I think I'm doing fairly well, as it was my fourth time, except that I need to think of strategies to get the students concentrated. Maybe I need to help myself be focused on concentration before I tell other people to. I'm too into being liked by my students, and so I get distracted as well. Student number 1 was playing with a set of rubber bands and I have left my post and starting showing him how to form Batmobiles. In addition to that, these rubber bands were shaped as animals, and along with him, we deciphered which animal the rubber bands were shaped as. In the end, he gave me an elephant.
Anyways, it's not my teaching ways and distractions that I have been pondering in my pacing, but it was about the book we read. The Giving Tree. My student had a paper to do, and a questioned ask was along the lines of what the author's message is, and another one is, what have you learned from it? We both worked and came to the conclusion that love lasts forever. My heart drenched like the porcupine-like-monster being crushed in Donkey Kong Country 2's Castle Crush stage. Not because of how big his handwriting was (bigger than the space provided, so when he thought he finished writing all he wanted to say, the little space left had to be written extremely smaller) I knew very well that the love I know of doesn't last forever.
I think back to my cousin. He was dating three women at the time, one to be his future wife, and currently is. While riding with him, we somehow landed in a conversation of this cloth figurine, about as big as a Harry Potter book, very soft and fine crafted.
It was a figure of a character he liked from a show. I remember that he has had this for awhile, and years back he would talk about how his friend made this for him, and how they're trying to get celebrities to wear it to popularize this fine piece of craft for a good business. I don't know what these cloth figurines are called, but it sits in my cousin's car, even now, dangling on the rear view mirror. Its been 4 years since I know he was in contact with the creator of it, and it might have been even longer.
They were close. They slept together. But they weren't in a relationship. They were dating, and he was dating with a few others as well. Dating is just getting to know someone. As we kept talking we somehow landed in how he met his wife. He was seeing two other women, and one of the other woman happened to be the threader of his cloth figurine. He said that it was easy to drift apart from the women he was dating, except, this one. I remember him saying "the one who made (touches cloth figurine) this." "She had genuine feelings for me, so it was hard for her." Or, something along the lines of that. I held back my tears. I had just felt that feeling of hope, that the love I thought did last forever, but the reality hit, and it doesn't. I have just went to a similar rejection that I'll never forget, May 8, 2010.
That finely crafted doll swaying side to side hung up around his rear view mirror was created out of her love. He didn't have feelings for her. She was rejected. Maybe she did love him so much. He didn't reciprocate.
I don't know how long it has been since she was rejected, but hearing that right before his wedding (I was riding with him to his wedding rehearsal) led me tighter into my dark corner. He wasn't marrying her. He wasn't marrying the one who sew that doll for him, but another women he met later on who he felt a sense of seriousness towards.
I don't know what I'm getting at anymore, but just felt like adding this to my blog chronicle.
***
Another thought that crossed, was my first experience of thinking suicidal. It goes back to fourth grade, the grade my students are in. My mind slowly matures, so I'm pretty sure these students are way ahead of the mentality I had when I was in fourth grade. Back then, I would think that there were different levels in thinking and acting, and the best ones would think exactly alike, and the poor brain holders thinking the same as how the best thinkers thought of like before they became the best thinkers. But its not like that, it's all about experiences I assume.
It was in Ms. Cook's class. SSR has started, all the students were scrambling to the sink, walking around, but I knew very well that I had to pick up a book. I was the only one reading. My teacher was caught up in a frenzy. She was giving the class a lecture. I felt good, because I was the only one doing what I was supposed to do, though she did not point that out to the rest of my classmates. I was reading and reading, and she was lecturing and lecturing, and after about 5 minutes in the students started their SSR. I was done with my book. I raised my hand to get another book, and my teacher, in a serious tone, said no. I was supposed to get a book in the beginning of SSR. She was in a bad mood. And right after she said that, I teared up. I cried. I thought of suicide. I thought about what would they all think and say if I was dead? I started to cry myself, thinking of myself dead, and thinking what my parents and my teacher would think of if I was dead. Every time I was scolded, even for little things, I would cry. And just for not being able to stand up from my seat and walk up to the bookshelf to grab a book, I cried.
About five minutes into my tearing up phase, the teacher apologized. My memory is fuzzy after the apology. But I'll always have that memory as my first thought of suicide.
***
Okay, I really have to focus on my essay now. I have a couple of writing papers actually, and I plan on not sleeping tonight... hopefully I'll have the time to do them all. I want dark circles in my eyes, because I think they're cool to have. And I can flaunt to my neighbor that I haven't slept for 28 hours (she always says that she oversleeps and says that she has so much work to do that she can't come to class because she overslept, so I'll flaunt my 28 hours of strained eyes to her in class tomorrow)
PS I think I gained a pound, too much pizza today. NOH lost, wish they got 9 wins first and then lose so the standings would show that they have more wins than the Lakers. okay, back to pacing.
