Patience

Patience is a virtue. That’s a phrase that’s thrown around with some regularity, mostly by people who are snarkily (it’s a word- look it up) pointing out to you that you yourself don’t have any. The phrase can be traced back to the 14^th Century English writing of Langland. It can also be linked to the Latin phrase “Maxima enim..patientia virtus” (Patience is the greatest virtue) or even the French “Patience est une grant vertu” (Patience is a great value.) I think it’s funnier though to search just for the etymology of the word “patient”…which comes from the root of both the Latin and the Greek words for “suffering.” Ha. That seems about right to me, especially in the context of my last week or so.

So my best friend Meriam-Webster (perhaps you met once in middle school) actually defines patience as “having the quality of being patient: bearing pains or trials calmly or without complaint; manifesting forbearance under provocation or strain; not hasty or impetuous; steadfast despite opposition, difficulty, or adversity.”

I, by the way, was blessed with none of these traits.

I wish I was patient. I try to be patient. I practice at being patient. But then I become impatient in my search for said patience, and well, it’s a bit of a vicious cycle at that point really. Maybe it’s that I’m a mover and a planner—a person of ACTION, always thinking six steps ahead of where I am now. Like that my life is an enormous game of chess…or an old school Choose Your Own Adventure book, where each choice takes you down another road, and then another, and then another, and you carefully plan out what each course looks like dependent on your decision and your move. But there ALWYAYS has to be a decision and a move. You can’t just sit there. Hanging back, calmly doing nothing seems mostly like, well, like that I’m doing nothing. I don’t understand people who can just sit back and watch. I have to DO DO DO!

Or maybe, like the classic line from “When Harry Met Sally” taught us, maybe when I finally know what I want to do with the rest of my life, I want the rest of my life to start as soon as possible (such a great movie…J teases me for liking it. I think the response he musters when I drop that line or any from the movie is merely an “ugh” coupled with an eye roll. ) I guess that, like the immortal words of Colin Hay suggest, I feel like I’m sitting around, waiting for my real life to begin. And I would *really* like my real life to begin as soon as possible. Thank you.

I don’t know for certain where I’m working this fall. I don’t know if I’m moving. I don’t know if my resume has been received or is being looked at or being thrown away even as we speak by the hundreds (yes hundreds) of employers I sent it to. I don’t know what city to look for a job in (since I don’t know where J’s next assignment will land him.) Because of said assignment ambiguity I don’t know if I’m looking for a new job for one year…or two years…or five years, as I don’t know if I will soon after getting said imaginary job have to relocate again. (How do other Army spouses do this? Anyone?)

I’m not totally without direction though, because let me say this: I have always had the utmost faith in things unfolding as they should. I have a path. I know that. I trust that. I follow my heart and my gut and those have never steered me wrong (though quite frankly very few of my life plans as I have imagined them have come to fruition in their initial iteration.) So I get it. The being-flexible-and-waiting-to- see-where- you-land business. But it’s the waiting. I’m really pretty tired of WAITING for them to unfold. Shouldn’t I be DOING something? I’m so ready to find a good job, in a good city. I’m ready to marry J. To settle down. To have a place of our own (hell, to live in the same city even.) To think about our own little brood of impatient children.

And five years from now, all that will probably be mine and this angst will seem silly.

But it still doesn’t answer the immediate question of “what’s next.”

J called me yesterday and I was sort of short with him on the phone. He could tell I was busy and stressed out and freaking out even in the three short minutes we had on the phone. Today when we talked I was better able to articulate my frustrations. He laughed at me.

“Um, dear. What makes you think that all this isn’t going to work out? Some of these jobs you’re really interested in you JUST put your resume in for…like less than a week ago. You realize that, right? That it’s been less than a week?”

Stunned. Stupefied. Silence. Damn it. J talking sense again.

“You’re going to be fine. WE’RE going to be fine. It’s just going to take a little time. And some patience on your part.”

I reminded him I had none of that. He laughed at me and suggested I find some. It made me laugh. He can always make me laugh.

After I hung up with him today, I went for a drive. I had a couple errands to run and was just happy to get out of the house and into the amazing weather. And then incredibly, there as I drove, reiterated in song form in a 1990’s flashback on my car stereo… was what J was trying to say to me all along. A sign so clear for me to pull-it-together-already that it might as well have been written on the marquee for a nudey bar on the Vegas strip, all decked out in flash and glitter and neon lights.

Guns and Roses. Patience.

I never (ever) thought I’d see the day that I admitted that I drew inspiration from a Guns and Roses song, but talk about timing. (God speaks to some through dreams, or burning bushes, or booming voices from the sky. I get Guns and Roses. That seems about right. )

For those of you who missed that day in Junior High music appreciation, I will paste the lyrics to this song below. It was a message I needed to hear today. While J tried to make me hear him this afternoon, this was the how his message finally got through. And so, in the immortal words of Axle Rose:

Shed a tear 'cause I'm missing you, I'm still alright to smile
Girl, I think about you every day now
Was a time when I wasn't sure, but you set my mind at ease
There is no doubt you're in my heart now
Said woman take it slow, it'll work itself out fine
All we need is just a little patience
Said sugar make it slow, and we'll come together fine
All we need is just a little patience
Patience...

Sit here on the stairs, 'cause I'd rather be alone
If I can't have you right now, I'll wait dear
Sometimes, I get so tense, but I can't speed up the time
But you know, love, there's one more thing to consider
Said woman take it slow, things will be just fine
You and I'll just use a little patience
Said sugar take the time, 'cause the lights are shining bright
You and I've got what it takes to make it
(We won't fake it, oh never break it, 'cause I can't take it)

A little patience, yeah, yeah,
Need a little patience, yeah
Just a little patience, yeah, yeah
Some more patience, yeah

It's all relative

38 weeks left
15 weeks down
12 weeks until mid-tour leave (new stat…and new workout/ weight goal to aim for)
15 total pounds lost
15(ish) months until the wedding

(And see friends, this is why we do the average weight over time. I finally stepped on the scale today, hands actually over my eyes, peeking out between ever-so- slightly spread fingers, only to realize that in the last month of eating every.single.thing in sight, and complete dietary meltdown, I really only gained back 7 pounds. I thought it was going to be oh-so-much more. I am encouraged by this because if complete and utter champagne/ wedding food/ birthday food/ vacation food/ no exercise/ umbrella drinks/ BBQ picnics and sweets all day long for entire a month only gains me back 7 pounds…then moderation for the rest of the year should totally do the trick. And I’m finally done traveling for awhile, so I can exercise and get back on the diet wagon and start anew. And look at that…I’m now back on track for 1 pound a week. All is right with the deployment diet: Operation Wedding Dress continues.)

One of the things that I talk about in my courses with my students is relativity. No, not the crazy Einstein kind where letters stand for numbers and I black out about thirty seconds into the conversation because math is hard. We talk about how things are basically all relative to the context in which you are situated: what means one thing to you in your life, may not mean the same thing to other people in theirs…or might mean something completely different to you if you were in an strange setting or an advanced age. (Wanna watch J and I basically get into a mental fist fight? Throw the topic of relative/ situational ethics out there on the table and watch the madness ensue. It’s a lot like two starving hyenas getting thrown a fresh gazelle carcass, each one of us suddenly becoming scrappy and ravenous, losing even the guise of propriety in trying to outfox or out muscle the other one from sole possession of the win. To be quite honest with you, I don’t even remember where I stand on the matter anymore…or where he does either actually. But man do we enjoy fighting about it. I know…we’re *those* kinds of geeks. It’s fine.)

I’ve been thinking a lot about the word “relative” recently, both in the context of the family/ relations definition and in the “it’s-all-contextual-and-interdependent-on-other-stuff” meaning as well.

I have spent the last ten days on the road visiting friends, the first installment of which on the Eastern Shore with former co-workers of mine. While I am not related by blood to any of the people I spent time with, I would say that all of them were my “family”…that we are, in fact, related to one another. They are people with whom I share a bond of some kind…who have become very close to me over the almost ten years of our acquaintance. As my dear Meriam Webster puts it, we are “connected either logically or causally or by shared characteristics.” The characteristics we shared in the beginning were merely a similar passion for education, and a shared office space. But in the time passed, our connection has seen us through firings and retiring and moves and growth; joys and triumphs and celebrations and happiness; cancer and illness and death and recovery. Several tears…and so many laughs. That’s what family is all about. “Related” or not. And that’s how these folks earned the title.

While visiting these friends at their beach house this week, I was introduced to a new set of friends from my former boss’s (aka “Virginia dad’s”) new job. And just like he did at the place where we met, he has established an affinity group of like-minded individuals at his new job as well, people I feel like I have known for years, just by virtue of stories shared. Plus, if Virginia dad likes someone, I’m pretty sure I’m going to like them, too. Because he’s good people. And he attracts the same.

There is one in particular that he has become very close to, someone he calls his “son.” After having spent only about thirty minutes with this new friend, I knew he was “one of us.” But he had to do the math for me. “So let me get this straight. If our lovely host here says I’m like his son, and he says YOU are like his daughter, that would make US brother and sister, yes?”

“I suppose it would.”

And then he punched my arm like we were siblings. For the rest of the weekend, he called me Sister. And somehow, that seemed exactly right, even though we had just met.

After my week at the beach (I’m totally tan, by the way…and very relaxed), I pushed off and went to visit the future in-laws… and brothers’-in-law…and aunts and uncles and counsins’-in-law and, well, J’s whole fam damily (as my sweet mother used to like to say…mostly to watch my dad cringe slightly as his eyes rolled at her subtle wink toward cursing. I loved watching my parents play this back and forth game.)

Though I know I’ve said it before, I think it bears repeating now: I am very fortunate to be marrying into a pretty great family. Since the first day I met them all, they have acted like I was already part of the clan. And let me tell you what, this weekend was the true test. I went to visit them for the annual family reunion BBQ in which my in-laws and about, oh, 200 or so of their closest friends (and mostly relatives) descend upon the block for the big outdoor family throw-down (in its 18^th year this year, remarkably!) This year was my third: Two years ago being only my second “date” with J, in which I was first introduced to the whole family (and I mean the WHOLE family). Talk about getting tossed in the deep end!

While I adore J’s immediate family- mom, dad, and brothers, I was a little nervous going into this BBQ without J at my side (needless to say, I missed him terribly.) This was the first time I was there not as some girl that J was seeing, but instead as the soon-to-be newest member of this family, there this weekend not just on my behalf, but representing the both of us—our little two-man side of the family. (This is something that Army spouses get used to, I’m assuming. I’m still a newbie. It’ll get easier…)

I was at the house less than 15 minutes before mom-to-be gave me lovely gifts and put me to work (just like a real daughter!) Dad-to-be asked the important dad-type questions: how was my father doing, and was my car running ok. Brothers 1 and 2 started in with the playful banter, the teasing like that we were actual siblings, in an evening that ended with us sitting on the front porch, drinking beers and laughing into the wee hours of the morning. It was, as always, an easy and perfect fit. But with J’s immediate fam, it’s always easy. The next day, I would face the masses!

On the day of the actual BBQ, there were times I sorta felt like the guest of honor. And p.s. this had very little to do with me, by the way…they all wanted to hear how J was doing—where he was, what he needed in care packages, and all that. They also admired my gorgeous ring and wanted to hear about wedding plans. (Additionally, they wanted to hear how J proposed to me…which was a story that I told several times…and everyone agrees that after that trainwreck of a day, it IS in fact amazing that J still wants to marry me. The engagement story is outstanding and will be for another time…but well worth the wait.)

Basically, this was the first time I had attended something on his side of the family by myself in which I was there on our behalf—on HIS behalf. I found it pretty incredible how many folks wanted to sit down and just chat, to take considerable time out of their days to just check in on me and him and us. That’s pretty special. Because I hardly know many of them- have barely been on the scene for two years. And honestly, we’re not even related. But you’d never know it. To them, I’m already family.

Mr. Webster’s second definition of “related” makes more sense here; “connected by kinship, common origin, or marriage.” So yes, eventually the latter. But already the former seems to fit. We are in fact connected by a kinship. And our common origin, our shared interest, is J. And I’m so thankful for that.

So now I’m home from ten days on the road spent with random people, in off-beat places, with fairly intense interactions. I suppose that’s not a bad way to spend a vacation, yes? And I guess that what I’ve found at the end of that time is that being related is, well, all relative. Because while technically not related to anyone I spent time with, our kinship, our bond, our shared interests and common characteristics dictate otherwise. It’s reassuring to know that family can be found anywhere there is a group of caring individuals with a shared purpose. And I think that’s pretty amazing.

Alignment

When I was little (like four-year-old little) I had a Dr. Seuss book that asked you all sorts of personal questions (favorite color, best friend, etc.) and you got to write the answers RIGHT THERE in the book (yay! A hardcover book I didn’t get in trouble for coloring all over! This may have been the beginning of my bibliophile tendencies, and for *sure* is the beginning of my love of dog-earring pages, writing in margins, and highlighting everything… and my consequent absolute unwillingness to learn to read things on a computer when a hard copy is available somewhere. As anyone who has ever helped me move can attest to, 1/3 of my earthly possessions is books. Big. Heavy. Hardcover. Books.)

But in that Seuss book, one of the questions it asked was what you wanted to be when you grew up. Do you remember what you wanted to be when you were four?

I do.

In big red crayon, in letters poorly scribbled (looking a lot like “REDRUM” in lipstick on the mirror from “The Shining” now that I think about it…wow, that’s creepy) I wrote “TEACHER.”

And I’ve never looked back.

I’ve never wanted to be anything other than a teacher. I’ve never trained to do anything other than teaching. I’ve never doubted the route of the teacher (though clearly there are much less stressful, much higher paying professions in the world.) I actually had someone once say to me, “but you’re so smart. You can do anything in the world! Why would you choose to be a teacher?” It was probably the most offensive thing that anyone had ever said to me. And crushing.

One of my friends says that he has a visual of me actually coming out with of the womb with a little handheld chalkboard in tote. That image is funny to me. But I love when he says it, because I think it’s probably about right. I’ve always believed that we were each put on this Earth for a particular reason. We’re here to *do* something…to contribute something...to serve a particular purpose. It clearly doesn’t necessarily have to be a career-related contribution, but for me, I think it is. I am a teacher, and I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to be a teacher. It’s who I am. It’s what I do. It’s what I’m about. I dig kids. And I want to help.

I tread lightly on the topic that comes next because I neither want my employer to find me ungrateful for the job I have, nor to paint a generalized picture of my colleagues. Because what I’m about to say doesn’t speak to everyone. But it sure does speak to some. And that “some” is not me. And it’s been a frustration of the last year of my life. And so here goes. If you’re reading this, and you say to yourself “hey, I’m not like that!” then this is probably not about you.

When I got a PhD people just assumed that meant I wanted to work at the college/ university level. No one believed that I was just a big geek who wanted to learn more. No one believed it was because one of my mentors in education, a man for whom I would have done just about anything, was the chair of the program and brought me there to work with him. No one believed that I just wanted a terminal degree to prove to myself and the world that I could do it. Obviously, having a PhD is about teaching college!

But let me tell you a dirty little secret friends. Teaching college is only a little bit about teaching (crushing shock to me…the rest of you are probably thinking “duh.”) It’s about how many papers you’ve published. It’s about how many conferences at which you’ve presented your research. It’s about BIG research. It’s about getting grants for the school. It’s about making contacts. It’s about working on committees. It’s about rankings.

And oh…yes. If you get a chance, teach some classes. Maybe do some academic advising if you get around to it. But if not, no big deal.

Now again, let me be clear, I have some friends and colleagues who are really good at finding that balance between research and teaching. But that’s because that’s who THEY are. What THEY value. It is not what the system necessarily values. The “system” isn’t set up to reward (or require) good teaching, nor does it encourage you to spend the bulk of your time doing the planning and prepping that good teaching requires. That’s all on you. As long as it doesn’t get in the way of what your job performance is rated on: the papers, and the committees, and the boards, and the money. And had I really known that that’s what I was signing up for, I would have gracefully bowed right on out, as, for me all that other business is about 48th on my priority list behind teaching, advising, teaching, advocating, teaching, helping, and have I mentioned *teaching*?

I spend my time in my classes telling my students that when they go out into the world, the best way for them to stay happy in their work is to find an institution/ school/ company that aligns with their own personal values. That way, each day when they get up, no matter how hard the actual job is that they have to do, they can at least feel confident and rest assured that they are doing something in which they truly believe.

Um. Do you hear that there in the background? It’s irony calling. And he’s laughing at me.

So, I may be the only professor in the world with a great job at a great institution of higher learning who is *actually* looking forward to finding a job back in an urban public high school somewhere. A place where good teaching is so desperately needed and wanted…where the 60-hour weeks are rewarded with personal satisfaction of doing good work, with making a difference in the life of a child, and with the ability to go to bed exhausted each night, but proud of the what you’re doing. (And no one asks you which editorial board you’re on.)

I’m too much of a nerd to give up research and writing all together. I’ll get back to it. I promise. Because I do like it. I really do. I’ve always had the utmost admiration for those amazing school principals and superintendents who are research-based in their thought process…who publish and continue to learn and grow and advocate. I want that to be me for sure. A teacher-researcher. But for now, I think it’s time I found an organization that aligned with what I hold to be the most important parts of who I am. I am a teacher first and a researcher second, not the other way around.

All Inclusive

39 weeks left
14 weeks done
(?) pounds gained (let’s be honest. It’s gotta be gained, not lost. I’m on vacation. No scale, but I’m laying on a beach sipping umbrella drinks. So. Yeah. See “Lame Excuse Post” for further details.)
15(ish) months until the wedding

In a post many weeks back I mentioned that J and I were not getting married in the towns in which either of us currently resides. I have only a very small number of friends and family members still living where I grew up. And I grew up in a cornfield in the middle of nowhere (NO-WHERE) making it difficult for travel to said cornfield (As illustration: Airports? The closest good one is about 2 ½ hours from where Dad lives. Further illustration: there are two stoplights in my county. ) Because most of J’s and my friends either live on the East Coast in the greater DC/ Baltimore/ Philly/ NYC area or are in the military and will need to fly in from God-knows-where, and because the aforementioned places actually have large airports and more than one hotel, and because 90% of J’s (enormous) family currently resides in this general area also, it just makes sense that this is where we get hitched.

The complication, of course, is coordinating an event in a city that I know very little about, and in which I don’t currently reside. So, there’s no running across town for a quick…(flower check/ cake testing/ limo rental/ deejay screening) meeting. ( I call it “Leap of Faith” wedding planning. Other people talk about getting married as “taking the plunge.” That’s what I call committing to a reception venue.)

Because of this situation, J and I are leaning very heavily on our family in the area and the reception venue we have chosen, which is TA-DA! an all-inclusive venue. I write them a check, and they supply the room, the open bar, the hotel, the decorations, the catering, all the china/ flatware, the bar/ waiter services and the cake. (whew!) I just have to find a florist and a deejay and the wedding reception is complete (except for the wedding industrial complex purchases like…monogrammed…um…everything? Which, let’s be honest, I’ll probably be pulling the ol’ skipper on that stuff. Unless you are all very interested in receiving small boxes of Jordan almonds with monogrammed stickers and ribbons in matching wedding colors…then…maybe I’ll…ha! Nope, can’t even say that with a straight face. No bubbles either.)

So, to say that the words “all inclusive” have been my saving grace for phase one (oh yes, there will be phases) of this planning period, is a gross understatement. I’m clearly counting on the fact that I will be working with local others that know what they are doing, have thought of things that I can’t even dream of, and will be providing me support as I go forward. (Aside…J and I are actually looking at all-inclusive honeymoons as well. I’m not sure if this means we’re really smart or really lazy. Or merely gluttons for all-you-can-eat food and drink. Probably a little from Column A, a little from Column B, and quite a bit from Column C. )

As I have mentioned, last weekend I was in the wedding of two of my best friends. Saying that it was a magical wedding to me is not hyperbole. All I could think of the whole weekend was “this wedding is so them.” Down to the very last detail, the wedding was them. The flowers. The music. The food. The cake. The vows. There was so much laughter. There were so many photographs of silliness. There was so much completely evident love. This was just the kind of party that they would throw. I couldn’t stop smiling the entire time. The perfect reflection of the relationship of two of my very favorite people.

But one of the best parts of this wedding were the friends who were there. C and D met in grad school (in that very same first grad school class in our very first year of grad school where J and I met as well.) I was (or would like to believe at least) instrumental in the two of them getting together (D was a big chicken in the beginning. In a very big sisterly way I told him to get off his backside and ask her out already.) And as the relationship had its ups and downs, I was usually the person on the other end of the phone for C, because I knew them both well, saw the love they had for one another, and could talk C down when she was ready to knock D upside the head.

C and D were the ones that J confessed his “like” of me to, far before I had put it together that he was interested. C was certainly my closet confidant at the time J and I got together, and his biggest advocate when I was trying to figure out if this was all really happening. (I believe her words went something like this: “Stop being an idiot and date him now.”) And C was definitely one of the first people to know I was getting engaged and to see my ring (weeks before me, for sure.) The four of us have done international travel together, and spent some of my favorite times from the last 5 years together. So yeah, we’re close. All four of us are close.

But coming to the wedding, and seeing the enormous wedding parties of both sides, I realized something more. That kind of closeness that J and I have with them, they have with all of their friends. I stood there in a room of close to 50 of their best friends from high school, college and grad school (by the way, who still has close friends from high school? Hell, who has 50 close friends ever? This is what I’m talking about.) and I realized that I knew everybody, *all* of them, well before that evening. I knew who they were. I knew how they knew the happy couple. I knew their life stories and what they were about and what they did and where they were from. And they knew the same about me. I was greeted with familiar hugs by even folks I had maybe only met one time before. D and C have always done such a remarkable job of introducing all their friends to each other, acting like we all had been the best of friends forever. And somehow, that kinda makes you feel like you have been.

With C and D, you never feel out of place. If you are their friend, you are a member of their family. And that means that you are also friends with their other family members. And it’s the best feeling. Like we’re all in it together (another illustration and interesting side note…D’s best friend from college and C’s best friend from college are now engaged to be married, having met through D and C at one of many of their “family” weekend get-togethers.) And seriously, if an outsider walked into the room, they’d think we had all, all 50 of us, been best friends for years. It’s the strangest and best thing ever.

One of D’s best friends from high school brought with him a new girlfriend to the wedding- a girl that none of the rest of the “family” had met before (she was awesome, by the way.) About halfway through the evening, she came up to me and said the following:

I was so nervous coming here this weekend and hearing all about all these amazing people that my boyfriend loves so much and holds in such high regard. But I have never met a more inclusive group of people in my life. Everyone is so nice and has gone out of their way to include me- to make me feel a part of the gang. Like I’ve always been a part of the group. As an outsider, it’s really nice.

I think my response was merely “welcome to the family.”

It was in those moments that the words “all inclusive wedding” took on a whole new and way more important meaning for me. It has become important to me that I plan an all-inclusive wedding. A wedding in which everyone feels a part of the “family.” Where all are co-mingling, enjoying themselves, and enjoying each other. A wedding that people can walk away from later and say, wow, I just had a good time with great people.

I know what many of you will say…the wedding day is about me and J, and if we spend time trying to include everyone else…pleasing everyone else…that we’ll make ourselves crazy. And I get that. And I agree. But what I can do as I start to approach wedding planning questions like “what is your wedding theme?” and “what do you want your wedding to feel like?” (yes, sadly, these are real questions that I’ve been asked. Gulp.) is to work hard at creating an atmosphere where people feel relaxed and happy, a friendly place where our guests feel they can be themselves. Like a family reunion. (Or possibly a fraternity party.) And I think that’s really the definition of an “all inclusive” wedding that I want to keep in the forefront of my mind as I go forward.