Let them eat cake.

"It's not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can't tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself."

---Joyce Maynard

Cake is usually symbolic of a celebratory time.

It is almost always the foundation of a birthday party, an anniversary celebration, and the decadent addition of a dinner for the record books.

But for me, and for my boys, cake is symbolic of something entirely different. A time of struggle. Of pain. Of loss.

Maybe that’s why I always request cherry pie when my mom asks each year what kind of cake I’d like for my birthday.

And maybe that is precisely why each of my boys enjoy pie over cake.

Just the thought of that makes my heart hurt.

Many years ago - in what I now refer to as my "other life," - when the boys were very young and times were very tough, there were days, and sometimes many days, when there was no food left in the pantry. I learned to scrimp and save and improvise but it seemed like each month – without fail – there would be a series of days when we had next to nothing.

Except…cake mixes.

My grandmother was the queen of coupon clipping. And if you’ve ever clipped coupons you know that cake coupons are a dime a dozen. So each time she and my grandfather would make the drive from East Texas to my place, she would always bring me a sack full of cake and cornbread mixes.

What is almost (but not quite) humorous today, was not at all funny back then. There were many mornings when I’d open the pantry door, looking for something of sustenance for my two young sons, and only an endless row of cake mixes and cornbread batter mixes lined the shelves.

I did what any mother in that situation would do. I scrounged up the eggs and made the batter. I wish I could say that we have sweet memories of those times of eating plain yellow cake for breakfast and for lunch. But the truth is that those memories are more of the bittersweet quality.

Bitter because I am painfully aware that my kids share these memories with me.

But still sweet, because I can look back now and see just how blessed our lives have become since those days.

So it is with such mixed emotion that, all these years later, I've found myself saying about our children - our blended family, let them eat cake. I could never, ever voice this aloud because, quite frankly, I fear no one would understand. This all began to come to me a few days ago as I worked out.

Instead of the usual music in my ear, I used this time for prayer, feeling a special need to lay my heart bare before God. It was one of those moments that come to a mom when she has relinquished all physical control, and yet the mothering "urge" is stronger than ever. I concentrated on lunges, squats, and planks, but in my heart I was crying. “Oh, God. Please let our children experience the same relationship with you that we've found. Be real to them. Very real.”

There was but a moment of silence, both around me and inside me, before His still, small voice spoke to me. Stopped me in my tracks. “Remember what it took to bring you to this place with me?” His voice ushered me back to those stark years, to that one moment when I had no place to turn but to my knees. “Are you sure you’re ready for them to experience that?”

I grew so still inside my soul. I didn’t know how to answer that question. Still don't. I'm fairly certain that I don't WANT to answer that question. Never, ever, ever do I want my children to have to endure the heartache and the pain that I did at their ages, and just beyond. I want to pave the way for them, make life as easy to navigate as possible.

But I also want them to become great men of God.

Men that instinctively know that true strength is found in weakness and that their weaknesses are merely open invitations for God to come in and perform the mighty in their lives.

But the truth is that you can’t teach that to your children.

You can model it.

You can explain it.

You can pray for it.

But, in the end, it is up to them to seek this path for themselves.

And now, as our children are having (and raising) their own children, and the last few strands of my apron strings have been ripped from my waist, I find my heart both bleeding and rejoicing. 

I ache because that's what a Mom does - she feels for that child, long after they are grown and out of her home, and her prayer is that they will learn – much as she did – that God is indeed the sanctuary. 

But...also rejoicing because she trusts their journeys will be as rewarding and as fruitful as hers has been.

Let them eat cake.

My Journey

We all have our own journey, and each one is unique and equally compelling and relevant. Some share their stories - their journey - easily and freely. Others of us are a little hesitant, maybe too concerned with what others may or may not think after they know a little more about our inner struggles and victories.

Our journeys encompass so much: our relationships and our ability to nurture healthy ones, our jobs and careers and how to balance those with the relationships, our hopes, our dreams, and...our health.

This post is about the leg of the journey that is health.

Let's start off by saying that I was never an athlete. I never played a sport in school, I very seldom participated in sports-like activities outside of school. I did take up running several years ago and did that for a while. And I did do a summer boot camp a couple of years ago. But - by and large - I have never been what you could consider an athlete.

As a kid, though, I was active in playing outside and I maintained a healthy weight all through childhood and my teen years. I never remember really thinking twice about what I ate and I had a fairly good sense of who I was and was comfortable with that.

All that changed when I was a young mom. Those years were filled with days that were tough, that were hard, and that - in the end - were heartbreaking. In spite of all the hardships and the other things going on in my life at the time, I loved being a mother to my two boys. It was - and still is - the single most rewarding thing in life. I would have been a bigger mess had it not been for those two little souls who depended on me and needed me.

Somewhere in the big middle of trying to balance all that life was throwing my way, I forgot how to take care of me. I gained weight - lots of it - but even more destructive were the changes going on inside of me. 

Even though I wouldn't realize it or learn from it for many, many years, I became an emotional eater. That in itself is a post for another time, another day, but you can read between the lines. I didn't take care of my body and as a result began to suffer health issues, some of which still haunt me today.

One of my dearest and most well-loved friends would tell me, "Feed your body well and then just let your weight fall where it will." I would listen and think how in the world do you even begin to do that? Something that should be so easy and so natural - putting good things in your body and trusting it to do good work for you was just so far beyond my ability to comprehend in those dark days.

Fortunately, I was one of the lucky ones. Through the love and grace of a great God, the love of a good and caring man, and a slow, reluctant love for myself, I became healthy. Instead of turning to donut therapy, I learned to reach for things that would feed my soul and not things that would harm my body. I learned the difference between eating and feeding. 

I wish I could say that once the light bulb came on, the changes began immediately. The truth in my journey is that it took me years to heal my body from the inside out and just as long to heal my mind of destructive behaviors that served to only stunt my growth in all other areas of my life. 

My story is not unlike the stories of many of you. There is a silent community of us - in all stages of the healing process - that need the confirmation that not only can we live a life that is healthy and full, but we can do so without guilt, without self-doubt, and without worry about what others may or may not think.

I'm thankful for a whole host of things these days. For family. For friends. For health. For a support group of women who are working to make their lives and the ones of those they love full and happy. 

And I'm so proud to be a part of this. 

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We are...FABULOUS!

We all have days when we feel like fabulous teachers.  We walk into our organized classrooms, greet our students with a smile and then proceed to teach several hours of kick butt lessons in which all students are engaged and make progress as learners.

There are no major behavioral issues.  There are no complaints about not having a pencil.  There are no interruptions over the intercom.  The dreaded copier stands free, without a line, and works flawlessly.  Not a paper jam for miles.

It is a good day.  You lean back in your chair in your classroom at the end of the day, smiling to yourself and wishing you had your own theme music because the day was Just. That. Good.

If you enjoy nerding out as much as I do, there are wonderful research based best practices out there for us to hang our hat on and I believe that teachers can, should, and do keep up with those.   It is critical that we share our fabulous.

However, there are also all sorts of studies and papers and articles pontificating about what it means to be a good teacher; who is effective, who is not effective and why the so-called demise of the public education system is all our fault.  It is a lot of fire and brimstone and most of it is largely not helpful.

Listen, we know how to be fabulous.  We need to harness that fabulousness for those days that don't go as planned. You know the ones I'm talking about. They generally come one day after the PURELY FABULOUS day. It's some kind of Murphy's Law of Teaching: for each really great day that lifts you as high as your little teacher heart can stand, there is an equally NOT great day that plummets you right back to reality.

Some days are filled with way too many interruptions, a copier that won't spit out a decent copy no matter how much you cajole or curse it, and there are those days that leave you wondering how - or if  - you will ever reach that one struggling student.

Those days exist too.  And while I try my best to not allow myself believe those are defining moments, they often do bring me down and make my fabulous feel further away, like it's locked up in a box in a room full of mandates, state expectations, and endless streams of data that is just. so. hard. to. keep. up. with.

Teaching is a roller coaster for sure. It's easy to see why it's as much a calling as anything else. It used to be that teaching was considered a noble profession, one where the teacher was to be respected, revered, and  - considered a professional. 

What I want to say to all my dear teacher friends is this: teaching still is the most noble thing a person can do in life. Whether we touch one life, or many, in our career, imparting tools and strategies that feed growing minds will never, EVER be anything less than the most fabulous thing one can do with their life. It doesn't matter what is happening in The Powers That Be (no matter how miserable they can make our job seem) that dole out their definition of what makes a good teacher and how that teacher should be compensated (or NOT.)

At the end of each day, the main ingredient is still the main ingredient. Our students still need us. Our students still depend on us. Our students still love us. And the best thing of all? We still love them.

I think it's time we define what makes us fabulous for ourselves. Don't let anyone else do it for us. Just do it. Think about how fabulous you can make another teacher feel and the importance of contributing to the conversation about what makes teachers...there really isn't another word for it...fabulous!

Confidence: the good kind.

I’ve been thinking some lately about self confidence. Where does mine come from? What about everyone else’s? How can I better teach and foster it in my students? How can I encourage it in my friends, or my coworkers? Is it a skill that can be taught and practiced, or is it some inherent gift?

I believe confidence, forged from self-love, is a skill. I think self-compassion and self-kindness are skills that can be honed. Since there is an insane epidemic in our society of body-hating, I think loving yourself (the way you are right now, not 15 pounds from now or a college degree from now, or a healthy relationship from now) is one of the first steps on the journey to a successful (and fulfilling) life.

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. 31 The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.”

It's not just happenstance that the Bible admonishes, in more than one place, that our first commandment in living for God is to love Him; following on the heels of that verse is the second, the one that many times is misinterpreted. "Love your neighbor as yourself." 

We intrinsically know we are to treat others kindly and with compassion for their circumstances, understanding for their shortcomings, and forgiveness for their mistakes. Yet most of us fail to grant these same concessions to ourselves. Instead, we are our own worst critic, constantly second-guessing, seeing the glass as half-empty, and finding it difficult to embrace our flaws as willingly as we embrace our strengths.

It’s hard to love all of myself, all of the time. But when I’m spending time alone with my reflection, I’m consciously seeing myself through the eyes of someone who loves and accepts me fully and completely… my imaginary “biggest fan,” if you will. But it’s not just physical. To me, external beauty is such a reflection of internal beauty. So while I’m loving my body and my face, I’m also loving my heart and my spirit and my whole history as a person.

I don’t compare myself to anyone. That would rob the experience of joy. I even try not to compare myself to myself, although there are certainly some thoughts, some memories. I remember how my body looked and felt in high school, how it felt after losing 50 pounds all those years ago... But it’s always done through this filter, this point of view of an imaginary fan who loves me the most right now, as I am in this moment. I don’t say mean things or think about stuff I want to change. I just admire. I just love. And for that time, through the imaginary eyes of my biggest fan, I am my biggest fan. I am the one who loves me the most. And you guys… I think people need this.

Because the thing is, you walk around making up what people think of you anyway. You can never really know. I mean, you hope your parents are proud of you, and you suspect that mean girl might just be jealous of you. But you can never KNOW. Your interpretation of what people think of you is essentially made up. And for some reason most people, most of the time, make up mean and negative things. They see themselves from the POV of an imaginary enemy. They imagine how they must come across to someone who doesn’t like them, who doubts them, who think they’re ugly, fat, dumb, or just not good enough. They spend their entire day hanging out with this judgey imaginary person who makes them feel insecure, and their entire life suffers for it. When you constantly see yourself from the POV of someone who judges you unkindly, the world feels like a harsh and dangerous place, so you shut down, take less risks, and find ways to live smaller.

The complete opposite, in fact, is true. We all deserve to be seen, loved, and admired for exactly who we are. 

I just need to load the wagon.

I jumped off the merry-go-round a few days ago.

Just...jumped.

For weeks the hurry and scurry of schedules, deadlines, state testing, and everything else that was somehow sandwiched in between had me spinning...

Faster and faster I spun, with no concrete destination, no end in sight (well, okay, I knew there was an end to most of it but I certainly couldn't see it), and with growing panic squeezing my insides with each subsequent turn.

By late last week my proverbial vision was blurred and all sense of what was up, down, right or left, right or wrong, had successfully evaded me. My internal scheduler went on the blink, my ability to reason and rationalize went on the fritz, and - can I just be real here? - I became one irritable human being.

Sometimes I struggle with just how open to be on this blog. Making myself vulnerable is never comfortable and yet, as a writer, I feel the need (even on this blog that is read by "tens of people") to share truths as I learn them. And the truth I re-learned these past few days is that there is only one place to go when I finally realize that the load is just too much for one lone girl to carry.

Maybe one day I'll learn to leave everything at the Cross before it becomes overwhelming. Wouldn't that be a novel approach?

After several days of feeling faint twinges of annoyance at even the most simple of conversations, the most minute of inconveniences, I began to feel the effects of spinning way too fast for way too long. In the middle of it all, I had an enlightening - although brief - moment of clarity. The common denominator in each situation was <gulp> ME.

That, folks, is tough to admit. But you know what I mean, right? Sometimes we realize we just need to take ourselves out of the equation for a while.

So that's what I did.

I jumped off the merry-go-round.

No emails. No Face booking. No blog reading or blog writing. No phone calls. No texts. I. Jumped. Off.

For two days I stayed as quiet as possible, staying inside of my home and attending to only those things of "hearth and home." As the hours passed and I gradually let go of all the issues, circumstances, and events that I was trying (unsuccessfully, I might add) to micro-manage, I slowly felt my soul begin to refuel. Where I'd felt parched and dry before, new rivers of joy and inspiration began to - little by little - forge their way through until I felt like myself again.

I was behind a fancy Dodge truck a while back. Stenciled in beautiful scripted font, on the tail end of this truck, were these words: "Don't worry about the mules. Just load the wagon."

Now I'm fairly new to this cow girl business and I'm not entirely sure of the meaning. But I do know what I took away from the sentiment. I don't need to know the answers, the reasons why or why not, the endings, the WHATEVER, for every little thing I have going on in my life.

I need to merely load the wagon.

Load it by making sure I'm prayed up. Load it by fulfilling my responsibilities first and my calling next. Loading it by loving the people God has so strategically placed in my life with all that is within me. In the room that's left I can then layer in the extras. When it's full, I need to just accept that it's full. There will be time enough at a later date to load more.

And then I need to relax in the knowledge that I'm not the driver of this load. But, instead, my life is totally in the hands of the only One who knows my past, directs my present, and is already preparing me for my future.

So even though I'm back on the merry-go-round today, I feel that tingle of excitement again as the spinning commences. The thrill is back, the sheer exhilaration of freedom making me want to throw my head back, close my eyes, and enjoy the ride.

Classroom Heroes

This is the time of year when things get crazy in the school building. State testing, lots of kids out of class due to extracurricular activities, and lots of stress (in both students and their teachers) that sometimes leads to poor decisions. Our English department finished our testing yesterday and I have to admit that I feel as though a heavy weight has been lifted. We’ve (and by we, I mainly mean my kids) have worked diligently all year. They have risen to the occasion of every gauntlet I’ve thrown their way, and I could not be more proud.

The really cool thing about this time of year is that I can now teach what my friend, Tammy Kuhlengel, calls our “love units.” The things we are passionate about but have to place on the back burner until after testing because they don’t necessarily move our TEKS and curriculum forward. For me, it’s always a unit of some sort on To Kill a Mockingbird. I love the book, the movie, and all the nooks and crannies there are to discover within the cover of Harper Lee’s coming-of-age novel. I never tire of it; I’m such a fan that I even named one of our goats Harper Lee!

Last night, I was looking for a few documents I need to complete my grad school application. I came across one of my portfolios from one of my favorite undergrad education courses. It involved a complete development of a unit of instruction, including a novel study, media connections, articles, and concluded with a “Big Event.”

A “big event,” according to our professor, Dr. Susan Stewart, is the time in the unit when students take what they’ve learned and they collaborate on a project that assesses what they’re taking away with them. She taught us to “practice what we preach,” “make it meaningful,” and fully “immerse kids in the classroom.” We learned in that class to frame the text, in order to focus the students on what was to come. Next, we prepared them by giving them the first exposure to the text. Finally, you return with your students to the text and use collaboration for assessment.

The first page of our portfolio required us to give a personal background to the research we used for this assignment. I have to say that I sat on the floor last night and cried as I read over what I had written during that assignment. To be honest, I don’t think I’ve thought about it since I turned it in and yet, reading the words solidified that my goals and my ideals back then were evidently pretty transparent. It’s how I strive to conduct my classroom every day, even now, five years later.

Classroom Heroes: Cultivating Characterization AND Character

His name was Mr. Beeson. I’m sure he had a first name, but I’m equally as certain that not one of his Junior Honor English students knew what it was. He wore a tweed sport coat and a tie most every day that school year of 1984-85, yet hardly ever wore a smile. All business….no bull, that was his motto, and he stuck to it harder and tighter than white on rice. I can’t say that I remember a lot of what we did or read in class that year; I do, however, remember being humiliated more than once for volunteering a thought and being shot down because it didn’t qualify as a “right” answer…in his opinion. Junior year English was not a favorite, and my friends and I didn’t have much reason to anticipate the next year.

Except…Carol Harrell walked into Senior English, full of light and and life and laughter, and – despite the Dr. Suess-esque name – she revolutionized how we thought about, approached, and embraced literature. She was a real person, who not only loved to talk about all things literature but seemed to truly care about our thoughts as well. Her classroom became the spot we all couldn’t wait to reach each day. It didn’t take long under this umbrella of safety for us to blossom and, as we learned to express ourselves, we also began to grow as individuals. In short…we began to feel like heroes. Senior year will always hold a special corner of my heart. Even though it would take me some twenty-five years to reach the place where I was “ready,” the seed for teaching was planted way back in Carol Harrell’s vibrant classroom in Garland, Texas.

Creating classroom heroes.

Isn’t that what it’s all about?

Here we go!

So...today marked the end of a wonderful (not EVEN kidding) week of professional development before the start of yet another school year. Our hallways fairly hummed with the promises of all this upcoming year can be. Morale is high and it's obvious from the tired yet happy smiles that my coworkers are feeling much the same as I am.

We are ready.

On Monday morning, schools all over our region will open their doors and students of all ages, of all walks of life, and of all talents and abilities will come inside the hallowed halls of learning.

Some will come eagerly, and early. Others will barely breeze into a chair before the final tardy bell. Still others will come quietly hopeful. Maybe last year wasn't quite their year, but they are thinking this one just might be. Maybe their situation changed over the summer and they are ready for the routine of school to provide a needed respite. Maybe they just miss their friends, their coaches, or US - their teachers.

No matter how they come to us, we have to be ready. 

Ready for each student and whatever circumstance may accompany them. School should be a place of comfort and of safety and I am so proud to work with those who feel as I do. Despite teen attitudes, eye rolls, and the occasional "blessing out," we find happiness in what we do.

Real happiness.

In the today's culture, where our validity seems to be centered on things we accumulate: money, possessions, relationships - I'm afraid that we're missing out on what the real meaning of happiness is.

"Things" bring temporary elevated levels of adrenalin (not necessarily happiness) that tend to plummet as soon as we adjust to our new acquisitions.

So that new car, new clothing, new house, new relationship, may very well bring pleasure and contentment and certain levels of pleasure...for a time. But when "the new wears off" we need something deeper, more permanently grounded within our souls, if we are to be the joyful creatures that God intends for us to be.

I learned a long time ago, from a close friend, to practice the law of attraction. We can draw people, circumstances, and even certain "things" by daily practicing optimism, outward signs of joy (smile, even when you don't feel it), and - most importantly - exercising that small mustard seed of faith.

Happy people attract happy circumstances. That doesn't mean that illness, hardship, and tragedy never cross their path, but it does mean that they are not shaped by the circumstances of their life. Instead they shape their life and bring meaning to those circumstances.

I'm thinking happy thoughts today. Practicing the law of attraction. Surrounding myself with like-minded people. Cherishing the relationships in my life that mean more than worldly wealth ever will. Clinging to a faith in God that has never failed me.

And looking forward to another nine months of learning and laughter with some of the finest of our next generation.

We are ready.

Here we go!