i'm going through changes

When I started this blog four years ago, I had just finished my Associate's degree, started full-time with the local school system and really wanted to get my teaching degree and be a full-time teacher. Now I have finished my Bachelor's degree, I'm still an in-school suspension coordinator, but I no longer care to be a teacher.

I've looked long and hard about who I want to be as a person, and the school system just doesn't impress me at all. There is a lazy self-importance to most people that work in a school that shows in everything they do. Not only do I feel completely unwanted, I really feel like my job is pointless. Even if I had the ability to make a difference with the kids, I don't have the support of the school. The pay is completely inadequate too.

I guess if I work at it hard enough and long enough, I'll get my comeuppance, but it's been a long time coming.

countdown to the BLET

I started jogging last week and I can already notice a difference. I have about 23 weeks before BLET will start and I think I'll be in condition that will exceed thier expectations. When I go back to work, I'm going to re-start weight watchers. With diet and exercise, I should reach several goals all at once.

My money situation is dire. My job sucks ass in the pay department and it won't get better anytime this year, which means several of my goal won't get met. This pisses me off. I've busted my ass to better myself and I want some payoff, but it never comes. Until I get some manner of decent break, I'm just spinning my wheels.

nightmare

I dreamed last night that my degree got messed up and I needed more classes to fix it. Then I woke up. Sadly, with the way things worked out, it would be much more than an inconvenience. I would honestly not mind taking a few more criminal justice classes. Besides, the only job prospect I have will not become available to me until next June. Oh well, nothing can be done about it now except to do it and get it over with.

I almost thought about still trying to get a job with the school system and just not doing the licensure classes. I'd lose the job at the end of the school year, but who cares now?

disillusion

I no longer care to be in education. Too little pay, too little reward, and too much bullshit. Working in education is a losing battle, hands down. The people are mostly full of themselves and flock into little gossip groups. We encourage the kids not to be like that. I'm just sick of it all and I don't even want to go back.

Sadly, it's not the kids that have me fed up. The "adults" mostly make me sick. There are a few exceptions, and there are some I'll not soon forget.

My life is taking me in a whole new direction, and I am excited.

travelling the road to wellness

Since I'll most likely start BLET's in January, I've started getting into shape now so I don't risk injury. Feels like a death march. I've always gone for fitness that appeals to me: weightlifting. That will not help me run a mile. No, I have to take a boot camp-like approach to my fitness goals, namely jogging and calisthenics. In 6 months, I should be in awesome shape. By this time next year, not only should I be in the greatest shape of my life, I should be in the career I plan to retire from. Not exactly what I was hoping for, but that's where I am right now.

on the lighter side

This is worth 10 minutes.


Big Buck Bunny from Blender Foundation on Vimeo.

Done...for now

July 25th has come and gone. I have completed my current studies. Now the fun part begins.

active file

I was told today I have an "active file" with the poilce department's human resources office. Interesting.....more to come.

resolve

Ok, the pity party is over. I can't curl into a ball and just give up. Yes, everything that is going wrong sucks. No, I don't think it should be so hard. Bottom line: it is, so quit bitching and work through it.

And miles to go before I sleep...

Almost done with the first part. All but done with the first step. Now I must choose which path to take next. No matter what I chose, there is still much to give to do to get where I need to be. I'll keep all my options open.

Robyn said something funny to me today. "I thought white guys got all the good brakes." Obviously not. Anyone who thinks different can shove their opinion of "white privilege" and shove it up their ass, right beside their head.

The truth is, I've never gotten a good break in my life. I've been used and abused at every turn. I'm waiting for my turn. I think I've put in a lot of sweat equity to get to where I am, and I'd kind of like to see some return off this.

If I go into law enforcement, I must get into shape before I even begin the training. I am an injury waiting to happen and I know it. Two years ago, I was heavy into weight training and I probably could have conditioned myself to pass a physical test easily.

Good things are around the bend. I can feel it.

hitting pavement

When I didn't get a job last school year, my principal said that everything happens for a reason. I don't believe that. I wish I did. I hold out for the proof that I am deluded by my own cynicism. I openly accept the possibility that there may be something greater just beyond our comprehension. A greater purpose or reason that we don't perceive directly. I think people call that god.

The truth is people suffer and die like dogs everyday for no good reason. Bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people. Most people must accept there is a better existence after death to keep them from going murderous.

I was born a skeptic and I can't always look past what lies on the surface. If I was made this way, was it a god's doing? Does that mean god has set me up for failure?

I want to embrace a spirituality, and I may search the course of my life to find my inner peace and never find it.

five days

Five days and I will have almost completed my five-year plan. The only thing not there is the career part. I have no intention at 34 to start a five year get a career plan. This will be a five month plan. I will attempt to go into law enforcement. I have 3-5 months to get into shape while the in-hire process begins. I actually like working out, just getting the time managed to do it. If I want to do this thing, I will.

home stretch

I have two classes left to attend. One exam and one paper left to turn in. No new job...yet.

Chugging along

I am slowly but surely finishing all of my requirements to graduate. I'll be done with everything by Friday with a week to spare. Now all I have to do is get a job.

I'm most likely going to leave the school system if possible. I no longer care to be in education. I like the kids, but I despise how I've been treated by the adults. I think I'll write a bit longer on that at a later date. Either way, a fresh start in a new career field will do me a world of good. The next one will most likely be the one I retire from.

What a 4th...

There were a lot of first times for me this past week. I camped in someone's back yard. I attended a 3-day July 4th cookout. I watched a whole pig get roasted on an outdoor spit overnight. I watched a movie outside projected on the side of a garage. I went to a liquor store that was about the size of a grocery store.

I realized how small and broken my life really is, but that is a good thing. I now know what I expect from myself. I know how I want to be.

The Goldwing Journal

I have had the bike for awhile now and I haven't been able to ride. I've just been that busy. I've fixed it to the point it is road worthy but I haven't been able to go out on it yet. :-(

This Winter I will paint it and make it all pretty and see where we can go from there. I think...THINK my goal is to end up with a Harley Road King. That is my idea of awesome in action. That sad part being I've never ridden one, so I don't know if I will like it. We shall see.

3 to go

I'm almost done. I only have a bit more work to do. One test, one project paper, one 8-page report, three book reports, and one 10-week journal to complete. Sounds rough, but I can do it. In fact, I'm just limbering up my "writer's mind" so I can start doing two of them today.

A position came open at the school I work at according to the schol system website, but the principal swears it was a mistake and that was an old posting. To be honest, sometimes I really don't know why I'm fighting so hard for a job that doesn't really want me, doesn't pay well, and I'll have to take more classes out-of-pocket to make it happen. It just seem like they expect an awful damn lot for so little in return. Granted, after about 5-10 years, you make more than you can going to another field, but really? Summers off and no holidays make it a tasty possibility. Money isn't everything, but if you don't have it, nothing else will come about.

So here I sit, weighing trade-offs and wondering what might come of it all.

the road of life

Life is a journey, not a destination. I've been traveling with purpose these past few years more so than ever. Too bad for me my life's highway is paved with broken dreams and shit. My broken dreams and everyone else's shit no less.

It is almost impossible to secure a teaching position this Fall despite my hard work. If I had graduated in May...who knows. If I get a job, it will be at the last minute when schools are like "OH SHIT! HIRE A WARM BODY BEFORE THE STUDENTS GET HERE!". It will be a horrible school and I'll not enjoy it at all. How am I so sure? Good teachers get hired at good schools. They don't go to schools that are horrible because they can choose to go to schools where they can get the biggest bonus check for all the little angels passing. The politics of public education usually stomps the idealism out of teachers by their second or third year. By the fourth or fifth year it's usually too late to do anything else. I had no idealism to start with, I just like the job for what it is.

July 25 will come. I will graduate. I kind of hoped it would be better on the other side of an education.

choices

I am at a crossroad. I graduate soon and I'm pretty sure where I go is where I'll be until end of my career days. It's either state or private sector. If I choose state, I can either stay in education or go into law enforcement. Either way, I keep my state employee benefits. If I do private sector, I start all over again with my retirement. Anything other school will pay more, but I won't get Summers off and that means a lot to me. Everything is a trade off with its own set of sacrifices and perks. In 10 weeks I'll be done with school, and I must figure out in a few short weeks what path the rest of my life will take. Big fun. w00t.

interview blues

I am a good interviewer, but I didn't do as well as I had hoped. I go in to interview for physical science and I wind up being asked if I could do physics too. The answer is no I can't.

I remember how good I felt when I was offered two positions when I first started working here. I could do ISS here, or be a TA at another middle school. I picked this one because I felt I could make a name for myself. I didn't realize I'd be put in a room far away from everyone and become at best an afterthought. I like how all schools like to say "we're a big family here" I come from a big family. I am the bastard step-child that is tolerated. The grandparents that loved me died years ago. I'm never visited or spoken to, just treated as an afterthought. I get invited to everything second-hand I only know a few people at family reunions.

I've only in the past year started learning what a real family is supposed to be like. I take a lot of my mannerisms and such from my biological father's side. Maybe that's why I'm disliked so much. I only ever wanted to belong. Is that so wrong? All I have is thirty years of regrets, guilt trips, hard feelings, and isolation. Thirty years of broken promises and shattered dreams, let downs and screw-overs... and I'm tired, so tired of all that.