It is a grey and mild Saturday noon hour and I just adore being in my pyjamas (reindeer decorated, but the softest flannel in my collection so keep Christmas with you all through the year, I say!) still at this hour. My morning has involved waking at 9:30 (sweet, sweet slumber), tea and a great book in bed followed by an un- abandoned journaling session, and a peanut butter and banana topped bagel. Does it get more blissful than this?
I just started "Note to Self: on Keeping a Journal and Other Dangerous Pursuits", by Samara O'Shea. What a treat! I am addicted to writing in my journal-- I keep it on me at all times. For me, it's a place to record, process, celebrate and bitch about the events of my days. I have been surviving and celebrating lately by keeping gratitude lists-- Oprah recommended this ages ago and I kinda liked it. This is a pursuit that I recommend highly to anyone-- but it has occurred to me lately that my gratitude lists are making me turn a blind eye to my dreams and true feelings.
I will use the example of my day job. I work in other teachers' classrooms each day to teach French. I have lovely colleagues and VERY kind students, who generally are OK with learning French, or at least polite about it if they hate the subject. I approach most days with a positive outlook, or I can create one for myself if I don't feel the love on the drive to work.
Here are the crappy parts: I push a cart around to each room with supplies for each class. That it is a fancy cart does not make this job seem any less degrading. Three classes I work in are set up as chaos, either because the teacher of the room doesn't get bothered by loud students, messes, no space to manoeuvre around, etc. It makes me CRAZY! The joy in keeping one's own classroom inviting and beautiful and inspiring has been removed from me. I work out of a dark office full of photocopy paper and I am constantly clock watching to make sure I am on time for the next class. Am I rushing because I am stressed or stressed because I am always in a rush?
On the other and less whiny hand, I don't have to work late to keep a room tidy or decorated. As I walk through the hallways, every student that knows me proudly beams "Bonjour!" to me. I don't generally deal with parents because, who cares-- it's just French. I can keep my marking minimal because the assessment is easy-- can they understand me (B), engage in coherent and spontaneous conversation in French with me (A) or do they answer "Merci beaucoup" when I ask them what they did for the weekend (C or D depending how many actual words exist in French...)? I make a great salary with holidays I will never have in any other type of job. And as my Auntie Margie says, "Every now and again, you will make a difference to one kid".
As I read my less whiny hand, I see the angel on my left shoulder, the gratitude list girl who always thinks it's best to look on the bright side. But slogging through the day to day pains of crashing in to things with my cart (I always make my husband push the grocery cart for this reason!), arriving to rooms full of students' crap everywhere, feeling like a babysitter instead of an educator-- I hear the devil on my right shoulder saying "stop the bullshit gratitude lists-- you deserve more than this! You're dying in this life-- write all the books you dream of, for crying out loud! Get your 'Yoga and Journaling' classes started! Your Salad Girl catering business plan is ingenious!".
Whether we listen to the little angel or the little man in red has been a forever compelling life path question, I know. I send my dilemma out to the world. How does one leave the comforts of a great salary, pension, holidays, blah blah blah, to carve out a life full of passion and dreams of nurturing others and creativity?
The good news for any of us juggling this question is that, to the Monday to Friday people, Saturdays will never lose their bliss. No dilemma so great as figuring out your destiny at 33 years old (34 in two weeks) cannot be made better nor more dream-filled, by reading a book that inspires you in bed, with tea and a PBB bagel in your flannel jammies.
Salad Girls Tips of the post:
- Open your journal and write out your secrets! Release them on to the page-- it is more patient than people (as Anne Frank, the wisest thirteen year old, said)
- Make gratitude lists, but counteract them with "badditude lists" of what is getting your goat.
- Enjoy every Saturday you can in bed with good books and tea for as late as you can.
- Face every day knowing that the next Saturday is only a few days away.
Namaste!
Salad Girl
I like this Tam. I feel the answers will work themselves out here.
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