Wanderlust and seeking of peace

I haven't posted for quite a long time to this blog.  The past several months have been fairly horrific regarding mine and my family's schedule, more so than usual.  I may catch up on the specific details later, or not, but basically it has been event after chaos creating event, clogging my heart and brain with the flotsam and jetsam that accompanies the chaos of our complex urban lives. I yearn for simplicity, but it most often evades me.

Illnesses of others, illnesses of my own, death of friends, new babies, doctor's visits, travel, holidays, crazy pets, kids who have trouble in math, kids who have trouble with writing, kids who are pack rats, flu season, Girl Scouts, Cub Scouts, re-opened estates from generations gone by, the time suck of the flickering screen in all its forms, lawyers, lawyer and more lawyers, the never ending influx of kid related paperwork and forms to fill out and checks to write, scheduling summer camps in January for god's sake, people clamoring for me to go back to teaching swim, job changes for me (non-swim related), job changes for others, and as the King of Siam would say, et CET-erahhh, et CET-erahhh, et CET-erahhh.  *sigh*  So many balls in the air you just can't keep up and eventually they start to fall down, sometimes on your head.

So following in the footsteps of my father, and many others, I have been trying to take it one day at a time.  Not borrowing trouble or worrying about things beyond my control, or way off in the future, but just getting through the day, and stealing quiet moments and joy when you can.  But still elusive is the real serenity that you feel in your bones. A centered mind and soul. The kind of serenity that seems like it is very unlikely when surrounded by young children.  But as my hooligans begin to age, I see a glimpse of possibility in my future, the possibility of some reclaiming of my sanity and grabbing hold of a bit of that serenity, at least occasionally.  Someday, at least.  It makes me yearn for that stillness even more.

The cost of taking things one day at a time can often be found when looking at my friends.  I'd love to spend more time with many of my friends, and develop deeper friendships with others, but the desire to uncomplicate our lives often means turning down invitations, or not returning phone calls or emails with the speed and regularity that I used to do, and little time is left to write occasionally on a blog, among other things.  I don't mean to offend folks.  I am just trying to make it through one day and keep my head attached.  I must say that the person who takes affront most often seems to be my mom, who just can't comprehend how busy I really am.  Sorry, mom.  I know you are really focused on planning the trip for August, and I am grateful to be included, but right now, I am trying to make it to sundown, then Sunday, and then hopefully to the end of March.  August is light years away for me.  I'm trying though.

Blah, blah, blah.  What first world problems, I have.  I am so busy, I don't have time to plan my vacation in August. So absurd I want to smack myself in the face in disgust when re-reading it, but there you are.  I will shut up soon about my first world problems.  I do know I am blessed.

But first, what brought me to fill the blank page again tonight was a movie I saw today.  A movie called The Way, starring Martin Sheen and directed by his son Emilio Estevez. It was excellent.  Just what I needed to see to remind me that I can find my path to serenity, if not today, then perhaps another day. I need to do it one step at a time and trust the process.  Briefly, the movie is about a life changing journey taken by a grieving man, who steps off his hectic life path and takes a long walk along the camino de santiago as a method to honor and grieve for his recently departed son.  Along the way he finds his peace and center.  I finished watching it and was filled with envy about the ability to step off the rat race path and go towards that calmer, focused path.  Envy isn't the right word, since it has a negative connotation, and I nothing I feel about this desire is negative.  What I feel is more about hope.

I have been itching to pare down my physical possessions to help tame the chaos and confusion in my life.  Feeling this need already, I was inspired by a post by the minister at the church across from us about shedding worldly possessions, following a passion, or embracing simplicity and giving yourself over to others.  I watched this movie as I was cleaning out my closets (again) and weeding out the extras and trying again to get down to basics, or at least closer to the basics than I am now.

While, with little ones in tow, I am not quite ready to step off the known path to the unknown quite so dramatically as Martin Sheen does, I am drawn closer to it with every year that ticks by.  I find myself often thinking of the backpacking journey I took after college with my friend Heather Jo, and later joined by my brother.  6 weeks with my pack.  Walking, boating to train riding through Europe, Egypt, Israel and Greece, shedding worldly possessions as I went.  Did I really need that extra sweater or pair of shoes?  No.  Leave it for someone who does.  It was wonderful.  I learned that everything that I REALLY needed, I could carry on my back.  Keeping things simple was so freeing.  I really want to experience that again.  I think everyone should experience it as well.

I hope that sometime soon, I can get the kids and family on an extended walking tour and get them to experience that divine simplicity. You.  Nature.  A simple meal of cheese, fruit and bread.  Clean air and open skies above you.  Divine.  For now, I move towards that goal of simplicity one day at a time, one step at a time.

For tonight.  Watch the movie.  It was wonderful.

Supplemental schooling details for Anna (and whoever else wants to know)

Why am I doing this?  I am pretty insistent that the kiddos learn certain things that I am sure are not going to be provided by the public schools adequately, or in the manner that I wish. The schools just don't have the time to fit it all in.  I really want them reading more interesting and challenging things, and compiling more data about all things in general. But particularly about grammar, writing skills, math basics (alternative methods of problem solving since I think the math curriculum is questionable at best), history and literature. Literally this week, we have just started actively working with supplemental schooling and plan on doing it from now on, indefinitely.  So keeping them where they are in school, but moving forward with significant additional help at home.

I found my outline in a book I read called The Well Trained Mind.  Has some great stuff, and some stuff I won't use, but that is ok too. http://www.welltrainedmind.com/classical-education.  The website has some good stuff to get you started, but if you really want to dig in, buy the book.  You can also use a pre-set up curriculum that is similar, if you'd like.  I found one called Classical Conversations, which is designed to be totally home schooled, but can be used as supplemental too.  Has a REAL Christian bias, but if you can deal with that, the information is easily laid out for you and easily bought, since it is a huge business.

But I decided to somewhat follow the Well Trained Mind process.  It goes like this...For the first year, we are studying things from the Ancient period.  The goal is to start at the beginning of early human history, and spend a couple years going through the whole timeline of history (more on that later). It gives the kids an overview of data and stuff that happened in order, so ideally it makes more sense.  Going through it in order helps place everything in perspective rather than studying chunks of historical data out of context.  Example - Margaret studied ancient Greece this year, and also jumped into America, our government and the Constitution.  Kind of jarring difference when the two could have had some real relationships pointed out.

So - 1st through 4th 'grades' are the first run through of the timeline. Gathering data and information.  This is called the 'grammar stage'.

• First grade - Ancients - BC 5000 to 400 AD
• Second Grade - Medieval/Early Renaissance 400-1600 AD
• Third Grade - Late Renaissance/Early Modern 1600-1850AD
• Fourth Grade - Modern Times - 1850- Present

To quote the web site - "spend one year on each division. If you begin to do this in first grade, the student will study all of history three times: in elementary school; in greater depth in middle school; and, finally, by using original sources in the high school years."  www.welltrainedmind.com/history-at-the-center.

Then, you do it again, but with a different focus.  Middle school is the argument or logic stage.  Theory is that kids are naturally questioning and arguing (on a different level of complexity) at this age and going with that natural tendency allows them to review the data on a different level.  More in depth, and questioning how and why things happened how they did and when they did.

Final stage, high school levels, is the rhetoric stage.  Review the same data again, more in depth, focusing on areas of interest for the teen, and accessing primary sources.  The Iliad isn't so daunting when you have already touched on it twice before.  Learning how to assimilate data into your own ideas and share that data with others.  Public speaking with clarity and conviction, and the real craft of writing clearly are the focus.

How we are doing it:  I have both kids working on the first grade process just to make it easier on me, but Margaret does hers more in depth.  What we do is read a bit about the subject we are working on (right now we are focused on Ancient Greece).  Either poetry, fables, myths (kids are OBSESSED with Greek gods right now), bible stories (if so inclined, but interesting to compare to Greek's explanations of how things were made/controlled), biographies (we just checked out Socrates and Alexander the Great), historical events, philosophies, basic culture and religions, science which is ideally based on what they were thinking about at that time in history (so the ancients were looking at plants, the human body and animals), art, music, etc.  All focused on that period and that culture.

After we read about whatever topic was chosen that day (myth, biography, history story, whatever), I have the kids copy a sentence (or three for Margaret) out of the text.  Practicing physically writing neatly and well, plus exposing them to more complex language and grammar instead of 'See spot run'.  Now for those who aren't writing yet, have them practice letters or color a 'journal' about what you read.  Twice a week, we do narration.  Narration is after the reading, I have the child narrate back to me what the story was about, and write that down.  I do the writing for Donovan since he can't do it well yet and I don't want to pressure.  Prepares the kids for active listening, learning to think about the important parts of the story, communicating thoughts, and eventually prepares them for books reports.

Twice a week we do some math skills drill (just did a multiplication flash card game yesterday with Margaret.  Going to practice with money later this week).  Haven't gotten to science yet, but have checked out a couple books on juvenile science experiments to try.

We are starting with Ancient Greece since that is something really interesting to the kids, then will move to Ancient Rome, Africa, Arabia, China, India, Aztecs and Mayas, and thinking about looking at the Northern Europeans like the Nordic Explorers and the Polynesians too.  Basically, hit all the important cultures during that time period.

The great thing is, that since I am not totally homeschooling, we can do whatever we want, or whatever is needed most at the time and take as long or as little time as we want.  Kids are eating it up, since it is a lot of me reading to them, with just a bit of writing or discussion afterwards.  They are REALLY looking forward to the science experiments. After the 'assigned reading' the kids are free to do their own reading.  Margaret just got a book on puppies (always puppies) and Donovan wanted a book on Superman and Space, so we are adding Astronomy to our science too. 

So there you have it.  That is what we are doing for now and why.  Hopefully it will last.  For now, it is fun.  Margaret and Donovan told me today that they can't wait for summer so we can do more of 'mommy's school'.  I must say, I am having fun too!

And in the category of you can't take yourself too seriously

Earlier today I challenged a friend to mock those wearing lobster embroidered shorts.  All the while wearing shorts with Anchors stitched on them. I am nothing, if not, a goofball fully willing to mock herself.

Guess I can't even excise my own demons on my own blog without pissing people off

Part of putting things out there on the web is a bit like climbing up a ladder.  The higher you go, the more your butt shows.  I posted something earlier today that was a curiosity to me, something that has perplexed me and many of my friends for several years.  Something that bugged me so much I finally had to comment on it and clear my mind.

In my post I referred to a person, not by name, but by description.  Someone else later told me that they thought my obsessive ramblings were mean-spirited, when they were definitely not intended to be at all.

Though this person posted their comment anonymously, which I don't respect, I respect the fact they they felt that way.  I don't like nasty rhetoric so often found in our world today and want to do nothing to add to it, so I have chosen to remove my post.

I don't want bring more nastiness into the world.  Merely typing the post has excised my demons, so its purpose has been served for my mental health.  No need for anyone else to be outraged or offended by something that I wrote.  That is never my intention.

So I censor myself, again, but I am ok with that.  Moving on.

As the Magic Eightball says...Outlook, not so good

Ever have one of those days?  Or one of those weeks? 

My beloved boss finally departed the firm after 14 years working here, after putting up with some less than professional behavior over the past several years.  Her departure is an incredible loss of historical knowledge, that no else in management seems to acknowledge.   Whatever, the die is cast and we move on.

My first day without her was this Monday.  This entire week has been filled with crazy freak occurrence major mishaps, minor hassles and not to mention drowning in administrative screw ups and various minutia.  Not a good or productive week job wise.

Today I find that 'they' have rearranged our data storage in an effort to solve some lingering performance issues on the network, and in the process entirely removed our whole working projects file area, including all of the major, critical historical knowledge given to me by the last three departing members of my ever dwindling team.  My job has just gotten significantly harder.  Imagine suddenly having Google and Wikipedia removed from your world of research options.

Hopefully they will be able to restore the data, but the fact that it was removed at all, without any notification to our vastly diminished team, doesn't bode well.  Is this intentional?  A hint to follow in the footsteps of my boss? Are they incomptentent?  Or do they just don't give a shit?  Asking my magic eight ball and it replies 'Reply hazy, try again'.

So as for my future job stability, asking my Magic Eight ball - 'how is my future looking at my current job?' The reply may very well be 'Outlook not so good'.

Perhaps it is time to jump back in the pool for a while and hug on some little babies instead. But I will save that for tomorrow.  Today, just digging in sand, again.

I made a list

As you can tell from my last post, I hate contentiousness.  I don't like to fight and argue and I literally get sick to my stomach when people around me engage in that type of behavior.

I also hate censorship.  I hate having to monitor what I say or do in public, for fear of offending someone, or even worse, having some ill informed person respond in a callous or casually indifferent manner, thereby offending those about which I care deeply.

I have strong feelings about certain subjects and sometimes feel the need to share those thoughts with others and relish hearing what my thoughtful intelligent friends have to say on the subject.  But I hate nasty negative thoughts and argumentative behavior and just don't want to see it on my feed or shoved rudely into my face, without regard for the feelings of others.  I only see the energy getting worse, as we come closer to the election cycle.

So I am having a dilemma.  Censorship vs. Free Speech.  And I have now compromised.

Since I hate arguing, yet I hate censoring myself, I made a list on Facebook.  I use this list to moderate the discussion.  With it I can and remove potentially offensive statements from the view of people who may be fired up or even outraged by my views, as I don't intend to offend people that I truly I care about.  I also use it to cull out extreme and reactionary viewpoints that are only brought forward to offend, or mock, belittle and diminish the views of others.  People who know me know what I think. I am outspoken and fully willing to share what I believe, but I don't feel the need to rub it into the face of folks who feel, passionately, different than I do, and I don't want to argue unnecessarily. 

So I made a list.

I call my list The Naughty List.  Don't know exactly why, but it seemed to fit.  The people on this list aren't naughty necessarily, but these are my friends who can have a civil discussion and share intelligent viewpoints, respecting the views of others, without bringing hate or derision to the party. Some agree with me and some don't, but everyone plays nicely in the sandbox.

So there you have it.  I have finally censored myself, but somehow it feels ok to me.

Have a great Tuesday y'all.

Discussions, debates and arguments

As a child, I came from a family of arguers and debaters.  One side of my family is quite bull headed and loves to argue about things.  All emotion and passion, and unfortunately, often little logic.  The other side of my family is quite bull headed and loves to debate the finer points of issues.  All logic and some passion, but often little emotion. 

The nightly dinner table, for me, was more than just a feeding trough.  It was practicing manners and civility, learning the art of conversation, and accumulating an appreciation of the thoughts and ideas of others through discussion and debate.  Often times, we would linger well past the last bite of food and we'd begin a discussion that would lead to a controversial issue.  My father, with a glint in his eye, would begin to debate the issue with me and my brother and we would rise to the cause.  It was a game to us. Can you prove your point, validate your theory, all through logic?  Can you remove emotion, address their concerns and points, then discount your opponent's ideas, all through logic?

To my mother, it seemed like arguing, but it wasn't.  He was teaching us the art of verbal thrust and parry, but also, teaching us to see all sides of the issue and respect the validity of the ideas of all, regardless of if we agreed with them.  Most of all, he was teaching us to think.  As we became better debaters, we would switch sides of the 'argument' regardless of our beliefs, often debating and supporting a side or idea which was not in line with our personal beliefs.  An academic exercise, to be sure, but another lesson in seeing the world as other's see it.

As I grew older and the illusion of my Beaver Cleaver family began to fall apart, there was more arguing and less debating.  Cases of scotch were consumed, confusing conversations and clouding the issues.  Personal topics were brought into the exercise, violating all rules of order and civil debate.  I watched slack jawed and powerless as debates turned to arguments, then arguments turned to fights.  I learned that fights are no fun.  Trust me, I lived through many of them.  So, as my domestic world crumbled around me, I stopped joining in the fray.

Years have passed and hours of therapy have been logged since then, and I have come to enjoy a good debate once again.  I (try to) choose to walk away from pointless conflict and argument, but have rediscovered the fun of debate. I have drawn firm boundaries with the arguers in my life and actively try not to engage in their game, or walk away (literally or figuratively) when they try to draw me back in to the ugly fray.  I seek out smart folks, who love a good discussion and occasionally engage with them, even when their beliefs are different than mine.  I have found once again, that a good discussion or debate can be quite enjoyable.  There are venues where ugliness reigns, but I avoid them at all costs. The level of partisanism and virtiol has gotten so bad, that I no longer watch television news. It just disgusts me, especially during a political season.  So I seek my news in written or radio format instead, sometimes going so far as to seek international news sources to avoid partisanism.  My choice to try and quiet some of the hate-speak and intentional agitation.

Unfortunately, especially with the elections once again rearing their ugly head, I find more arguers nudging back into my life and squashing out the debaters and conversationalists, particularly on Facebook.  Some are professional agitators (literally, it is their job) who just want to stir the pot and make people angry.  Others are ranters who are upset about the state of the world, and justifiably so. I respect their opinions and sometimes may agree in part.  But in my mind, endless ranting wastes energy that you should point towards a solution. Some just think it is fun to argue.  I don't.

People have every right to post what they please, clarify their position, support their causes and passions, and rant all they want, but sometimes, it gets to be too much for me and I don't want to see it on my thread.  Occasional friendly banter ~ OK, I am good with that. As I said, I love a spirited debate as long as there is respect on both sides, and acceptance of the validity of the ideas of others.  But I am choosing to walk away from threads that spiral on into tit for tat spitting.  Also - threads that are filled with anger, or an endless convoluted trail of chatter that is going nowhere and only irritating or enraging those involved.  Those will be removed from my view or my feed, and if I am the owner, possibly deleted entirely.  That is not debating to me, it is not even bantering, it is arguing and baiting, and that is no fun for me.  Too many painful memories, so I choose to walk away.  Nothing personal.  Continue your rants, if you wish, in your own venues, I just don't want to see it in places that I can control.

So if in the next year, you see me dropping off fiery threads, or removing things from my wall, or not answering posts that you think I'd be interested in discussing, it is nothing personal about you or your beliefs. I don't mean to censor.  Feel free to carry on your discussion elsewhere.  I just choose not to engage in quite so much negativity with no purpose.  It is merely an act designed to preserve my sense of happiness and mental wellness.  I remember the days when the debates turn to arguments, and those turned into fights, and I don't want to go there again.

Thanks all, and happy debating.