So, it's only been a few weeks since I wrote. It seems unreal (and impossible) that there are only four weeks left in the semester, although the bags under my eyes surely show it. It seems hard to believe that I am almost finished with Phase II (of four) of the education program and I only have two more semesters of classes before student teaching. It seems strange that I've effectively made it through three school years of studying the fine arts and I am almost ready to enter the wild world of Advanced painting where I finally get to choose what I paint (which may or may not be as fun as I think it should be).

I feel like I am waist-high in the "Professional Development School," and feel very lucky to have chosen a field in which they place a great deal of emphasis on what your life will actually look like when you get out of school. School for me right now looks a lot like the real world, which, unfortunately, seems often so rare in the school. I am used to wearing dress pants at least on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. I find that my primary wardrobe in comprised of a strange combination of professional attire and clothing that is accustomed to the saturation of oil paint and mineral spirits-- I find myself savoring the feeling of clean blue jeans and a shirt that can legitimately be called "casual." My Instruction and Management teacher calls these clothes "University Mode." I find myself wishing I could go back to the days of just being a student, but suddenly find myself carrying the weight of labels such as "role model," "Mentor," "Authority," and "adult" draped across my shoulders. It is heavy, but it fills you deeply and fully.

Teaching, I am beginning to understand, is not a calling for the weak. I am daily learning the meaning of the words, "tough love," and find myself growing a backbone in terms of boundaries and conflict management. I still get flustered when I need to settle an argument between two five year olds (which is often irrational, of course), but I hunger for the day that I figure it out. Each week, new speakers come in to my classes to tell us what it is like to be teachers. I think the most common reflection we receive is the reminder that you'll never know everything and you will be daily making mistakes. More and more I am beginning to see the importance of forgiveness because I can see how much teachers need it.

This feels strange to say outloud, but I am learning that I love kids. Last week I was speaking to someone about all that has happened to me this school year in terms of jobs and suddenly realized that all of those questions I was asking about where I was supposed to be and what I should be doing with my time instantly faded when I took this job working in this kindergarten class. I have never once questioned where I should be since I began there-- I don't think I can ever go back to working anywhere outside of some sort of school environment. This is all that I want to do. That is a beautiful, wonderful realization. I almost feel unworthy of it.

I've been thinking a lot in the last few weeks about what I've been called to. I have this sense that I've been made for something significant, that God has made me this leader-person for some very strange reason. I often feel as though I've been given a sword too great for me to wield-- I daily wonder at this thing I've been given. How did he come to choose me for this noble task of teaching? A few weeks back, I was sitting, listening to a speaker talk about people who would change the world someday and remember thinking to myself, I'm not sure I want to be in positions of leadership in my life-- it would be a lot easier (and cleaner) for me to just be a person behind the scenes, following. And I had this sense of a voice saying in reply, But this is the place that I've called you to and you must stand up under it. I feel as though I've been given a sword to great for me to weild.

I often wonder what all of this means? What will my life be? Where will I go when I am out of the bounds of the "PDS"-- when I am in a classroom full of kids all alone. They often speak to us about how most teachers quit after only three years of teaching, how in the first year it will be hard, and maybe by the third year we will begin to see things move and change. Veteran teachers say if you want to have an effect on education, you must stay in it for 30 years. I want to be in it for the long haul. It seems strange to write these things, to be looking down the barrel of your career, your life-- like for the last 21 years have been building up to this, this moment of breaking out into the freedom of all that you'v been made to do.

I mean, surely, things change and perhaps I'll end up doing something else all together, but there is this beautiful thing when you begin to see all the good you've been made to be begin to materialize. And maybe I'm being idealistic. Maybe not.