really that surprising that it takes a lot of work to teach 175 students the complexities of science.  

I know I wanted to find balance this year but I’m not sure I know what that means to me.  I know it isn’t possible to have equal parts of work and play.  The more I’ve thought about the importance of my work, (at least to me and maybe to my students), the more I realize it isn’t really balance I’m hoping to achieve.  I do want to make sure my life is the best life I can make for myself and that it is satisfying and joyful and not JUST filled with work.  However, I’m not exactly sure what that life looks like.  I guess that’s what this year is about – figuring out what I want my life to be.  I have realized that a big part of my life is going to be my teaching and that is going to involve a lot of work.  I have also realized that it is going to take a lot of work to get healthy and get to a healthy weight.  And when I really think about it, work is a good thing.  Lots of people right now wish they had a job and I'm lucky enough to have a job I love.  And there are people who are wondering when they will have their next meal, and I'm lucky enough to be able to prepare healthy foods on a regular basis.  I realize now, that the kind of success that matters to me involves a lot of work and that's not a bad thing.

It's been several weeks since I've updated so here's how I'm doing on my goals.


I've struggled with eating healthy.  I got sick and I wanted comfort - and comfort to me involves food.  I ate healthy foods but too much of them.  However, I did exercise most days even when I was sick (however the exercise wasn't too energetic).  I have lost weight but I've been losing it more slowly.

10/10

10/17

10/30

I've really been cooking simple comforting recipes.  Here is a super quick and easy sausage wrap I like for breakfast or lunch.

Quick and Easy Veggie-Sausage Wrap

Sausage Wrap

1 whole wheat tortilla (fajita size - 110 calories)

2 ounces Gimme Lean soy sausage (60 calories)

1/4 c. (or more) cooked veggies (I used leftover zucchini, corn, soy beans, red onion)

2 TB Daiya Cheddar "Cheese" (40 calories)

A few dashes of your favorite hot sauce (mine is Cholula)

Fresh Salsa or Pico de Gallo

Directions:

1.  Spread the soy sausage down the center of the tortilla.

2.  Top w/ the cooked veggies, Daiya, and hot sauce.

3.  Fold the tortilla to enclose the veggies & sausage mixture.

4.  Place on a microsafe dish and cover.  I cooked mine in the microwave onion for 1 1/2 minutes and everything including the sausage was cooked.  (I imagine the time depends on your microwave.)  

5.  Top with fresh salsa or toppings of your choice.


I've been to the gardens at least once every week.  It's been fun to see the fall decorations.  And there are still so many beautiful flowers.

Amazing Color

Early Morning Dew

Fall Pumpkins

Mystery Flowers

Sherbet Rose

Colors of Fall

“In the Book of Life, the answers aren’t in the back.” Charlie Brown

This week I’ve been thinking about questions.  And, how you can find the answers.  And whether or not the answers are really answers or just decoys, or wishes, or someone else’s answers that don’t really fit.  Or, maybe they’re the best answers for right now but in the future, there will be better answers or at least different answers.  Any way, like the 4-year-old who asks, “Why”, I’m finding I have a lot more questions than answers.

For example, when given a room full of 34 very different students, many who have difficult lives, speak different languages at home, have different abilities, are exhausted (because they have been staying up late playing “video” games, watching TV or texting), and are distracted by their growing interest in the opposite sex and peer communication (they are boy/girl crazy and talk too much), how does one person, in 50 minutes a day, teach them the life skills, language skills, academic skills, and science processes and facts they need to get a good grade in science class, learn enough information to do well in future science classes, and help them pass a state test that determines not only their “success”  but the “success” of the school and the teacher?

Or, given the fact that I have lost, in my lifetime at different times in different increments, more than 200 pounds and gained it all back, and given the grim statistics of losing weight, and the fact that my family struggles with weight issues and most of them, on both my mother’s side and father’s side, are overweight, how do I (not Valerie, or Oprah, or my friend, or the lady down the street but ME) not only lose weight this time but also keep it off so I don’t have to repeat this process again?

Weight Going UP

Weight Going Down

Weight Going UP - A Teeter Totter of Weight Gain

 And, given the fact that there are only 24 hours in a day and I really need to sleep for 8 hours and I’m no longer “a spring chicken” and have only so much energy, how do I find time to teach all day, grade a minimum of 300 assignments a week and do all the paperwork, plan 5 days worth of lessons for all my classes, clean house, shop AND prepare healthy, tasty, and low-calorie food, exercise, pay bills, run errands, take care of the cats (and I really don’t know how people with kids do this), keep in touch with friends and family, and find time to take care of myself and do the things I love to do? (Right now, as I am typing this – it is 4:30 AM Sunday morning because this is when I have “spare” time and still, my cat is literally lying on my arm, purring loudly, while I type, to remind me that he hasn’t been fed yet.)

And those are just three of my most pressing questions.  I have lots of questions.  Do I have tendonitis in my foot?  Should I go to the doctor or will it get well on its own? Do I really have to give up all salt to lower my blood pressure?  How do I get a tomato stain out of my blue and white shirt?  How do I find the time AND money to go to school myself so I can earn more “points” and make more money?  Why are there people who think the world will end if gays get married, or that guns can ever be good, or that Sarah Palin could ever make a good president?  And, why do cats like to sleep in bags when they have perfectly good cat beds? (And why do I spend money on cat beds when cats will sleep in bags?) Like I said, I have a lot of questions.

Cat in Purse

Cat in Shopping Bag

In the past, I knew how to find the answers.  When I was young, I could ask my parents because they knew all the answers.  Of course, like every other teen in the world, I figured out that they didn’t know all the answers.  And then, just when I figured out my parents didn’t know everything, I found religion.  Now, I could ask my church leaders, or the Bible, or God himself because they knew all the answers.  And for a very long time, I let them think and decide for me.  Or I prayed and “heard” an answer or at least I “heard” an answer I thought I was suppose to hear.  I’m not saying that my parents and my church didn’t help me.  Some of the answers they gave me were good and I still hold on to them today.  But they definitely didn’t have all the answers and some of the answers weren’t right for me.  

People have told me, if you just start praying again, you will find the answers again.  But I think once you realize a fairy godmother isn’t going to find you a prince, and Santa Claus isn’t going to bring you presents, and a god isn’t going to answer your prayers, it’s really difficult to go back to believing in magic.

And here’s a progress update:

Getting Healthy Goal: Okay (could have eaten better – but I did eat only 3, yes 3! bites of the delicious vegan cake served at baby shower, lost a little over 2 pounds.

10/3

10/10

 

Overall loss: 35 lbs.

Blood Tests (retested after 2 months of losing weight, exercising, and eating healthy & vegan): glucose back in normal range, cholesterol down over 100 points!  Yea!

Balancing School Goal: Here’s why teaching is difficult.  This week when I collected homework – two boys have each only done half of the motion problems because they didn’t realize there should have been problems on both sides of the paper.  I say:  “You must have shared the assignment.  One of you got the front page and one of you got the back page.  I think you made an honest mistake, so I will give you an extra day to complete the homework and I won’t count it as late.  Give me the finished homework tomorrow.”  (We keep extra copies of all assignments in a file box on my desk.)  The next day, the first boy brings me the homework and I tell him to place it in the homework folder.  I ask the second boy for his homework.  He tells me the first boy brought it to me.  I look in the folder.  They have turned in the original work and have not completed the assignment.  They tell me, “But you said we could share our homework.”  And I ask them:  “Do you really think I gave you an extra night to do nothing and permission to do only half of the homework, when everyone else in the class had to complete all the problems?” (These are honor students who get good grades and are looking at me with as much surprise as I am looking at them.)  Now, here are some questions I can’t answer.  Were these boys trying to take advantage and are amazing award-winning actors?  Or could they really think that I would allow them to only do half of the homework?  And, do I give directions that can be misunderstood that much? 

Taking Care of Me Goal: How can I take care of me when I’m busy taking care of 175 students?  Actually, I have worked on my blog, relaxed Saturday evening and I did go to the gardens. It wasn't easy but I made myself stop and "smell the roses".  I felt rushed and frantic as I entered the gardens but I made myself slow down and take my time.  And it was worth it, even though I haven't gotten all my work done.

I stopped and listened to the waterfall.

I stopped and watched the carp.

I stopped and looked at the view.

I stopped and watched the lizard crossing the road.

And as I walked around this corner, I really did stop and smell the roses,

Beautiful Moments, Grumpy Faces, Spider Webs, and Roses

As I drove to work in the light blue-grey of early morning listening to Bryan Luke on my country music station and drinking my Chai tea, I could see the moon with its shadowy surface, hanging low but huge on the horizon.  That was a good moment.

My current favorite morning drink - Good Earth Chai Tea (brewed strong), lots of lemon juice, and stevia (sometimes agave syrup) over ice.  Not traditional but refreshing.

Another morning and another drive, and I looked towards a whiff of engine fuel that assaulted my nose and saw an old VW bug.  I thought of my grandfather as he showed me where he placed the magnetic box that held a spare key to my own little red VW bug – after he had rescued me twice because I locked my keys in the car.  At the time, I felt young and stupid but now, with him gone and me - definitely older and maybe a little wiser, I’m glad I have that memory of someone who was willing to rescue me and protect me.  That was a good moment.

Grandpa - washed my car every time I drove to visit him, built a 6 foot puppet theater for my student teaching project, fed me fresh fruit and veggies from his garden, and took care of me in a million other ways.

It’s period 1, just barely after 8:00 AM on Friday morning after a very long week and I’m having a physics discussion with my not-totally-awake 8^th grade honors class.  One of the young men in my class shares an answer that is so totally off the mark that I can’t help but laugh.  The class, including the young man, joined me.  I gave him a discussion point just because he made me laugh.  That was a good moment.

It is not easy to think when you are sleepy!  I appreciate my 8th graders for doing their best so early in the morning. (I can't show pictures of them - don't have permission - but they are a beautiful bright group of kids!)

And there were other moments – conversations I shared at lunch and after school with other teachers, the strength and strain I felt as I did bicep curls, the silky, smooth taste of my broccoli-spinach soup and in celebration of the end of the week, the Hawaiian Margaritas I shared with my housemate as we watched “The Big Bang Theory” (love my DVR) on Friday night.

I know I'm rather new to drinking, (being a former Mormon), and I do it  so rarely but I think Tequila is rather nice.  We used a recipe from the Internet for a Hawaiian Margarita. And, I did not take the above picture - I drank the Margarita instead of photographing it.

However, I have discovered that enjoying “the moment” doesn’t mean that all my moments were magically transformed into Disney scenes.  And I spent plenty of time crawling through the gravel, struggling to climb the cliffs, and staring into space exhausted, overwhelmed, and discouraged. For example, it’s 6^th period, fairly early in the week and I am so tired I could cry.  I tell the students: “I’m sorry – I’m so tired today”.  And a student replies, “You sound tired,” (you’re thinking she’s sympathetic – how sweet, No, she continued with) – “and grumpy and mean.” AND I ate 2 Snickers single-bite candies! which have sugar and are most likely not vegan!

Oops.  I allow students to buy "treats" with earned tickets.  I've decided I should only use "treats" I don't like  because on bad days - those Snickers are too hard to resist!

But it is the weekend, so the time is mine to enjoy and fill with fun activities – except for the stacks of papers that have to be graded, the visit to Kaiser for follow-up blood work, the lesson planning that’s essential, the grocery shopping, the preparing of healthy foods so I can eat already prepared fresh veggies instead of Snickers, and the list goes on and on and on.

Work makes me grumpy!  I have too much to do and too little time to get it all done!

And maybe that’s the way life is for me right now.  I am not far enough along in my development to find joy in cleaning the cat boxes or grading stacks of papers.  Sometimes, in between enjoying the lovely moments, metaphorically speaking, I just have to suck it up and crawl through the gravel.  But I am trying to absorb or learn, that just because something isn’t pleasant or easy right now, (like getting up early to exercise, or being patient with 13 year-olds that need time to adjust to a school routine as much as I do, or not relying on comfort food to comfort me), doesn’t mean it isn’t worth it.  Or that it won’t get easier the longer I work at it.  And maybe, with practice, I can see more positive moments and less gravel!

Sometimes when life beats you up - you've got to just keep flying.

I'm finding it is taking me more time to get everything done.  I wanted to post a blog every week but it just didn't happen last week.  I wrote most of this last week but couldn't get it finished or published until this week.


And how did I do for the last 2 weeks, I mostly ate healthy but I wasn't as perfect as I have been (I really need to get rid of those Snickers!).

As for my weight – I’m not sure – my scale stopped working and I had to get a new one.  It shows a 3 pound loss for last week.  And another 3 pounds for this week!  I have now lost a little over 30 pounds!

9/19 - Old Scale

9/26 - New Scale

Oct 2nd - I guess I made up for the Snickers with all the walking I had to do at school this week.

As for school, I do NOT KNOW HOW TO GET EVERYTHING DONE and have a life of my own.  There is so much work!  Last weekend, I tried the technique of setting time limits for work and just getting as much done as I could and that would have to be good enough.  Except, it wasn’t good enough!  It is the end of the second week and I don’t have grades for any students because I haven’t graded enough papers.  This weekend I graded papers until I had enough to evaluate students.  It took about 8 hours ( not all at once) and I watched saved shows while I graded.  It wasn't fun but it wasn't horrible.  (I was hungry the whole time I was grading though but I didn't eat.  Even though I know it's a mental thing - I would really like to grade papers with out feeling so hungry.)


The gardens were beautiful the last weekend of September.  There are still roses!  In fact, I'm amazed there are still so many flowers.  There were also a lot of spiders sitting on beautiful, big webs!  One web completely blocked my chosen path, and I chose to take a different route.  (I think webs are beautiful but I don't want to walk through one - and these spiders were BIG!  And I know I'm a big bad science teacher but I still don't want to walk through a web with a big bad spider on it!)  I'm sure there is a lesson there - sometimes your "path" is blocked and it's easier to take another path than fight your way through.  Or perhaps the lesson is that I'm not more important than someone else (even if the someone is a spider) so why should I ruin his? her? day.  However, the reality is that someone else will eventually come through the path and knock down the spider web but today it wasn't me.

Sept 5th

Sept 26th

Sept 19th

Sept 26th

Some of my favorite pictures from last week's walk and this week's walk:

Roses - Sept 26th

Flowers - Sept 26th

Grasses - Sept 26th

Little Bunny - 10/3

Big Spider - 10/3

Brook - 10/3

Camellias - 10/3