Skin

perhaps i wasn’t born for this.
is it etched in my skin,
a tattoo of failure that follows
me wherever my words take me?

they pull me down,
anvils on the dock,
seagulls pecking at my skin,
offering the freedom i can’t have.

i wish my words could be the wings
that could carry me away
from the place where i’m inadequate.
where i could be real, in my own skin.

instead, they’re thrown back at me,
hateful darts into my skin.
if only i could pluck them out
and send them where my heart belongs.

Sarcasm

i’m so thrilled to know
that the class i dread the most
has the neediest, rudest students.

i’m so thrilled to see
that every imaginable computer problem
will happen seventh period.

i’m so thrilled to hear
how well my not-quite-eight-year-old
understands sarcasm.

i’m so thrilled to know
that you think i need to read a book about defiance
so i can begin to put her in line.

i’m so thrilled to remember
why it is that she and i were not defiant.
fear is a great facilitator of submission.

i’m so thrilled to hear
the temper tantrums and talking back
that follow me everywhere i go.

i’m so thrilled to be
in this place i cannot escape from,
in this hollow where i don’t know who i am.

let me be thrilled
about something for real:
that you will never read this
(not knowing who I really am).

Carry

as much as i hear what you say
i will never understand why.
how in any right mind
could five rooms full of
talking-back teenagers
ever compare
to the jubilant joy
of young children
dashing through the snow?

their voices carry
like songbirds emerged in winter,
shutting out all the
whipping wind’s hollowness.
yet,
you would rather be here,
trapped in our windowless dungeon,
feeding them the lines
you’ve spouted so many times?

i’ll take my two weeks
and carry them in my mind
on my forever vacation.
for now,
i will draw a zipper across my lips
and, for once, be polite.
after all,
this year cannot carry on,
and summer’s sun,
giggling girls,
and road trips
beckon my dreams
from your harsh reality.

2010 in review

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

Healthy blog!

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

Crunchy numbers

Featured image

A helper monkey made this abstract painting, inspired by your stats.

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 3,500 times in 2010. That’s about 8 full 747s.

In 2010, there were 357 new posts, not bad for the first year!

The busiest day of the year was February 24th with 41 views. The most popular post that day was Runaway .

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were facebook.com, en.wordpress.com, jingleyanqiu.wordpress.com, alphainventions.com, and vittetoetimes.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for write up on nature, step write up, gorham pageant of bands, christmas write ups, and how to live on one salary.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

Runaway February 2010
4 comments

2

My Grandmother’s (Ever)last(ing) Gift February 2010
1 comment

3

Top Ten Reasons Why Co-Teaching is Best for ELLs February 2010

4

How to Live on ONE Salary in Today’s World, Day One January 2010
1 comment

5

Co-Teaching: Here’s What I REALLY Think January 2010

Step Write… On

I started this blog on January 3rd, promising to write every day. Now I am entering my 363rd post, and even if I missed a few days here and there, I still managed to update the blog according to my goal. As I enter 2011, I am wondering what the future will hold. I was thinking about writing a blog called “Writing my Bike,” but there are so many other things I like to write about besides biking. My aim to stick with this for a year was partially inspired by the movie Julie and Julia. Not that I was thinking I would become a famous writer, exactly, but that I wanted to commit more of my time to writing. Sticking to one subject, as she did, just didn’t seem to work for me. Over the course of the year, the most hits I receive are for my posts about living on one salary and co-teaching. Interesting. There’s really not much more I can say about living on one salary, because most people are swimming in so much debt that they wouldn’t be able to consider it anyway. As far as co-teaching goes, my situation has improved quite a bit this school year, as I am working with different teachers, so I really don’t have anything bitchy to say, and can’t think of what I could add to the positive benefits I’ve already mentioned.

So… for 2011, perhaps I will continue to add daily posts… perhaps not. I love having a record, although at times an obscure one, of my day-to-day life, so even if few people ever read the blog, at least I will know what was happening at that point. Isn’t that really what a “web log” is supposed to be anyway? A log of one’s life?

Before I close, I would like to put down my resolutions. Just two. First, I would like to try to be more responsible with money, as we have racked up some debts in the past few months, and second, I aim to be consistent with providing the girls a weekly allowance. The only way they are ever going to learn how to manage money themselves is to start now. We’ll see how it goes.

Happy new year everyone! 2010 was an up-and-down year, so I’m hoping that 2011 will be smooth and easy.

December Daughters

Miss Mythili

Miss Logical:
Daddy had to take a cold shower
because we took all the water
with our up-to-the-line bath.

Miss Tattle-Tale:
(whiny voice)Grandpa, Daddy has the binoculars
and he won’t let me have them!

Miss Manipulative:
I am not going to brush my teeth
or comb my hair until you give me Blankey.

Miss Dreamer:
Wait, star, I need to change my wish!
I actually don’t want to be
a monkey living in a tree.

Miss Imaginative:
(holding a broken piece of cilantro)
I just don’t understand why your
daughter would think it’s OK
to jump over the water like that.

Miss Mythili,
my ever-changing artistic child.

Riona

if i say no to your sister,
she stomps her feet
and demands justice.
if i say no to you,
you reluctantly leave the room,
rest your little legs on a chair,
and silently allow
the crocodile tears to flow down your cheeks.
how could i ever say no to the child
who can’t go an hour
without an I love you
or a kiss on the cheek
or a snuggle on the couch?

Isabella

in the course of a few months
of second grade,
you have learned the
kissing-marriage-baby-carriage song
and its R-rated 21st century version,
how to access the Internet
and what web sites have the best games,
how to apply lipstick
and pose like a model for pictures,
how to multiply and say
Newton’s laws of motion
in English and Spanish,
and how to grow up
too quickly right before my eyes.

Fifty-Seven

it takes two sisters
four hours to make
three pies
dessert for fourteen people
when we include
two of six aunts
two of seven uncles.
three platters of lasagna
and forty-two plates later
we celebrate
year fifty-seven of
my father’s life
who with two “old” legs
just rode
twenty-four miles up a mountain
and hiked three and a half
and still carries his four grandkids
wherever the
endless numbers add up to next.

Endless Arrays

this is what it could be like:
the drive along the curvy road,
the sleeping baby at home,
the seven of us occupying
every last seat in the van,
the mountains with their
endless array of snow,
our legs working their way
through drifts and down slopes,
the warming hut that
warms our hearts,
the children with their
endless array of happiness;
you here, the four of us together,
just as all families should be.

Dimension

i am not here in this moment
of screaming, cussing anger.
i am magically moving my father’s car
into another dimension

here, at home, where i have a husband
who in thirteen years has barely
raised a voice, let alone allowed a cuss
in a world that is love, love, love.

you may pull forward your Sorento
and disappear into your hateful reality.
i prefer to remain in the dimension of love
that shields my heart from your evility.

you will drive home, your elderly parents
unable to determine where they went wrong.
i will drive until he takes the wheel from my
shaking hands, his hands on my hands, my heart.

Relentless Warrior

The last three
Of twenty-one
I have to stop
Three times.
Breath a luxury
My lungs desire.
Gatorade gone
Wind relentless
And skinny bike chick
Passing me up.

How many months till May?
It’s pedaling up
Faster than i can ride down
This hill that’s kicked
My ass into the gear
Of the relentless warrior.