Be the change you want to see.

for Inktober, a meme crossed my dash on FB

i wanna write short pieces for each of them

day 1 is Witch

I didn't plan to become a witch
but the pain was too much
and it had to go somewhere

you flayed me open
pushed inside and
burned my heart

I pulled myself back together
grasping at ragged frayed edges
of my dignity and personhood

and then I finally got home:
told you what I thought of you
and burned the last vestiges in the sink.

wiping all of your fingerprints off
may never be completely finished
because fuck this stupid world anyway

getting bad-touched again and again
till you can say no and mean it
and make it stick (goddamn those who push straight to hell)

goddamn me too; I try to do right/write/rite
without the language to call it what it is
and so I study the secret words.

Power. Words are Power.
Name it. Hold it still.
And someday? it will do as you will.

Tonight was a special festival performance for my Waldorf teacher program.

Several of the teachers performed: Glenda did 3 eurhythmy performances, Sybilla spoke several pieces, including an adaptation of a TS Eliot piece which I want a copy of, and Christof sang, I believe operatic pieces. All performances were infused with energy, that part's not the problem.

I realized after leaving the performance space, that, to put it in pagan terms, I don't feel Waldorf all the way down into my root chakra.

And I realized something else. While this training is giving me a firm grounding in certain intellectual, emotional, and spiritual balance, the approach is entirely to Apollonian for my freaky little self.

I miss the dirty jokes and innuendo, I miss goofy word play, I miss that kind of cuttin' loose that is fun as hell when you're with the right people, or even when you're by yourself. I miss the exalted feeling I get (got) from being out in storm winds at sunset, the feeling of nature being vibrantly, even violently alive (not calmly alive) all around me.

I miss the Dionysic stream.

I am still getting loads and loads of Good Stuff (tm) from this program, and what I might end up doing ultimately, is taking the new core of calm confidence this program has been helping me to build up, and take the rest of the fearless simplification and heart-warmed thinking philosophy of meticulous care and respect and preparation, and take it to teach in the public schools anyway, like I initially thought I would. Goddess knows I can handle the Dionysic style chaos the public school classrooms often wind up coping with... Especially to work with the kids who need remedial study which I can provide.

I think I can do a beautiful job to ground the classroom and kids and provide the Safe Space so many children need in order to heal, grow, develop, and soar. I might not choose to do it in pure Waldorf, but I love Fusion art and music and cuisine and... that's much more ME anyway.

...
Still thinking thinky thoughts...

<3

That thing I said yesterday? about not getting dressed till choir?

Umm, no. That won't work.
Jeff needed at BART by shortly after 9. I came home and started tea and to cook breakfast... it was a bit after 10 when a synapse fired and I thought, "it's Thursday today? waitaminnit" checked calendar - nothing. Found business card for Acalanes... yup, the appointment with their personnel office was for Thursday, 10 am. *facepalm* Fortunately I was STILL dressed and had eaten and had tea at this point. I phoned, apologized, asked if it would be all right for me to come over shortly, answer was yes. Covered the food, put deodorant and the breast-containment-device on, boogied out, found that my house is literally a 4 minute drive from their district office.

Got there, cooled my heels for a bit (okay, I did deserve it - next time I have GOT to write it on the calendar immediately once I get out to my car and not trust my memory or the little business card).

Discovered there was to be an interview with head of personnel. Okay, wished I'd dressed up a little, done something with my hair, but okay.

Here's the nice part. The head of Acalanes personnel was the one person during my first try at jobhunting after learning I'd be losing the job at my former school, to give me encouraging words. He probably doesn't realize how much of an effect his kind and reasonable words had on me, but I intend to write him a brief thank you explaining that. He's the one who said, at the right time, "Sometimes, the job is just not a good fit. (emphasis mine.) We have teachers who start out with us, leave after a year or two or don't receive tenure, change districts, and are perfectly happy in their new position and stay there till they retire. And the same thing in reverse - we hire teachers from other districts who weren't happy there but come to work for us, and it's just a better fit."

*happy sigh!* And on top of that, the interview was intellectually challenging, and despite the surprise, not a worrisome affair at all. I did well, expressed myself coherently and without fear, and I believe I made a good impression, despite my casual attire.

I think this is the payoff of all that Work I have been doing.
Calm. Clarity. Positive self-image.

I like where I'm at. =)

After the interview, Gail was going to fingerprint me but the machine was glitching (even ctrl-alt-del didn't fix everything, lol!) so I'm to phone her and come get prints done when it's convenient.

So I have just a little while before I have to be heading over to group, not the homework-o-rama kind of day I was expecting, but quite, quite rewarding anyway. Now to apply with Lafayette, Orinda, and Walnut creek districts, since they share fingerprinting results with Acalanes

Still to do: 3 chapters of reading in Steiner's Kingdom of Childhood lectures, one writing assignment: "write about an event in your life that didn't make sense to you at the time, but is beginning to now, with a new perspective," and a self-evaluation for the last class we took.

I got it. *grinning*

God, I feel good about all this. Ducks in a row, and all. I know this is a peak, that it won't always go as well as this, but I also know that there was a moment of release and healing a few weeks ago, and it wasn't temporary, it wasn't a stopgap measure or a bridge... something really really has changed.

Really, really, a paradigm shift, a change in me, toward solidity and centeredness and wholeness.

There is nothing wrong with me.
I just have had to learn to get RID of everything I've been carrying along, that was NOT me, still working on it, but I can't begin to put into words how this all feels, and the Potential for Greatness that I finally perceive.

In myself.

Whoa. How about THAT?

I heard an echo from childhood today, a memory with repercussions:

"No, not YOU!"
"It's not ABOUT you!"
"As if YOU know anything aBOUT it!"

And this is why I fell a little in love with Jeff; I said "Evanescence is a cool band, I recently heard an album of theirs..." and he downloaded everything he could find by them by the time we had our next date next week.

*jaw dropped*
You did this because _I_ said they were good?
he sort of smiled, with that one eyebrow raised and said,

"Your words have an impact, you know."






Everyday I struggle between feeling invisible versus trying to influence people's thinking.
I realized during tonight's concert that the echoes of childhood can go away now.
I will feed the wolf of kindness and consideration and of trying to do the right thing.
I will work to believe that people find my company and my time valuable and worthwhile.

And I will work toward treating myself as if I am "a keeper", worth the maintenance costs and upkeep.

A little bit every day.
A little bit every day.
A little bit more every day.

I will.

Choir went well. I both dread and look forward to being forced to sight-sing.

It's scary as hell. *grin* I'm glad I keep going.
Good for me to remember that there's stuff I wanna do that I have to work on learning how to do it.

and this lesson's visceral. the fear locks up in my belly, and the frustration makes me squint and work harder, and I angle my head so I can hear the other altos and try to tune in to what they're singing...

very physical. Is good stuff.

( A favorite poem of mine since age 11. )

I used to agree with what Ogden Nash said in this poem.
Used to feel certain that I was alone in my life, that I was a freak and destined for the solitary life, that I'd never have a boyfriend, never fall in love, never know connection or the cessation of loneliness.

( >*introspective navel-gazing ensues* )