I'm freaking out a little.  There is a lot going on this semester and at times it is overwhelming.  Normal course work, stuff that any other time in my academic career would have been nothing, is starting to be beyond my capacity.  Not that it is too hard, just I feel I should be delegating my time and mental energy toward the harder tasks at hand.  Here's the best way I can think to describe it - imagine a brain surgeon in the middle of a long and complicated surgery, and then imagine the surgeon's secretary buzzing in to the operating room to ask the surgeon to fill out a time card or something mundane like that.  There are bigger and more important tasks to attend to.  Now I'm not trying to say that what I'm up to is brain surgery, but it does require a lot of time and it is stressful and has a lot of pressure attached, so when I have all this going on I just am not very enthusiastic about having to devote 3-4 hours to learning the difference between major and minor scales in Music Appreciation.  Maybe I should take advantage of the mental vacation time, but I just keep wanting to leave the classroom and go work on something that has more to do with my quickly approaching future career. 

If I spent half as much time being productive as I do fretting I would have graduated by now and have already landed a job.  I fret with the best of them.  "What if I don't get the form in on time?  What if the form is filled out incorrectly?  What if I need to fill out more forms?  What if there are no openings for me?  What if my advisor can't see me today so I have to wait until tomorrow to get his signature on the form?  What do you mean I have to get signatures from the head of my department AND the dean of students?  How much time is that going to take?  Let's see, I have 45 minutes from the time my classes end to the time I have to be in Cuba City  to meet with my supervising teacher, I wonder if that is enough time to walk from class to my advisor's office to the head of my department's office to the registrar's office to the dean's office then to my car to make the 10 minute drive to Cuba City...even if that is enough time I'm going to be all sweaty and uncomfortable when I get to the high school and I already got mistaken for a high schooler once so I don't think arriving disheveled is going to help anyone...what if they don't like me?  how am I supposed to get these kids to listen to me?  how am I ever going to have any authority of these kids who are not only taller than me but probably cooler than I ever was in school?  Am I really smart enough to do this?  Can I really communicate to these kids?  What if this is the wrong choice?  What if I should be doing something different?...back to the forms...What if they don't like my essay?  I really hate writing essays about myself because I just don't ever know where to start or when to stop.  I go too long to cut off too short and never get around to saying what I wanted to say as well as I intended to say it.  And there are dishes over there that aren't going to do themselves and if I don't do them now I will not be able to have coffee in the morning because my mug is in the sink and I won't have time to wash it in the morning since Kyle has to be to work so early tomorrow morning.  How is tomorrow morning going to work?  Kyle has to work at 7, I have class at 9, maybe I can study for my quiz before my class starts, after I drop Kyle off.  I hope I can find a parking spot.  Maybe I could write my essay tomorrow morning instead of tonight because tonight I just can't think straight anymore.  So much to say.  So much to do.  So much to go wrong...oi"

I talk to myself like that almost nonstop lately.  I spin my wheels fretting and then am paralyzed, so I fail to get as much accomplished as I needed to, and so the pressure/stress builds and so the story goes on and on.  I can find the 100 things that could go wrong and they are all I can see when I close my eyes and picture the days to come. 

God help it work out.  Help me trust that everything will work out for the betterment of me thanks to your perfect plan.  Every traffic delay, every setback, as well as every perfect hair day and unexpected boost are part of that perfect plan that will only see me better for having gone through them.  Help me find your strength and experience your peace.  And in the worst case scenario I guess I'll just be back here with you, and that really isn't that bad at all.   

I am officially the worst update-er ever, as cliche as we all know that is, and as terrible as an opening line it may be, we all know it is true.  Sometimes in the minutes in between the insanity that has come to be my life, I get bored.  But mostly I am too distracted bracing myself for the next event to get bored.  Not really "bracing", that is not a fair description because I truly do prefer over stimulation to boredom and I am most productive when crushed under piles of deadlines.   

The summer was a whirl wind.  I had classes, then camp, then more classes, then a week with my dad and sisters, then a week scraping myself off the floor, then school started and here we are.  You would not believe where "here" is!  The insanity!  My first day back to class (which was last Tuesday) I got an e-mail from the head of the social sciences review board about an incident last spring.  I had hoped the 'incident' would be happily behind me by this semester but I actually had to appear before a review panel to talk about the incident (which I can't really go into, suffice it to say I didn't do anything wrong, someone else did, and the review panel needed to hear first hand what happened and then they needed to help me make arrangements to keep myself free from retribution for my participation in the review).  Then a professor offered me a Teacher-Assistant-type position that would have been the coolest thing EVER.  But because Kyle and I are moving in December I couldn't do it (the prof understandably didn't want to train someone for just one semester - so if I were able to stick around for next semester it would have worked, but no such luck - we are moving on). 

This semester also finds me starting "pre-student teaching" which means that by the end of the semester I will do 80 hours in a classroom (preferably 40 hours in a high school history classroom and 40 hours in a middle school history classroom) with a supervising teacher.  If that isn't terrifying....then today I got a call from a professor in the social sciences department at my college, asking if I would like to tutor his middle school daughter in history.  When he realized what he needed he went to speak to the head of the social sciences dept and she right away recommended me with a rave review of how well I would do.  If that isn't the nicest thing ever...it is.  It just is.  When people in your field - your superiors, people you respect and admire even - appreciate what you have accomplished and see potential in you - wow.  I am honored.  Thankfully tutoring 2 hours a week fits with ease into my schedule and tutoring is going to be an awesome experience.  I have a passion for history and I think I can inspire a similar passion in pupils - this tutor-ee will be my first real opportunity to test myself.     

Unfortunately all has not just been a matter of too many wonderful opportunities.  There are these...people.  They have always been around, but they recently decided to mess with my sister.   Sex and the City movie fans - remember the scene in the movie after Big leaves Carrie at the church, and the limo with all the girls in it pulls up next to Big, who is standing in the street and Carrie hits him with the roses until all the petals fall off and then Carrie gets herded back into the car by Samantha, and Miranda then Charlotte whirls around and looks at Big with complete fury and mouths "NO" "NO" - that's me right now.  These people make me feel like growling.  Again, I can't go into detail, suffice it to say their actions are despicable and if they don't make it right in a short order I am going to expose their arrogant hypocrisy in all it's double-talking-hateful-splendor.  They have been confronted privately, so they get a few days to FIX IT.  If they fix it I'll be the first to welcome them back into the fold of reasonable and respectable human beings, but if not then I'll tell you the whole story from start to finish - you and anyone else who will listen - and then we'll see how arrogant and prideful they feel.  In the meantime we'll just hope for the best for everyone's sake.

This is a big semester for me...pre-student teaching, tutoring, getting ready for the big move at the end of December...and this semester is my last as a student at UW Platteville.  Technically I will be a student still in the spring, but I will be living in Illinois and working in a school alongside a real teacher.  I won't be taking classes at this institution which I have grown to love.  Not to mention I will be leaving a lot of people I love.  We'll be several hours away from our friends here in Platteville and for the first time I will live a state away from my sisters and my mom.  For the longest time it was the four of us against the world, and now the band is breaking up.  I'm not going to be here to be the big bad sister bear when outsiders make the mistake of messing with my siblings and they aren't going to be near when I have mental break downs and need someone to laugh over nonsense with.

There are many events I want to go into further detail about - have wanted to go into further detail about for a while now - like camp and so on - but I've just not had the time or the mental capacity at the end of the day.  I'm hoping to fix that but I will not make promises I'm not sure I can keep.

I'm healthy.  I'm looking forward to what is coming in my life - and I like my life as is too.  Life is good.  I am a lucky girl, blessed by God with a wonderful family, a loving husband, good health and more opportunities than I can take advantage of at one time.  I'll keep you updated...