A Spotted Pony Kind of Girl

I tell my students that I'm from "the olden days, and  I am! I know about rotary phones, life before Google, and remember having to teach people about the value of email! In this case, however, I'm talking about being from a time where your parents decided what you would be when you grew up. All four of us Huntleys knew a few things for absolute certain: we would turn 18, leave home, go to college, get degrees and support ourselves. We would have careers, marry and have children, and all in that order. None of this was ever in question. Our parents would not (and could not) help us. We'd pay our own way through.

I don't know what my siblings were told about their futures but mine was a bit ambiguous. All my life, I'd wanted to be a mother, a teacher and a helper of children. I had no other ambition. (I had a "calling" -- with an uppercase /c/ -- but that's a story for another time.) When we played with the neighbor kids, I was the teacher, running the school. 

However, my dad forbade it. "It was no career for a Huntley. I was too smart, it doesn't pay well enough it, there is no future in it." When I was a kid, if your dad said you couldn't do something, you didn't do it. So I set my sights on becoming a dietician, but my heart wasn't isn't it. All my friends at school knew what I was really doing there . . . I was working toward my Mrs. degree. I got it in my first  year and  the Mr. got me to Texas, land of my dreams.

On our trip down, we stopped to see my Uncle Myke who helped me with my vocational planning. He is the one who first called me a Spotted Pony. He said I'm like the Appaloosa*, rare, courageous and fierce but good at lots of different things and that I should NOT listen to my Dad and follow my heart and have my future wherever I wanted it. I was only 19 at the time, though, and not brave enough yet to go my own way. 

I spent several years in work far from teaching. Administrative assistant, full-charge bookkeeping, office management, that kind of thing. I loved those roles, actually. I'm really good at seeing what someone needs and quickly filling that void. One of my bosses called me "Radar," - we just had that synchronicity you sometimes have with some people.

Yet eventually, I couldn't avoid my calling. Unce Mykes words stayed with me. I worked "around" teaching: Children's Minister, Life Coach, Mentor,  Homeschool Mom and then the spotted pony finally shone through. I came to teaching at the perfect time in my life, when I had the patience to finally take on a job that takes YEARS to learn. Who knew?  I'll tell you now, I couldn't have stuck it out in my 20s. Maybe it takes a spotted pony to be a teacher. Maybe it's easier if you get caught in some fences and brambles along the way first, so you know you can get out and be okay.  

Whatever,the reason, I know I'm home. I have plenty of room and sunshine here. Happy New Year.

*The Apaloosa are a breed once found only on the Palouse, just miles from where I grew up, so very familiar to our area

Dreams do Come True

Hello!

Yes, it's been a while. (I sound like a 70s song!) In fact, I have "thought about us for a long, long, time," My summer took a few unexpected turns and landed me here, on November 5, thinking about how long it's been since I've taken time out for blogging.

This summer I started studying for my teacher's credentials and found it very compelling. I completed my coursework to the point where I could take my certification exams and then, 4 days before school started, I -- almost accidentally --got a teaching job!

I came home from my second exam feeling a little bummed; I just wasn't sure how I'd performed and my wise friend Colleen Waller told me that applying for jobs would restore my faith in me. I agreed to apply for two jobs. It was late in the hiring season and I did not think there were many true openings. I saw an FAC position was open at a Title 1 school near me (you know my heart) so I applied for it and something similar in Austin ISD.

Mere hours after I applied, I got an interview for the job at Xenia Voigt Elementary and only hours after the interview, was hired. The next two months have been a whirlwind. I was in no way prepared to set up a classroom, much less start teaching, 5 days after my interview and 6 days after I sat for my EC-6 Generalist exam. Now my world is filled with children aged 5 to 7 and -- yes -- lesson plans, supply lists, art projects and bulletin boards. Several of my students are featured in this RRISD showcase in the playground photos.

More importantly, however, my heart is filled. I am living, walking proof that it is never too late to respond to a calling on one's life and follow your dreams!  I love teaching. I've always known I would! And now that my first home-schooler is a junior in college and my last home-schooler is a senior in high school and my Littles are all in public school, it is the perfect time for me to venture out on this new path.

Here are the two awesome Paraprofessionals who are in this with me 100%. So grateful for these two women and their dedication to our students.



Here I am on the first day of school:


So there's the update. Back on the blogging train now so more to come!

The Assist

Thanksgiving.  Thanks giving.  This singular, secular, holiday contains a unique invitation to change our outlook and our destiny.  Because there is something magical in the act of giving thanks.


In high-school I had a basketball coach named Mr. Snodgrass.  Mr. Snodgrass had one hard and fast rule.  On the court if you made a basket, you immediately turned toward the girl who passed you the ball, pointed at her and yelled, "Good pass, Mary!"  [In basketball, the person passing the ball to the scorer has given her an "assist." ]  This acknowledgment  had to be immediate and loud enough to be heard and if we did not do it, we were benched.  There was a practical reason for this act; it allowed the person tracking the stats to accurately record the assist. But it had a didactic purpose as well:   it helped us realize that we were -- in fact -- a team and that it is important to thank the people that help us succeed.

I regularly makes lists of the things and people I am thankful for.  The simple, clean act of writing it on paper somehow increases my gratitude.  It brings before me the clear memory, the bright face, the soft touch, the warm words that at some point were just what I needed to hear, see or feel.  I have a good many people on my gratitude list this week and some life circumstances too.  In the rush of getting ready for the official holiday of Thanksgiving, I am blessed to take time with a cup of coffee and a clean sheet of paper and do some thanks giving.  Over the next few weeks of Advent I will be taking my it a step further as I write notes or phone people from my list to thank them for the "assist." 

Mr. Snodgrass, wherever you are, I hope you realize the lasting impact of that lesson you taught me 35+ years ago!  You planted in me the seeds of a thankful life and taught me to regularly stop to thank my teammates!  Thank YOU, Mr. Snodgrass.  Good pass!