The Struggle to Poem

This perhaps seems to be my constant litany, work vs. creative development. I never imagined it would be this difficult to maintain a writing life and teach, though it seems that many of my coworkers struggle with this, too :-/

I love teaching, I really do. It gives me purpose and joy. I think I love writing more, but I also think I'm a better teacher than I am a writer. I think this is going to be my lifelong struggle, finding balance between the two.

Enough emoness. Actually, my above rant is perhaps the opposite of emoness. It's two conflicting loves. One loves me more, and one I love more. Anyway, I'm glad I have two loves in my life (wait, I have more than that, I'm a multitude of love...)

I'm never going to figure this all out X-D

 Ok, moving on...

I've been trying to get more engaged in community lately. No, that's not true, the community's been trying to get me more engaged in service. I'm just one to leap on opportunities to share the love. So I have a few brewing projects.

First off, I'm going to be giving some free writing workshops to the community coming up. One will be in the very near future, geared towards examining the feminine voice and revisionist mythmaking this month. I'm very excited about sharing my ideas on this with other women, as I think it's an important concept and goal in feminist writing. I'll post more details as they avail.
My second upcoming workshop is, I think, going to be on the poetic line -- metrical considerations y others. I'm excited about that, too, though it's during the summer so I'll have a wee bit more time to prep.

And if that wasn't enough?

This is perhaps the service I'm most excited about. This Saturday, I'm going to be judging a poetry contest at Santa Rosa High! If you know me, then you know just how special this is. My first professional job was teaching 6th grade in Santa Rosa. I learned so much working there, and I've always been grateful that the little school took a chance on little me. You see, I was just twenty years old, bright eyed and bushy tailed for sure. I hadn't a clue how to teach (I didn't even have a license) but I knew I had a heart for it. The principal hired me on the spot, and so began my life as an educator.

So this weekend, I'm going "back home" so to speak. Santa Rosa is a lovely little town here in South Texas. Each grade level consists of no more than 100 kiddos, so I was the only 6th grade reading teacher. I did some finger counting and figured out that my students would now be in 11th and 12th grade, which is precisely the age groups I'm going to be judging. They'll be my old kiddos!

Anyway, I'm excited.