Taking the time

-or-  What I could learn from my middle schooler

So...living outside a military base and teaching in a district that the federal government has deemed "heavily impacted" can be a different way of life.  You value your friends a little bit more (especially when you don't really know how long they will be around), you say thank you for your service to the gate guards (most of whom have not heard these words yet, as they are all of 18), and you honor your country.  So, every day at 5 o'clock the National Anthem plays over the loudspeaker on base.  If you are on...you stop what you are doing/pull over.  We live off base, but within earshot of the loudspeaker.  So yesterday, my middle schooler was gathering eggs and I watched as she started toward the house...not really paying attention to the time.  She was running across the yard, and all of the sudden she came to a full stop, turned and faced the base, put her hand on her heart and stood motionless for the duration of the National Anthem.  When the song was over, she came back in the house and said, "National Anthem...you can't just continue what you are doing, like you don't hear it."  This made my heart happy to know that I am raising a respectful child who values her country, but more importantly sees the value in taking the time to show respect.

We were on a break

Hello friends!  So...my small break from blogging turned into a large break.  Let me catch you all up to speed.  Currently...I'm still a process coordinator (though I am doing some behavior stuff on the side).  The monkeys are now in Middle School and High School (Freshman year is no joke).  I still have chickens (though there has been a fair amount of tragedy in that department...thanks a lot opossums).  My DH retired from law enforcement and is now working as a "behavior detection officer" (much the same...better pay and hours).  I can't really think of anything else off the top of my head.   I am going to attempt to write somewhat regularly, but I can't make any guarantees.  I will recommend, that if you love baseball, SEL and school in general...you can follow me on Twitter @Mayhew2nd.  

I almost forgot...

I even really had a blog in the first place...it has been that long.  But, over break I was reminded that I used to have a blog (in which I wrote in somewhat regularly) so I went back and reread a lot of my old posts.  There were many things that I forgot about happening.  I realized that I wrote about the monkeys more often than not, and having a blog is kind of like a written record of the day-to-day happenings of our lives.  I realized that I laugh at my own jokes (as my DH called me out for snickering while I was reading).  I also realized that I really miss writing.  In my new job (btw, I left the classroom and am now a special education process coordinator/licensed tester/IEP checker/Instructional Coach/grossly underpaid public servant), I do a lot of technical writing in the form of evaluation reports, but I never get to write just for the fun of it.  I feel like I need to get some of the pleasure of sharing a good story back.  So here's to a new year and new stories to tell. 

I'll start with one from yesterday.  The Middle Schooler is a bit of a brainiac (he would tell you he is a geek, not to be confused with a nerd).  Anyway, as we were driving to the next town over to collect the Clover from my mom's house after piano lessons, he said, "Guess what happened in Math today?"  I said, "Tell me." (because really, who knows what could happen in a 6th grade advanced math class on the first day back after break?).  So then he relayed this to me, getting progressively louder as he said it,  "Well Mr. R was going over the test we took right before break.  Then he told us the highest grade in the class was a 98%.  Then I looked down at my paper, and it was MINE HE WAS TALKING ABOUT!"  Was I happy?  Yes.  Was he happy?  Absolutely.  Was I surprised?  Not really.  Was he suprised?  Yes.  But, I'm not really sure why.  So I told him to keep it up.