The rain has slowed down for the first time in a few days. In less than a few hours, I'll leave my hotel home for the last two weeks, go home to my apartment and pets, and kick off getting ready for YEAR 5 of teaching! *gulp*
Reflection: Quarantine
For the last two weeks, I've spent time reflecting on the last year and soaking in this relaxation time as long as I can. I've thought about year 4 of teaching, reading (Breath, Interior Chinatown, He Saw That It Was Good, Flash Boys, and The Midnight Library; unfinished: Jesus and John Wayne, IQ), watching Netflix (Car Masters: Rust to Riches & Cobra Kai), working on teacher homework, scrolling through *way too much* Instagram, improving my Adobe and ProCreate skills, Facetiming friends and family, and doing daily yoga with other quarantiners via Google Meet. Considering how crazy the rest of the world was in 2020-2021, Taiwan requiring quarantine doesn't seem like too steep of a price to pay for relative normalcy in the coming weeks and months (we're at less than 1,000 cases even though we were getting over 300 a day for a chunk of May! Go Taiwan!).
We all got these giant blue stickers on our arms after we passed through the airport on our way to the quarantine hotels!
The army of cleaning staff at the Taoyuan airport was amazing.
 |
| I practiced making more Ai designs! This is a line from my favorite song off of Maverick City's Juneteenth album. |
 |
| Everyone has been jokingly referring to the Day 10-12 Covid Antigen test as the pregnancy test because the lines are very important. |
My hotel room was mostly this twin-bed-mega bed!
A typical Facetime with Brianna :)
 |
| On our first day of yoga together, Jenny had us stand in different positions to form this MEGA YOGA PERSON. |
Reflection: The Summer
This summer has been a wonderful, difficult, emotional, and heartwarming time. It was full of family gatherings, BBQ, dog/cat cuddles, online school, storage units, wedding preparations for my cousin Audrey, garage sale prep/ a garage sale, peach ice cream on the back porch, Lego Masters ("Like, I feel like you don't understand Lego!"), family photo albums, chasing down home restorations, Covid restrictions, put-put golf, and shaved ice. Here are some of my favorite memories from this summer:
 |
| Ryman's first time at the beach! My sister and brother-in-law's dog grew TONS over the summer. Scroll to see how much! |
 |
| My parents surprised my brother and I with a pit stop in Monroeville, Alabama, of Harper Lee and TKAM fame (Also, isn't my mom the best?)! |
 |
| I got to see Aunt Wendy, Uncle John, Tonya, Waylon, and Uncle Larry! |
 |
| This was the final product from the garage sale! Scroll to see what it looked like before! |
 |
| This was probably a week from the sale itself. We did a TON of work in the few days right before! |
 |
:)My cousin just got married to another Connor, so now I have two Connors in the family!
|
 |
4th of July. My dad with a tree saw. My mom with the eagle eye on the dead branches. My grandmother advising the right cut. A grill running smoky. A good night.
 | That night, we went through old yearbooks and photo albums!
|
|
 |
| I got to go with my brother on his FIRST FLIGHT! I think that's fitting :) |
 |
| Connor and Ryman, our beloved nephew. |
 |
"Sounded out is Brittany"= confirmation that Disney World correctly transliterated my sister's name when we were kids :) Clearly this was found during the garage sale clean out.
|
 |
| My cousin Audrey had the most darling display at her bridal shower! |
 |
| Dad took me on a run through the *somewhat-closed-off-to-the-public* golf course where my grandparents used to live when my mom was growing up! When he and my mom were dating and he'd drive up to visit them, he would run on this golf course. Talk about paradise! |
 |
| Still outrunning me... |
 |
| I think my brother was attempting to make the *sheesh* face? Maybe? Anyway, he graduated. :) |
 |
| Reunited with Brianna after probably 3 years? |
 |
| Reunited with my oldest friend, Hailey, after 2 years AND WITH A NEW ADDITION! |
 |
| Dad, Connor, and I ran at Lake Atalanta. They both smoked me. |
 |
| This was my office for the last two weeks of school! The corner study of the Bentonville Public Library was always empty and *so quiet*. |
 |
| You know what was not quiet? My first Razorback game in probably 3 years. Wow. Not quiet at all. |
Reflection: Year 4
Year 4 of teaching was full of firsts: first time teaching Yearbook, using Adobe Suites, tutoring elementary students, winning a MtG game (still don't know how and still couldn't do it without Josiah telling me what to do), chaperoning a Robotics team trip (MAK was the rookie of the competition and still placed 2nd!), learning how to use the ProCreate design app, ending a podcast (technically began it end of year 3), having the Vida conference in Taipei instead of Taichung, PARASAILING (?‽‽!?!), being in a snowball fight in Taiwan on Christmas (!), having an old Arkansas friend moving to Taiwan, taking a leave of absence at the end of the year to go back to the US (my brother was graduating high school mid-may), and being on a drama team (for the Vida student conference)!
 |
| Here at The Inconclusive Podcast, we believe that the free exchange of ideas brings about human progress. Go forth and discuss! We had a good run :) |
 |
| Some student art on my whiteboard... |
 |
| The strangest things appear on my whiteboard at lunch... |
 |
| This almost made us start class late one day- the ranking of childhood TV shows got *very* heated among the Courage the Cowardly Dog fandom. |
 |
| Some of my students grabbed me during Prom and said, "Ms. Brown! Can you be our mom in our picture?" Also, again with the *sheesh* |
 |
| Michelle and Kate are wonderful colleagues and friends! |
 |
| Another doodle, this one featuring one of my approximately 800 student nicknames: Miss Breun (said with a Scottish accent) |
 |
| This is my breakfast dog! I hadn't seen him in a couple of months at this point and was just grateful that this very elderly dog got to see another day. |
 |
| Caitlyn, Connie, and I took a road trip to Kenting, Taitung, Hualien, and back |
 |
| The view out of our hotel in Taitung! |
 |
| My seniors pranked my room on Senior Prank Day by moving furniture and supplies around; they heeded my pleas and did a much more tame prank than years past! One year, my papers were scattered. EVERYWHERE. Another year, my room was completely swapped with the room next door. That one was pretty cool, actually... |
It was also a year of continuity. We did Cross Country (despite having both end-of-year meets cancelled), published the literary magazine at school, made the Sharkpost, and graduated another round of incredible seniors.
 |
| Probably my wittiest spirit week costume yet. |
 |
| An annual tradition: AnPing with Abigail! |
 |
| My cats are getting older and even more photogenic :) |
 |
| Our last CC race of the year! |
 |
| We took a lot of CC selfies... |
 |
| My first try on ProCreate! |
 |
| So fun seeing a fellow Nashvillian a bit far from southwest Arkansas! |
 |
| I... |
 |
| told... |
 |
| you... |
 |
| there... |
 |
| ...were lots of selfies. |
 |
| The Vida conference was clearly a blast as always! God planted seeds that we'll probably really see all of the fruit! This was right after a group picture with our campus when I suggested that James do the "Sharkle Sparkle" chant. |
 |
| Look at Kate's face. THE BEST |
 |
| This was the best Christmas snowball fight ever! |
 |
| For Christmas Eve dinner, I made *entirely too much* Quinoa and James had to document my embarrassment. |
 |
| ANOTHER. *throws glass* |
 |
| My robotics children! |
 |
| The fall edition of MAK's Literary Magazine, The Shark Review! |
 |
| Thanksgiving, maybe? |
 |
| Banquet shenanigans :) |
 |
| The Kaohsiung Marvel Race! We might have jumped a line for this photo... |
 |
| My friend Esther's wedding! Everyone from our first hiring year who went to PFO together came to see her get married :) |
 |
| UM, I FORGOT THAT RO AND I PARASAILED LAST OCTOBER. |
 |
| Another wonderful Hualien trip! Clearly, I like it there... |
Looking Forward: Year 5
Year 5 also holds some firsts: it will be the first time I'm not teaching English 1 as I am swapping it with English 4, the first time I will not teach To Kill a Mockingbird and will instead teach Beowulf, the first time Hamlet will replace Romeo & Juliet in my reading pile.
As I pack up in my hotel to unpack in my apartment, I remember a statistic that was touted during my masters program: almost half of teachers leave teaching within the first 5 years (according to pre-Covid data). My fellow teachers who started at the same time as I did have joked for years that "we just have to make it to year 5, and then we'll be fine!"
Year 4 had its ups and downs as I learned to navigate a different kind of stress load with Yearbook. I realized that I needed to make a change for next year in order to have a healthier life balance. I'm grateful for the changes that I'm able to make for the upcoming year!
Now that YEAR 5 is just around the corner, it's time for some vision-casting:
1. The Holy Spirit has been tugging on me to make space for Sabbath. I've realized I need to make more margin in life, both away from social media (we're not counting quarantine, ha) and away from work. My hope is to avoid all school work (including email and Google chat) on Sundays. If I can do this consistently, I can model this for my students and help them make some space in between the pressures of their academic lives. As a part of this trend, I'm going to try to not make anything due on a Monday or Tuesday so as to limit students' impulse to email me last-minute questions on a Sunday. :)
2. I want to be more intentional about teaching students how to read. Seriously. I took an online class this summer to renew my teaching license for Arkansas (part of a law passed in 2018) called The Science of Reading, and it's reminded me of some quality teaching practices that I've learned about but haven't conscientiously practiced well.
3. I want to keep trying to host at least once a month, whether it's a movie night or a dinner. Community is important. Pushing myself to cook something (especially my mom's spaghetti recipe) is important. Allowing people into my home is important.
4. I want to keep my goal of reading 100 books a year (I'm a few behind at the moment). In fact, I should go read now.
To close, I have a short story. During the garage sale weekend, my mom was cleaning out the backyard shed. She yelped and came around front carrying a box.
"What??" I said.
"Taj Mahal!" she said.
"What?!" I responded.
She explained that when she was young, she heard a story about the Taj Mahal. The story goes that the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan originally started building it as a tomb for his favorite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. The twist? We don't know if her body is there. It was moved so many times during construction that we can't confirm it without opening her coffin, and no one has done it. Though I can't confirm it from sources (though there's definitely controversy around its origins), reading down this rabbit hole has since fascinated me.
"Wait, so what does this box have to do with Taj Mahal?" I asked her.
"You see? He missed the point: it was supposed to be about honoring her!"
Under a pile of seemingly random and mundane papers, she unearthed two books; one book was from my great grandfather's collection. The other was signed by my Oklahoma land rush pioneer great-great grandmother Elsie.
I saw her point. As we went through boxes all summer, we had to decide what was worthy of keeping and what needed to be let go. We never knew what family memories we'd find.
I think the same is true of the last year.
Many days were routine.
Many days were not.
Many days were somewhere in between and carried treasures that I do not want to miss the point of experiencing.
God, make me learn from and value what you show me each day.
Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the Universe, who is Good and causes good.
Until Year 5 is complete...
Candace
Comments
Post a Comment