Adventures of Fast Turtle and Baby Bug

This used to be a personal blog, and by that I mean I started it to post pictures and funny stories about my kids. Then, as I got more into blogging and reading other blogs, I started to think about how I wanted a place to put more “serious” thoughts. So, I started integrated some “thoughts” posts here. They seemed somewhat out-of-place, tucked between kid updates, but no one seemed to mind. Then I went back to school, and really started stretching my brain again, and wanted even more to have a place to stretch it. I toyed with creating another blog, one where I could be “anonymous” and keep my academic life separate from my personal life. So I did that, and then never could bring myself to post anything. I always started, and then hesitated, feeling like I was splitting myself into smaller and smaller compartments.

And then, I heard a great mantra: Stop alternating and start integrating*. Although I first read that nearly a year ago it’s taken me till now (February 2009) for it to click. For me, maintaining separate blogs was just as much about alternating as it was about anonymity; for all that it purported to give me a space to explore ideas, how much can that exploration mean if you’re not fully in it? So, little by little, I starting thinking that the best place to launch into a new phase of being was here, amongst family and friends. It’s scarier, because you all (mostly) know me in person, so anything stupid that I say might come back to bite me at dinner. Or, eek, a job interview. But, for me, I just have to trust that (1) I won’t say anything THAT stupid, and (2) you all will forgive me anyway.

And, because this blog will be muchly about me and my spiritual/intellectual/emotional growth/journey awakening, here I am in brief highlights:

• Moved around many, many times growing up. Always the “new kid,” sometimes also “the other” as well.
• Graduated from a lovely high school filled with high-achieving, high-aspiring students. Privilege, privilege, privilege.
• Graduated from an even more lovely college filled with high-achieving, high-aspiring, inspiring students who are still some of my dearest friends. Intellectual challenge, and a little more privilege.
• Spent two years in rural France, teaching English, living in French, and enjoying the rain. Lots and lots of rain. Lots more time as “the other,” “the american.” No longer quite so privileged, as a foreigner and non-native speaker.
• Returned to the U.S. for graduate school for my masters in education, adult learning and ESL. First started thinking about how people learn, how we teach, what we teach, how “they” decide what we teach, how teachers influence their students in all sorts of non-academic ways. Many big questions I wanted to know more about.
• Worked in education research and taught ESL. Extremely valuable, professionally. Often crushing, personally.
• Married a wonderful man and had two kids who are growing up bicultural and, hopefully, bilingual. So many new roles, and, truly, a whole new level of happiness.
• Returned to graduate school for my doctorate in education policy and multicultural education. Like coming home…

Me, right now: Juggling work, school, kids, husband, house, family, friends, self…

Things that have remained constant:

• I love to read. Pretty much anything.
• I drink tea.
• I like rain.
• I don’t have a favorite color.
• I always want to know why people think what they think and do what they do.
• I have brown eyes and skin that is prone to burning. The rest is subject to change.

*Thanks to Brene Brown for these words of wisdom!