For one, I had kids staying for tutoring on Wednesday. One of the boys is, to use his term, “connected”. He is writing his autobiographical essay about his first time getting arrested. As I prodded him, he unloaded his life history. Another boy who was there for tutoring just listened to the exchange. He didn’t utter a word until the other boy left. Then, he said, “Ms. Lock you should be a counselor. I’ve never heard an adult talk so easily and so non-judgmentally to a kid. Do you realize what you got  him to say to you? Do you realize how much he trusts you? That would never happen with another teacher.” As I listened to him saying this, his eyes were filled with tears. I thought for sure he was going to cry. No kidding. His comment was one that caused me to stop and think about my purpose in the world. My principal tells me daily how happy he is to have me in the building teaching reading and writing, but I’ve often wondered if that’s what I’m really teaching. I find myself connected to the kids on a level that is much deeper than simple reading and writing.

I think this in tandem with the comment I posted a few days ago about art therapy is really begging the attention of my next career move. Of course, last week I had a kid email me from high school after he’d watch the segment on Oprah about the book/movie Into the Wild. I was at school, of course, and had the tv on watching it, too. We’d read sections of that book last year, and when he saw Sean Penn talking on Oprah about the movie version of the book, the student thought of me and headed straight to the computer to tell me. That was one of those moments, too. He took the time to email me.  However, there was more of that “cosmic whispering” going on when the student looked at me and said I needed to be a counselor. Couldn’t I do that and incorporate reading and writing?  Couldn’t I take all of the knowledge I have and roll it into helping kids be better people?

Two weeks ago, I was talking to a girl about her book and she veered off to her own homelife. She’s a sexual abuse survivor, she’s been placed in protective custody several times, her mother no longer wants her–because she chose the boyfriend who is the sexual predator over her daughter. Now the girl lives with her dad, who hadn’t seen her in nearly five years. She’s entered his life a stranger. A teen age girl, displaced, hurt, unwanted and he’s struggling to take care of her. My conversation with her was no longer about her book. It was about telling her that I understood. That I knew how she felt, that I was there to help her in any way I could. Ever since then, she’s been in my classroom each morning. Sometimes she curls up with a book; sometimes she chats about what she has for breakfast; sometimes she talks about how hard it is to not see her mom; sometimes she just wants to hear about what I did the night before. This is a girl who has straight A’s and because of that gets to leave school five minutes early at the end of the day as her reward and chooses not to leave so she can stay in my room and help me clean up.

The culmination of these whisperings came yesterday. I was at work, of course, when Oprah was on. The writer of Eat, Pray and Love was on there. Her story is much like the story I’ve been writing about self discovery. Two things were said: You cannot see yourself in moving waters, so you must be still and Oprah added a bible verse to the effect that “be still and you will know God.” These are the things I know. These are the things I hold true and yet the last three weeks have been about moving, moving, moving. I’ve taken little time to sit and listen. To be still.

I know what I need to do, and now I must do it. In the craziness of my life, I’ve neglected the things that matter–being still, listening.  I’m carving a new space for love, which is wonderful, but I must not neglect that space for being still and listening either.

My job in the next few days is to be still and listen to those whisperings. Am I being told to try something new? Am I going down a new path to a job/career that would allow me to intertwine all of my passions? How do I do that? Should I?

Let’s listen and see…..

Here is a closer look at the smaller button and the texture:

Yesterday, I started a larger project. I got the idea from Somersett Home. I’m creating a wall hanging of my grandma’s homes. Ultimately, there will be four images of her homes attached to the tapestry I found. I’ll decorate with some great trim, buttons, maybe some old keys and attach to a dowel that will allow them all to be connected and hang like little houses on the wall. These are works in progress, but I’ll post anyhow. The photo on the left is the house Grandma lived in in Long Lane, MO. The one on the right is when my grandma visited the house a few years ago just before it was torn down. I love the fact that she got to see it one last time. Obviously, time took its toll on the house!

This is a fitting quote on so many levels. I think of my girl friends who’ve had tumultous lives and they remember the houses they lived in during each significant period of their lives. I talked to Stacey last night about a conversation she had with one of her friends about her reason for moving to her last house. I think of her story about her family slides and how no one can know what order to put them in but her family because of the significance of the houses they were living in at the time. I think of Vanessa and her house with the blue door, and Tina’s memories of sleepwalking at a certain house, and I think of all the houses I’ve lived in–14 in total.

As I prepare for students to come to my classroom, I think of the autobiographies I’ll have them write, and the one activity I always ask them to do: create a life map using all the houses you’ve lived in to tell your story.

Each house was significant for us. Each door, window, creak in the floor reminds us of a moment in our lives that we cannot forget–good or bad. As I looked through the Somerset Home issue, I noticed an artist who created tapestries to look like houses and decorated them to reflect the homes.

Today, your challenge is to write about those homes you lived in. Yes, good or bad, you must create your autobiography. Celebrating my grandma’s 80th yesterday caused me to stop and think about the stories she’s told of her houses. If you have photos of the houses you’ve lived in, find them. Create a collage. If you don’t have photos, draw them, color them with your memories, no matter how poor an artist you are.

In the coming months, Tina will be doing art with the doors she photographed in Italy. I can’t wait to see them, but the doors to her own houses are her real story.

Here is a prompt to get you started, “As I opened the door….” Tell me what you see. Think about the homes you’ve created for your children. What do they say about your today? What will your children say when it’s time for them to do the same autobiography?

Now, though, I really want to scan it and show Stacey, my very best friend, what I did. I have a scanner, a lovely one, sitting right here, but I can’t use it. For the last two years, I was an instructional coach for the district and since I had to do so much work at home, I had a laptop, and it worked with the scanner. Now, that I’m back in the classroom, I don’t have the laptop and the scanner won’t work with the iMac I’m using, which is so very sad!  If I achieve national board certification this year, though, I’ll get a nice stipend, and I think I’ll buy a laptop. I so loved the mobility of it. I could sit on the porch and write with it. Now, I feel changed to the desk.

I’m going tomorrow or Saturday, though, to look for a digital camera. I need one of those, too. Stacey wants to see my art room as it progresses, and I need a way to photograph my art projects. I love my “old fashion” camera, but without the scanner to copy my prints, I have to do something!  I’m so far behind in the technology…

I’m taking one of my favorite poems by Christina Rossetti, “In An Artist’s Studio” and combining it with the “Mirror, Mirror on the wall” concept, which I studied in college. There are some great feminist articles about this in No Man’s Land, which is one of my favorite books on literary criticism, and the words found there in tandem with the Rossetti poem will be awesome!  I can’t wait to get started on it!

Here is the poem:

In an Artist’s Studio
Christina Rossetti

One face looks out from all his canvasses,
One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans;
We found her hidden just behind those screens,
That mirror gave back all her loveliness.
A queen in opal or in ruby dress,
A nameless girl in freshest summer greens,
A saint, an angel; — every canvass means
The same one meaning, neither more nor less.
He feeds upon her face by day and night,
And she with true kind eyes looks back on him
Fair as the moon and joyful as the light:
Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim;
Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright;
Not as she is, but as she fills his dream.

If you are unfamiliar with the poem, it’s written during the Victorian period about Rossetti’s brother, Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s work. He often used Elizabeth Siddal as his model and created some of my most favorite Pre-Raphaelite paintings with her as the focal point. C. Rossetti was an early feminist writer and was always questioning the role of women. In her poem, she questions the reality of Elizabeth vs. her brother’s vision of her. It’s one of the best poems on objectification of women.

The idea of the mirror and how it reflects who we are, who we want to be for others is a strong one in so many pieces of literature written by both men and women. Thus, it will make a fitting altered piece of art, I think! Plus, the title to the poem, “In An Artist’s Studio” is fitting since I’ll be creating something for my own studio. In addition, so many of the women in my family are reflected in my art work repeatedly, so there is definitely a double meaning to this project. I’m so excited. Can you tell?

I bought carpets, bean bags and throw pillows all scattered around the room for little reading nooks. Every child will have the chance to read in one of those comfy spots each week. I love this feeling of excitement that the school year brings. It always helps balance out the frustrations that will come later.

I began to paint my art room last night. I decided for a shade lighter than chocolate brown. I wasn’t sure that I’d like it or not as it went up on one wall. I left it over night before going on to any other section just to make sure it would be okay. I still wasn’t sure as of noon today, but I got back from buying a few items that will help pull it all together. I’m so excited. By Sunday, it will be done and I will have a lovely spot to retreat to after school next week.

If you’ve never seen the Somerset magazine series–artful blogging, Somerset Home, etc., you need to do so. The Somerset series is incredible. I bought Somerset Home the other night and fell in love. There are so many ideas that I’ve been trying and that I want to try. Beautiful art pieces are every where. Love it!

The house is still quiet. Jake has emailed several times and is doing great at school. Last night, I found myself wandering around the house not knowing what to do. The house was clean, supper eaten, bed made, etc. It was a strange feeling of loss and idleness and confusion. Thus the reason I started painting at 8pm, I suppose. I’ve not written a poem in two years, and I was thinking last night that I need to do that soon. It’s been a year since I wrote a professional article. It’s time to get busy on one of those, too. I can’t get over how much time I have in any given day. No husband, no kids around, just me and all these minutes click, click, clicking away.

I’m not worried, though. In a month, I’ll be complaining that I don’t have enough time. School will start, data will need to be collected, work will need to be graded, I’ll be the cheer-leading sponsor, so basketball season will be upon us before long, and, of course, so many teachers have been asking for my help with creating a reader’s and writer’s workshop, so the emptiness will soon be filled, I’m sure.

So, today, I have a plethora of images rolling around in my head.

I read my friend Stacey’s blog today, and she awarded me the “Nice Matters” award. I am nice. I work very hard at being nice. I left a post on  her blog that said I try to do the right thing every day. It’s so important to me to be the best person I can be, to be kind and open to others and make a positive impact on their lives during the course of the day. I sleep better at night when I can maintain this. I awake each morning happier when I know I’ll be doing my best that day.

A few years ago I started Yoga and in the process of learning to meditate, I connected with my spiritual self. It was the most amazing experience. I’ve always questioned God, but the experience of meditating and connecting every day with that higher power helped change my life. I’m not religious. I refuse to adhere to a religion, but I beleive strongly in the power of God, and faith in there is a higher power who guides us when we listen. I’ve prayed over the years and it’s never filled me with anything. I found that sometimes the prayers weren’t answered, and that disappointed me. Prayer was simply me talking and hoping that “someone” heard me. Through meditation, I had to be quiet and was forced to listen to the “voice” inside of me.  That voice was guiding me in the right direction. If I followed that voice, I didn’t have to pray for help to change things because I had listened to the voice in the beginning and got to the place I needed to be. It was an amazing transformation in my life. Suddenly, I was calmer, I was more focused, I was achieving things that I never would have if I hadn’t slowed down and forced myself to listen to God each and every day.

If you’ve never read In Praise of Slowness or the miracle books, you must. And, if you don’t sit down and reflect on your life daily, you must. Listing the good things you’ve done, the gratitude you have for everything in your life–even the negative, will change your life. You have the power to change who you are if only you listen to the voice–which I always think of as my umbilical cord to God.

I also went to the art store and got fabric paper to print family photos on. I’m hoping to make some wall art out of the photos. I have a lot of photos from women in my family; I have every grandmother for at least four generations. I’m lucky, and I think they are watching over me every day, so it’s fitting that my art room be decorated with their images.

Now, I just need a digital camera. Yes, not only is blogging new to me, but the entire technological world is new to me! I still use a film SLR camera. I love it, and am having difficulty giving it up. Photography was my first love–had my own black and white darkroom, etc., and as I look at the point and shoot digital cameras out there, I’m very disappointed in what they can do. I looked at a couple of really nice digital SLR cameras, but they are well over $700. On a teacher’s salary, with a kid leaving for college, that’s simply not doable, so I’m trying to decide how to handle this. But, for now, I’m tracking the progress of my new room with film, which I’ll upload later–just a lot of extra steps involved.

At the antique malls today, I found hundreds of family photos that were being sold. As an avid collector of my own family photos, I was so sad to see all of the unnamed photos in the boxes. I can’t imagine a family selling them at an auction or estate sale. I kept wondering if any of them belonged to my family members. Even though I have a lot of photos, there are still many I don’t have, and I’d love to know what their faces looked like. I looked at each one that was taken in Missouri, hoping something looked familiar in the way they smiled, or stood, but there was nothing. Names would be so helpful. So many don’t label their photos. If there is one thing I can say today it’s that you must label your photos. At the least write the first and last name of each person on the back of the photo. It’s so easy to think that we’ll remember them, and we might, but in a hundred years, how will they be identified? Name your photos just in case someone down the line sells them at an auction–a box full for a few dollars, and then someone like me comes across them, and sits for hours looking, hoping, and finds the one named, the one they’ve been looking for for years….