Yesterday was my birthday. I turned 37.
Seven is my lucky number so I had big expectations for this birthday and this year. I started getting excited last summer.
And then the election happened and our country seemed on the verge of implosion. I spent the spring getting bad news from work and rejections from high schools. I started to think that maybe this birthday was not going to the start of a lucky year.
I’ve spent a lot of time and energy trying to turn that attitude around. I am excited about my plans to invest in my professional self. I started reading some new books on the teaching method I use and quickly realized that I had lost track of how and why that method was effective, and was no longer employing it in a meaningful way. I’m excited to start next school year with new (to me) ideas and a renewed commitment to language learning.
I also look forward to participating in professional development opportunities, meeting other language teachers and possibly even collaborating with them in the future.
I will continue to focus on my own Spanish skills, and may even take a proficiency test in the winter. If I get a high score it could help my chances at getting interviews next spring.
So even though this year doesn’t look like what I had hoped when I started building up my 7.17.17:37 birthday, there is a lot to be excited about. I hope that by the time I turn 38, I’m comfortable with whatever the next year will look like.
It’s all about attitude and expectation, isn’t it?
Happy belated birthday!
Happy Belated Birthday!
And for what it’s worth, I think you rock for going to Ecuador.
Happy New Year! And oh my!!! You are so young! It is all perspective isn’t it. And, it sounds like you are finding wonderful new energies and have fabulous plans upcoming for this year.
Which books have reignited your teaching? (if you are willing to share.)
Joy.
Happy belated birthday. Good on you for looking for the positives and working on you!
Happy birthday! May this year be full of joy, adventure, growth and success!
Happy birthday! I like your attitude.
Yay happy birthday!
Happy belated birthday. Yes, the year so far has been stinky, but I think you have made a good realization of how to make the rest of your year a little brighter to live in.
Have spent all week picturing you at that pool of water surrounded by green and ‘cliff’ you shared last year. Hope your time was as wonderful as I imagined for you.
Welcome back, enjoy the very few weeks before you are back to school, know you will be busy with prep, and life, and home realities but hope you also get some major fun down time with your husband and children.
Happy birthday! 7.17.17:37 is such a cool birthday!
Happy belated birthday!