The Best Laid Plans...
“She stood in the storm, and when the wind did not blow her way, she adjusted her sails.” – Elizabeth Edwards
Last Monday, I walked into school feeling pretty good. Thanksgiving had been relaxing, fun, and restorative. The morning was crisp and fresh. I’d gotten to work a few minutes earlier than usual. True, I no longer had any memory as to what my lesson plans for the day were, but I trusted my pre-Thanksgiving self had gotten everything ready for my post-Thanksgiving self.
Shortly after I’d settled into my classroom and started tackling my to-do list, two young women came in. I taught them last year, and this year, they come to my classroom every morning before school starts to make tea and small talk.
This morning, though, they didn’t want to make either.
One of their grandmothers had passed away the day before Thanksgiving. While I had planned to check a few things off my to-do list in the 30 minutes before school began (water my plants, answer some emails, put up Christmas lights…), the three of us spent the time quietly crying, exchanging hugs, and discussing loss and legacy.
There was a time in my career when my drive to be productive and just get things done would’ve made this moment stressful for me. I need this 30 minutes to get stuff done. When am I supposed to get that stuff done now…? These were my 30 minutes. Over the course of the last 17 years, though, my understanding of what my actual job is has dramatically changed. Yes, I have to make lesson plans and grade papers and enforce rules and conduct parent-teacher conferences and attend meetings and participate in professional development and sponsor clubs and and and…. While these tasks might be part of my job description, they are not my job. They are not the purpose of my work.
Nurturing and supporting students as human beings—that is my job. And it’s certainly more important than checking menial tasks off my to-do list, churning out another Google Slides presentation about punctuation, answering an email, or adding state standards to my lesson plans. My product is people. People that need to leave my classroom with inquisitiveness, empathy, and resilience. People that need to be able to go out into the world and make it at least a little bit better. If I don’t get things done, that’s okay. Those things will still be there for me to get done later. But that student needed me right now. Even though I wasn’t getting things done, I was working. I was working on the most important part of my job: a human being.
I didn’t come to school with
“comfort grieving student
provide listening ear for overwhelmed colleague
answer substitute’s questions
write referral for student who dropped f-bomb (three times…)
encourage student to look into Richmond Young Writers
honor student’s last-minute request to help with college essay”
on my to-do list. But I got all those things done, even if I didn’t check off most of my planned items. They’ll still be sitting there, on my to-do list, tomorrow. And that’s okay. I had a productive day, anyway.
What I’m Reading
What am I reading? For the time being—my own manuscript, An Expected End, but I plan (teehee) to start reading other writers’ works again soon. My to-read list is long, and some of the titles I hope to get to in the coming weeks include:
How to Read Nature: Awaken Your Senses to the Outdoors You’ve Never Noticed by Tristan Gooley
How to Read Water: Clues and Patterns from Puddles to the Sea by Tristan Gooley
Chesapeake Requiem: A Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island by Earl Swift
A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson.
I bought the first three at Peach Street Books in Cape Charles back in September 2021 when Matty, the Littles, and I went camping at the Cape Charles KOA in the Eastern Shore. They’ve been patiently waiting on my to-read list and bookshelf ever since. I thought I’d get to them much more quickly than I have.
Writer Spotlights
Is sharing my own good news shameless self-promotion…? Probably, but this is my newsletter, so: Last week I received word that three of my poems and one of my essays will appear in Writing Through the Apocalypse, Poetry and Prose from the Pandemic, an anthology edited by Marcia Meier, to be published by Weeping Willow Books. The essay features Nacho and Soda. The book should be out in March 2023, in time for AWP 2023.
Win an award? Have a new book coming out? Present at a conference? Publish an article? Want it shared in the “Writer Spotlights” section of an upcoming issue? I’d love to share your writerly news! Fill out this Google Form for a chance to be featured!
What I’m Working On
My Debut Novel: An Expected End
The original plan for An Expected End included a March 2023 launch. Given that my publisher and I are roundabout chapter 20, there are 60-some chapters, and it hasn’t yet gone to beta readers or the editor, I’m not confident the original plan is relevant anymore. Currently, my homework (as I call it) is to focus on fleshing out Chapter 8, including developing my protagonist’s relationship with his mother and finding fresh ways to weave in T.S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” the lines of which form a refrain that runs throughout the manuscript.
Outdoor Writing
Over Thanksgiving weekend, I completed my article about about Black Girls Hike RVA, submitting it along with the accompanying photographs to my editor at Cooperative Living Magazine. I can’t wait to see the proof. It’s always exciting to see what was once a simple black and white Google Doc all prettied up into a finished spread, complete with graphics. The resulting article will be my first of 2023.
Teacher Life
Nine more weekdays (and only eight more school-day wakeups) until winter break, and it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas in the hallways at school.
Last week, my colleagues and I started taking turns bringing in holiday treats for those of us on the second floor (English and foreign language folks). Everyone signed up for a day, so we’ve been enjoying a holiday treat literally every single school day since we returned from Thanksgiving break, and will continue to do so until the start of winter break. This has proven very dangerous, and has tested my self-control numerous times (most days, my self-control lost. Badly.).
In addition, my second-story colleagues have begun decorating their classroom doors for our annual holiday door decorating contest. It’s always so fun to see what the different teachers and their classes come up with. I’ve participated and enjoyed it every year, but might not have the time this year. Despite that, I’ve really loved watching everyone else’s progress on their doors. The creativity is so fun to watch unfold. I’m particularly excited about one of the teacher’s doors that looks like the view of Narnia from inside the wardrobe. So fun!
Workshops and Classes
Last Tuesday was the final meeting of NotMFA. Tonight, we’ll get together in person to celebrate our literary successes from the past year. There will be food and gifts and spirits, and I will no doubt be up past my bedtime.
Podcast
In my last newsletter, I mentioned that my friend Jamie would be interviewing me for my own podcast. We planned to create a podcast episode about my manuscript and my hiatus from podcasting, but I contracted the flu and we had to postpone. A date for our interview and the episode release is still TBD. Stay tuned!
Writing Contest Adjudicating
Recently, I was asked to serve as a juror for the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards and the Page Turner Awards. Judging for the former, which I have judged for several years, will begin mid-month. I am still waiting for details regarding the latter, and am excited to add it to the list of contest panels on which I have served.
Volunteer Work
The winter issue of the Bay Quarter Bulletin, a community newsletter I orchestrate for Bay Quarter Shores, will go out January 1. Currently, I’m collecting community input and Board member reports.
The Littles
For several weeks during the 2020-2021 school year, I taught from home in our office upstairs. I’d sit in a comfy desk chair, with Nacho in a dog bed to my left and Soda snuggled up in a down comforter to my right. The Littles and I loved this routine, and to this day, they remember our work-from-home life. In the photo below, Soda supervises from her work-from-home perch as I work on An Expected End in our work-from-home station over Thanksgiving break.
The Littles’ primary spot to snuggle up is the heated blanket on the back of our couch. Here, Nacho curls up on the back of the couch against my neck and back, watching Matty load the car for our drive to the Northern Neck for Thanksgiving.
Below, the Littles enjoy a stroll through a small park in Warsaw, Va., on the Northern Neck Sunday afternoon before heading home after a lovely and festive weekend with family.
Look What I Saw Outside
My family spent some time at Belle Isle State Park on the Rappahannock River the weekend following Thanksgiving. Below is the mesmerizing view as we finished our hike. (I love this photo.)
I love the texture of this piece of driftwood we saw on the shores of the Rappahannock River at Belle Isle State Park.
A view of Totuskey Creek, near where we celebrated Thanksgiving on a beautiful, crisp fall day.
Links to My Latest
Writing
My most recently published piece is still “Two Rivers, Three States and a Lot of Paddling: A whitewater rafting adventure in Harpers Ferry,” which appears in Cooperative Living Magazine.
Podcast
The latest episode of my podcast, If She Can Do It, So Can You!, features Kai Butler of Work of Art. Listen in to hear our discussion about her mission, and, of course, our dogs.
Literary Calendar
December
December 21, 2022 | 5:30 PM | Chicken Soup for the Soul Reading and Book Signing with Lauren Mosher at Richmond Animal League.
February
February 25, 2023 | 10:00 AM-4:00PM | “Teaching Literature for Liberation” | This in-person workshop will share new frameworks and lesson plans for teaching Vietnamese-American literature, particularly in secondary schools. Breakfast and lunch provided. Register online HERE.
Want your literary event to appear on the Literary Calendar in the next issue of my newsletter? I love to share book signings, writing conferences, literary festivals, workshops, classes, and readings. Just fill out this Google Form for a chance to be featured!
Hi Amanda!
I don’t have a newsletter… yet.
Maybe that’s something I could chat with you about sometime. 🙂
I think Book People ( near West End) still has copies as does Barnes & Noble @ Libbie Place. Bbgb on Cary has a few.
Thanks for your interest!
I love how you interact with your students and it was a good reminder to read about them being the PURPOSE of your work. I identified so much with the "to do" list. I wish I had subscribed to your newsletter earlier!