I think it has come time to abandon the hope of actually catching up to the correct day on my picture of the day posts. I never seem to be able to get back to the present day. I think I will continue to take a picture a day, except now, I will post only those that are striking to me or epitomize a story or moment I would like to capture.
Here are some of those kinds of moments
Date Taken: 7/16/12
Setting: The Cup
Thoughts: For some reason, I have developed a bit of a possibly annoying habit when I go to ice cream shops. When I order a chocolaty flavor, I often ask the worker to dig into a specific section of the ice cream tub to scoop me the best possible scoop with all the best goodies in it. I also like to ask for sprinkles (crunchy is my favorite food after all) and when they ask me what kind I want, I always say, surprise me. In my head, I like to think that it adds a modicum of entertainment to their otherwise dull existences as ice cream caddies.
Britt, Court, and I went to The Cup and stumbled across a worker that was Britt's friend. I did my usual routine, and when I asked him to surprise me, he really did...
It. Was. Awesome. Date Taken: 7/17/12
Setting: Summerbridge
Thoughts: Jarred had to go to a training session and had texted me to ask me to keep him updated throughout the day. Here...is the remainder of that conversation... Date Taken: 7/18/12
Setting: Summerbridge
Thoughts: Just some beautiful flowers. The red ones took on this ethereal quality and they seemed to form into a heart shape that I found stunning.
Date Taken: 7/13/12
Setting: The upper school
Thoughts: Every summer, we take the students to the upper school and have Olympics. I feel it is necessary to preface the rest of this post with a fact that many people find off putting...I hate the Olympics. I find watching sports of any kind (unless a personal friend is playing) to be utterly boring and a waste of my time. So, there's that. More than that factor though, is the fact that the Olympics get hyped up in a way that feels unsettling to me.
There is a commercial for this year's Olympics that shows moms waking their various children early in the morning to take them to practices then shows them later on as their child wins a medal in the Olympics. First of all, are moms the only ones that can take care of children? Also, at what point did those small children actually consent to the long, arduous, painful road of possibly becoming an Olympic athlete? Why are we celebrating this kind of behavior. The adults that start training small children for these kinds of competitions are doing these children many a disservice. These children don't get to be children, they have to be machines whose bodies are not wholly their own, and whose disappointments play out at a national level.
I also find that the opening ceremonies and the overarching competition itself to be the most colossal waste of money, next to any and all superbowl half time shows of course. I wonder what would happen if the millions, possibly billions of dollars put into making those ceremonies and the games was actually spent trying to help people. There are kids that go to bed hungry every night, but that's boring, especially compared to fireworks and shiny costumes and elaborate choreography.
The only Olympics I like are the ones with do at Summerbridge. This year's games were the best I have been a part of. Josh and his committee planned them to perfection and everyone involved seemed to have a blast. What I love about our Olympics is that it allows our students to take a break from the heavy, adult burdens they often carry with them and run around and be kids for a little while. They get to laugh and dance and perform and play. They get to enjoy the company of peers that want to learn. They get to be excited about something larger than themselves. That's what the Olympics should be - a time to celebrate life's simple moments and joys and do so with little more than a few hula hoops, some cones, and some dodgeballs.
The pictures below are just a few of the amazing moments that happened on this day.
Date Taken: 7/12/12
Setting: Summerbridge and Shannon's House
Thoughts: This mask...will forever haunt my dreams...
Shannon invited us over to her parent's house to enjoy a meal and some relaxation time. Her house...is the most amazing house, ever. This fire pit is just one of the amazing features. After we ate burgers cooked on the built in out door grill, and met her parents in their full bar and whiskey lined basement (they publish a whiskey magazine), we ate ice cream and made smores around this campfire. It. was. awesome.
A lot of times, when I am at a friend's parents' house, I find myself wondering how they got from where I am now, to what they are. I have this urge to be at that place already - family, home, career. Yet, I know that to skip everything that comes in between, the struggles, the successes big and small, the actual building of a life I want, would be wholly unfulfilling. When I asked Shannon's dad about this idea, he said that we need to pursue what makes us happy. He gave us advice we have heard our entire lives - do what makes you happy. When he said it, I actually believed it could be possible. As I stood in this beautiful home, nestled into the woods, I felt like there could be a way to carve out a unique life path that includes the pursuit of a career that makes me happy and one that also enables a comfortable lifestyle that I could pass on to my own children one day.
Thoughts: Obviously, I didn't take this picture...but all the pictures I took today were lame...so, here is this one. I love it.
Date Taken: 7/10/12
Setting: Summerbridge, my desk
Thoughts: I found this on my desk this morning. Really, it is amazing I can find anything on my desk. It is perpetually messy despite my constant attempts to clean it up. All I can ever seem to do is re-stack papers in a different place or throw away post it notes. I never seem to put things in any kind of coherent order. The chaos that is my desk often reflects the status of my life. I am so frequently concerned with accomplishing multiple tasks at once that my life because messy and muddled despite my best attempts to clean it up, to organize, to attend to one item at a time.
It was nice to find this note amid my pile of papers. Anonymous. Cheerful. Supportive. Everything a good pick-me-up should be. I think the reason why I like this gesture so much is that it reminds me of something I might do for someone. I am a proponent of sending texts or emails to friends at random to tell them how much I appreciate them or how much a memory with them means to me now. I don't think we share those thoughts enough. We don't go out of our ways to compliment people, to help them, to offer them a smile, a nod, a hug. This note wasn't just a kind gesture, it was a reminder that I have the ability to accomplish my goals and that I have the capacity, as this person did, to affect peoples' lives in positive ways.
Date Taken: 7/9/12
Setting: Lehigh and a beautiful park
Thoughts: When there are beautiful, sunny, cloud-filled-sky days like this at Lehigh, they are magical. On days like this one, I get a feeling that nothing around me is real, that I am going to wake up from a vivid dream, that I am going to open my eyes and find myself a million miles from this place and where I want to be. On Lehigh Valley days like this one, the world seems so big, the summer too short, the days not long enough to take in the full, vast depth of beauty swells in sky and in the vibrant colors of the sky and earth and trees.
Day 136
Date Taken: 7/6/12
Setting: Summerbridge
Thoughts: Jake was doing an egg drop with his classes. I was brought back to 6th grade. I have a vivid image of some of the male teachers standing on the roof, hucking everyone's project off of it while we all stood around hoping our designs would keep out eggs protected.
The kids got a kick out of it. They were sprinting from the drop room to the landing pad, excited to see if their design had preserved their eggs. They unwrapped them as quickly as they could (although quickly takes a while when you use an entire roll of masking tape to attach two cups), and held up their eggs triumphantly if it survived. It was pretty awesome.
Day 137
Date Taken: 7/7/12
Setting: Somewhere in Swarthmore
Thoughts: Earlier in the day, Court, Matt, Brian and I went to to breakfast at a glorious little cafe in Bethlehem. Next to us was a young couple with a small baby. Honestly, probably one of the ugliest babies I've seen. It was just its facial expression, it was all bug eyed and seemed to indicate that poop was coming in the near future. I shiftily took some pictures...but, I felt it was probably wrong to post them. So, instead, here is the only other picture I took that day. Not really sure why...but, here it is.
Day 138
Date Taken: 7/8/12
Setting: On the road
Thoughts: Thanks anonymous car drivers, for sharing violent creepy imagery with the rest of us...that really serves to brighten everyone's day. (Sarcastic clap)
Date Taken: 7/5/12
Setting: Summerbridge
Thoughts:
1. I love when the kids doodle on their papers. It just makes me laugh.
2. I love looking at the center of flowers. The center always has the most interesting texture and color. The patterns are delicate and precise, saturated and random. I just like to see the variety.
Date Taken: 7/4/12
Setting: Lehigh
Thoughts: Well, I made everyone drive up to Sayre because I thought it would be a great place to view the fireworks. We sat up there for a bit but got nervous that we wouldn't be able to see the fireworks, so we headed to the lookout. Turns out, that was a horrible idea because everyone else in the surrounding community was there. We walked down from our parking spot and immediately turned back...as the fireworks were starting. Apparently, we could have just stayed at the Trem, because that's where we ended up. We stood on the top of the parking garage and had a good view. What is really amazing about the fourth of July in Bethlehem is that from Lehigh, we could see fireworks shows cropping up in the distance all across the surrounding valley. It was pretty magical...although not magical enough for us to stay for the entirety of the show we were actually close enough to see in full.
We were hot and kind of bored and also slightly horrified by a neglectful mother ignoring her child as well as some teens in bathing suits. Also, some random college student was dressed as the mad hatter. We saw him with a group of people when we were at Sayre and he kept appearing wherever we were. It was unsettling, so we left the show and went into the sterile lighting but refreshingly cool apartment and called it a night.
Date Taken: 7/3/12
Setting: Summerbridge
Thoughts: One of our students made this to hang in her core team's classroom. I love it. it is so fun and it just makes me want to smile. We had Olympics yesterday (more to come on this day) and I was reminded that these students, while dealing with so many real life adult problems, are still kids. They love to run around and act silly. They still want to paint funny pictures and bring them in to hang in class. They still want to bake cupcakes on their birthday and knight each other with a spirit stick made out of a plastic bat, cray paper ribbons and Christmas bells when someone gets student of the week.
What I love most about working with middle school students is that, for the most part, they are still so unfiltered. They will blurt out exactly what they are thinking exactly when they think it. There is a simpleness to that childlike state, an honesty that gets taken from them as they get older. What amazes me is that these kids can still smile and laugh and be their silly selves after what so many of them have been through. All the things that I never had to deal with as a suburban white kid living with hard working blue collar but financially stable and loving parents in a community with an excellent public school system...these kids deal with. Even on the tough days...especially on the tough days, the days when I am the most exhausted and stretched to my limits, they can make me laugh.
I was walking to my car one afternoon from the Trem and noticed these flowers. I have passed them on many occasions, but really noticed them for the first time today. At first glance, it appears these flowers are dying, lilting in the humid summer air. But, as I look closer now, it almost seems like they are pushing off from the ground, reaching out toward the light of the sun. Their petals remind me of an octopus or squid, its jellylike tentacles thrusting downward as it propels itself forward. I also just love the contrast of these soft and supple flowers against the sharp points of the Trem.
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