Grateful Friday

I'm grateful it IS Friday.  I'm tired.  

Even though Saturdays are packed and busy, it is a different kind of packed and busy and a change is as good as a rest.

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One of my students brought me this:

My love language.

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I'm grateful for perspective.  I give more seasoned teachers the side eye with their have-it-all-together vibe.  I'm not over here waving, I'm drowning.

I walked into school the other morning at the same time as the only male teacher at the school.  He's a young guy with a wife and toddler and newborn at home.  I also know he's in graduate school.  I asked him how school was going.  He said, "I'm exhausted.  I was up doing homework until 1:30 last night."

I sympathized.  I said, "That's hard when you have kids too.  When my husband was in graduate school he would wait until we were all in bed before he did homework."

He said, "Yeah, I need to have family time.  I need to spend time with my kids.  So I stay up late."

I hoped he felt understood.  At the same time I felt a little chastised.  Everyone is having their own struggles.  I need to be compassionate to everyone and give everyone a break.  Including me.

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President Nelson spoke at BYU this week.  I listened to a recording of his talk on my way to work.  It was wonderful.  At one point he was talking about how he followed God's laws and not the opinions of the world. He said, "Prophets aren't always popular."

Braeden and Anna arrived 1 1/2 hours early and the Marriott Center was already filling up.

So I think you just have to ask the right people:  he's popular.

Desi texted this picture:

Natalie, Anna, Braeden and Desi (and 20,000 of their friends)

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Our schedules don't work during the week for me to be able to talk to Emma.  We text a little and she's sent a few emails and they delight me.  Here are some snippets:

I want you to imagine a slightly scatter-brained, eccentric Parisian woman who works as a seamstress/restoration person at a museum. Are you picturing a 5’3” woman with glasses, a red bob with the shortest bangs you’ve ever seen, pants with flowers AND foxes, a blazer over a hot pink crocheted vest over a white button down shirt, all topped off with a green jacket tied around her neck like a scarf? If so, you’re exactly right. 

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The coolest thing was watching them assemble some Chinese armor. If you’re ever getting attacked by a Chinese warrior from the Middle Ages, let me know, because I know where all the weak spots are now.

~ 

I got a sandwich from a boulangerie (which was surprisingly difficult to find. How hard is it to get a baguette in this town?). My plan was to walk along the Seine, find a place to sit and eat, then go to Pont d’Alma, which is near the Eiffel Tower and has a metro stop on the same line as my apartment. It was far less idyllic than it sounds. For one thing, I was walking right into the sun and the path along the river has kind of a lot of garbage and no place to sit. So I went back up to walk on the sidewalk, and I ended up walking through this cool little park that was basically just a long stretch of grass and trees.

Her job sounds super interesting and I will just enjoy the descriptions from afar.

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I'm grateful I have a sack full of suckers to take to my class today.  We're having a lockdown drill today which I purely hate.  I hate that we have to have one.  I hate that we have to talk about it and think about it.  They bubbled with questions of every kind.  Including but not limited to what would we do if the bad guy broke the window and came in.

I told them the bad guy wouldn't do that because there would be police outside if there was a problem at our school.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.  I didn't tell them that I would do my best to stand between them and any danger.  I would.  But I didn't tell them because I like instead to have them believe that no one could possibly break our window.

One student had the idea that I should give them a sucker so they would for sure be quiet during the lockdown--their mouths would be busy.  I thought about 24 children eating suckers in the dark and getting suckers tangled in long hair.

I told them if they were silent, I'd give them a sucker after the drill.

They are thrilled by that idea.

I told them to not be afraid.  I said, "Are you afraid when you buckle up your seatbelt?"

They scoffed and said, "No."

I said, "It's not scary to buckle up your seatbelt, but you do it to be safe.  This is the same.  The drill isn't scary.  We just do it to be safe."

They bought it. I'm grateful they trust me and I'm grateful for every day that those little dears are kept from harm.