30 Something

I love and hate this time of the year. It's a time to say, "out with the old and in with the new." So I've decided that with my 30 b-day looming I'm going to go into this new year with a little less baggage. I've decided to finally end my relationship with Mister. There's absolutely no need to continue. I've exhausted my time with him. I'm also saying goodbye, along with 90% of the rest of America, to the 10-15 extra pounds that I've been carrying around. Aloha, to the excess fat. I want to make this year a big one. Of course no one really keeps up with their new year's resolutions, but I love making them because I believe that the new year is a great motivation for a lot of things. So I'm going to resolve to pay all my bills on time, keep my things organized, find a viable man to settle down with and stay as stress free as possible. I'm going to look over this in about a month and evaluate where I am with it. I really really want to do something big with my life this year and I like that sparks that the new year is creating for me.

I hate infomercials. I decided to get Terrance a christmas gift and in doing so he said that he wanted a colon cleanser. I know...what kind of gift is that, but I decided to go ahead and get him one. He said he wanted the one fromt he infomercial. WTF? I told him over and over again how fraudalent infomercials were, but to shut his mouth I decided to order it anyway, but instead of ordering it from the phone number I went online to order it. Those people are nuts. They charged me double and I've been on the phone trying to get information on how to cancel the order. They told me that if it had already been shipped and the only way for me to get my money is to sent it back when it comes. They are nuts. I can't wait to tell him that those infomercials are scams. If I don't get my money back he's gonna refund me. Grrrrr!!!!!!!

I had a really good time at home on Christmas. I got an e-mail from an old friend that I grew up with and went to college with. He's living in Texas--married, two children. I also met up with another old friend from home that was crazy about me when we were younger. Actually I was thinking about him not too long ago. He's married to a girl whose family has been friends with my family for years. They have a daughter. When I found out that he was married I got a little twinge in my stomach. He was a really good guy and I shot him down. Why did I shoot him down? Later on I found out the little girls that I used to babysit and teach in Sunday school were now teachers themselves--married with children. Ugh!! It seemed liked everywhere I went I was seeing people that I knew who were married and had children. On top of that my uncle and I had a conversation about beind 30. "Can you believe we are 30?" (My uncle and I are 4 mos apart). I was totally fine with being 30 until our conversation. I had dealt with the big 30 a couple of years ago when I talked to the president of the college that I worked for. We had given her a surprise 50th b-day party and I asked her how it felt to be 50. She went on to tell me that she loved it,blah, blah, blah. Then I asked what year was the hardest for her. She told me that turning 30 was hard because she had so many goals for herself that she hadn't accomplished, blah, blah, blah. I was so intrigued because 30 was going to be big for me and I was doing all these things so that I could be be happy at 30, but then reality set and I understood what she was saying. I had so many goals for myself. I actually had my life planned out up until the age of 32 and that's it and when I went back to look at the goals that I had for myself I realized that I was so far away. I began to fret, but that closer I got, the more and more I had to get myself prepared and at my last b-day I was one full year away, I decided to not allow 30 to take me down. But then my uncle had to make a big deal about it and then I had to see how happily married everyone was with children. All the way home I began to fall to pieces and I began to try to figure out who I could marry that I think I would be happy with. I began to comtemplate about musickbox. He's a wonderful guy and he loves me. Why can't I get with him? Well, besides the fact that he's pretty fanatical about Jesus, he's a good guy. I can live with the Jesus fanatics. I used to be one. Don't get me wrong I still love Jesus, but I'm just not as religious as I used to be. The Bible doesn't say anything about drinking being a sin. It says drunkeness is a sin. There's a big difference between drinking and drunkeness, but musicbox wouldn't agree with that. Also, the Bible doesn't say anything about listening to secular music as a sin, but musicbox would not allow it. So, I think I can deal with his hang ups, but I don't think he would be able to deal with mine. I actually think he would condemn me. But he does love me and has proven that he would do anything for me. Then there's Terrance. He loves me too, but I just don't like the fact that he's short...Okay I can deal with the vertical challenges, but he also had a gf that died. I have a fear of death and I have a whole crazy theory about the type of people we meet. It's nuts, but I don't think I can deal with that. I'll explain later. Then there's Mister. I believe if I begged and pleaded on my knees he'd give in a marry me. But I'm sure I'd have to worship him for the rest of my life. I don't know if he can deal with the fact that I would cater to him not because I wanted to , but because he wants me to. Ugh. What am I gonna do?

I'm contemplating going broke for Christmas. There is this really nice dining room set at a store that is going out of business here and it's only $300, but I can't really afford it if I want to pay my credit card and some other bills. Grrrr. I wish I had a man would loved me enough to buy me whatever I want. Why can't I find a rich man like in the movies. Ugh. If I do decide to buy it I will be behind in a couple of bills, but I'll be able to eat on a new dining room set. Hmmm, the choices we make. Hopefully, I'll go to the store today and it will be gone. That would really make the decision easy.

I was listening to Tavis Smiley's commentary one day and he saying that he was speaking to one of the great minds (I believe it was cornell west) and he was trying to be convinced that no one is a success. He was saying that when it comes to the end everyone will have something in their life that they didn't complete. So in essence we are all failures. So his question was, if that is the case "how good is your failure." I was thinking about that because man as much as I want to be a success in life I keep pining over the fact that I tend to allow fear to keep me from doing what I got to do. It devastates me. I've always been told that I was a leader and I always felt that I was, but in being that I always felt that I was too different from people and sometimes being different doesn't always feel good. So in order to feel "more normal" I would people please. I would try to conform and everytime I tried to conform I always ended up feeling bad because in conforming I did things that I didn't want to do. Sometimes I didn't have the mental strength to stand and be me and I've been wanting to work on that, but I didn't know how. I think that older I get the easier it is for me to be me. Especially when I start to see myself in my students. Some of them really need some guidance just as I did which is the reason for me wanting to teach in the first place.

Speaking of failure...

... about 30% of my students failed the semester. That to me is a shame.

I finished my first semester as a new teacher. I was exhausted and sick--literally sick of those kids. I've never been so sick in my life. I wanted to cough up a lung, that's how bad my chest was hurting from my cold. I finished my second evaluation and the asst principal loves me. I'm so glad that she didn't evaluation my 6th or 7th hour class. They were horrible. She told the principal and other teachers about me. So a lot of people have been hearing how good of a teacher I am. Man, the pressure.

I had a really good day that I spent with Mister a couple of weeks ago. He called me to let me know that he might need a place to stay since his power was off for 11 days. It turned out that he didn't need to stay because he finally got it on, but he still wanted to see me. Instead of the usual wham bam, I spent a lot of time with him. We laughed and joked about things. I complained about school. He complained about school. It reminded me of old times. For some reason I didn't tell him I loved him even though it would have been appropriate. I haven't talked to him since. Normally, I would call him or im him the next day to thank him for a wonderful time, but I didn't. I must be moving on. I did spend time with Magic fingers lately. It was ironic that one night last week we sat up and watched an MTV true life: I have a friend with benefits. We both commentated as the show went on about the rules of that type of relationship. I guess the deal was sealed. We both understood were each other--I wasn't looking for anything from him and he wasn't looking for anything from me. That's good because now I don't have to worry about being heart broken if he finds another woman.

Terrance has been driving me crazy. He continues to tell me that he loves me. I continue to sigh. He is getting me a nice christmas gift though. I'm getting him his dual action colon cleanse. Hahaha! He says that he doesn't want material things. He's a trip. I've never seen someone so health conscience that also smokes not only cigarettes, but bud also. He says that his new year's resolution is to quit. We'll see bout that. My gift to myself would be a new laptop, but I'm getting a little behind on my bills. I need to get those taken care of.

I haven't seen magic fingers in over a week. Mainly because over half the city has been without power due to a bad snow storm on last week. I was blessed, but he wasn't. I text him on last Monday to let him know that I was feeling a little frisky. He text me back saying that he was homeless. Boohoo. Actually when I text him I didn't really want to see him, I just wanted to get a response from him. I figured it would be a no go. Anyway the previous time we were together he asked me to rate him on a scale of 1-10. I rated him an 8. He rated me a 9. He said he wanted to be a 9 and asked me what he could do to make that happen. I didn't feel like talking about it. Yes, he feels absolutely incredible, but he doesn't know how to get me there and I'm not confident enough to tell him how. I told him that he needed to get to know me better in order to be a 9. He took that as a challenge.

Me and Terrance have been hanging out. He still claims that he loves me and I still avoid the love talk as much as possible. I'm just not that into him. He's too short. I know that's superficial, but dang I feel like I can see over his head when I stand next to him. I feel like amazon woman next to him. I need a towering man. Well, not towering, but someone that I can look up too.

School has been okay. I got my second evaluation and I did well again. The asst principal really likes me, but for some reason I feel like if there was anyone other than her evaluating me I would have been scrutinized. I need to step up my game. January starts a whole new semester with a whole new set of students. I think I'm ready. I don't know how much energy I have to deal with disresptful students. For the most part the kids are good, but there's that handful that drive burn my britches. As much as I hate to say, but I sometimes pray that they don't come to school. I understand if you are a student that wants to do good and just needs to work on it, but there are some that could care less about school or the other kids and they disrupt no matter what. I had a student come to my class after not being here in over a month and the whole time he wanted to leave to go to the restroom or go to the nurse. He constantly talked and bothered other students. He finally ran out of the room. Later on he said that he was sick and went to the nurse, but I found out the he didn't tell the nurse that he was sick. He just wanted to get out of my classroom. The next day he came to class asking for his referral to the office. I refused to give it to him and he sat the entire class talking about leaving. Finally he ran out and the dean bought him back. I told the dean that he was a disruption and that he constantly talks and cusses. He said that he will be fine in my class. For the rest of the class he talked. I was furious. There aren't many students that I have like that, but there are a few and for those I really wish they wouldn't come. I asked the student why he even came and his response was because he wanted to get his license. I told him that even if he did get his license, the state may revoke it because they are trying to make it into a law that if you drop out of school your license is revoke until you are 18. He said that he didn't care. He had no intentions on finishing school. There are some students who are runaways and feel like no one cares about them. I tell them that I care, but it's not enough. I wanted to become a teacher because I wanted to make a difference and show that one student that they can make it. I'm not sure if I'm fulfilling my goal.