My blog has moved!

Little old me has outgrown this little old blog.

Time for a new name, a new platform, and a new look:

www.oliviaobryon.com

If you use blogger as your reader, you can still add me to your blog feed or sign-up to follow me by email.  Hope to see you at my new online home!

No, we ain't gonna take it!

I'm feeling a bit revved up.  And, yes, Twisted Sister is stuck in my head.  This week was hard at school.  I will do my best to express myself while being careful not to overstep any professional boundaries, but I really wish that I could just say everything that's on my mind.

The hardest part about my job can be how I am sometimes treated.  I work my butt off.  I put my heart and soul into my work.  I care about every single one of my students, even the ones that are the most behaviorally challenging.  Fortunately, the parents of my most behaviorally challenging students have been supportive this year, so that's not what's eating at me.

I just wish that I could invite the families of all of my students to come in and spend a day in my classroom.  I would like them to see what it is like to balance the individual social, emotional, physical, and mental needs of 30 students simultaneously while also attempting to teach a class.  A lot of times, I only have a couple of minutes to solve problems that come up in my room, and it's not because I don't care, (imagine one student having an asthma attack, while another is crying under her desk, while two others are bickering... that's not an unusual scene after recess in my room).

I'm a very reflective and pragmatic human being.  I am willing to admit when I make mistakes and grow from them.  However, there are also times that I feel like families have to be present in my room during the event and know all of the students involved to truly understand the choices that I make.  Being a teacher is not the same as having children, unless you have 30 of them.  I'm not saying it's harder, I'm just saying it's different.  You're more likely to get the teacher to understand where you're coming from if you approach him or her with respect and a willingness to admit that maybe you do not fully understand what happened either.

There, I feel better.

Separation of School and Home

I know that I run a risk having a blog and being a teacher.

I try to use my maiden name for writing and my married name for teaching, but sometimes this is not enough.  Some students found the online me today.

Teaching can be all consuming.  Papers to grade at night, lessons to plan on the weekends, after school events to coordinate, parents texting and calling at all hours.  Don't get me wrong, I love my job (most of the time), but I also need a separation of school and home.

So, tonight, when I discovered that I had been discovered, I was pretty disappointed.

Sometimes I need a little break to be me, even if it's public, on the internet, in pursuit of my other passion, writing.

Hopefully, they found me so boring that they don't come back...

Familial Insomnia

It's 10:43 and I should be asleep.  I get up 7 hours and 17 minutes from now.  Anything less than 8 hours of sleep does not work for me.

However, I'm wide awake, obsessed with the concept of how many direct ancestors are responsible for me being here, typing this tonight.  Maybe I should not have slept in until 11, or taken that nap, or shared some of Alex's mocha after dinner...

2,048 direct ancestors in the past 10 generations, to be exact.  Two parents, four grandparents, eight great grandparents, 16 great great grandparents...  I feel like I have the Math Curse that my students love so much.

Oops on the 2,046 instead of 2,048... Apparently my mental math isn't as good as my fourth graders'!

Ten generations probably only gets me back around 300 years, (liberally assuming each generation has children about every 30 years).  That means, we really have thousands of direct ancestors, far more than the 2,048 that I was patient enough to calculate.

This blows my mind.

And, it does not even take into account all of the great aunts, second cousins, etc. that we're genetically connected to, (or their thousands of separate descendants).  The more I start to think this way, the more I start to feel like the whole world must somehow be related.  I guess it doesn't help that my dad found some MacKays related to us in the 1600s, (I don't think this automatically qualifies me as being related to my husband, right?).

What I also find interesting about all of this is that even though I connect most with my paternal last name, I really have countless last names in my background that are just as responsible for me being here.  According to my dad's recent family tree research, which gets a couple of our lines back to the 1600s, I am just as much German, French, Prussian, and English as I am Irish, but since my last name is O'Bryon, I've always connected most with this piece of my heritage.

It's fascinating to think that we're really the result of so many people from so many backgrounds.  I have ancestors that lived in the original colonies, ancestors that were Native Americans, ancestors that migrated only a couple of generations ago from Prussia.

I am so many people.  You are too.  The math nerd in me can't get over this.

A partial list of the last names in my background over the past few hundred years, maybe we're related!

Portland: Mecca of the Hybrid Hipster

Last night Alex declared to me that he is a hipster.  He is out of the proverbial closet.  Pipe smoking, road-bike riding, hipster.  Apparently, this video confirmed it for him, even though I was pretty sure that his love for Portland, Berkeley, and messenger bags gave him away years ago.

Actually, we're a new breed of hipsters.  True hipsters might call us posers, but I think we're just a hybrid of the hipster and the yuppie.  I'm not ashamed.  I like organic food, shit yogis say, and, of course, Portland, (as well as yuppie things like homeownership and a regular paycheck!).

So, when a coworker/friend asked me if I wanted to spend 26 hours stuffed in a Prius on a road trip to Olympia for her roller derby bout that would include a night in our beloved Portland, how could I say no?  (And, seriously, how could this scenario get anymore hipster?)

Yes, I know, true hipsters do not admit their hipster identity under any circumstance.  That's why I'm the hybrid version.

Here's my top 10 hybrid hipster reasons that I love Portland:

1.  Dirty bars, (even if I want to exit the dirty bars at midnight ;)
2.  Revamped industrial districts
3.  Foodie food
4.  Voodoo donuts, (standing in line for anything makes it that much cooler, okay, not really, but I still like weird donuts!)
5.  Microbreweries galore
6.  Green everything, (trees, hillsides, environmental consciousness, bicycles...)
7.  Proximity to the Oregon coast, Columbia Gorge
8.  Dogs welcome EVERYWHERE
9.  Alabama Street & NW 23rd, (two neighborhoods that make me miss Berkeley... hello gourmet food trucks with picnic seating areas!)
10.  Isn't Portland where young people go to retire?


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Voodoo Donuts in the middle of the night here I come!

Poetic Obsession

I'm taking a journey through other people's lives.  Through the stories of authors published, through their insecurities and perseverance.  More often than not, I hear myself in their stories.  Neurotic obsessions with the written word.  Undying insistence that they deserve to be published.

Maybe I do not deserve it yet, I often think.  But, I will.  I will write and write again until it works.  Until it clicks and all makes sense and someone will want to pay to read it, even if really, I only write it for myself.  Writing for myself does not pay the bills.

Each day I add agents to the growing list, I read stories.  Story after story of not giving up.  Author blogs.  Each day a different theme, a different message, still somehow threaded together, connected between entries, shouting truths at me.

Today, poetry.

First, it was Janet Fitch's advice to read poetry to learn how to write.

Then, it was a young agent, stumbled across after chasing down Barbara Kingsolver, who when googled, I discovered was the poet of delightful oddities.

So, poetry it is.

My late grandmother was a poet.  Ever since I was a child, I've carried around this book from house to house that belonged to her.  It is filled with poems, pencil marked with her favorites, an extra, my favorite of her favorites, glued to the inside of the back cover.  Somehow, one book of poems, created an imaginary bridge between the living and the dead, a relationship between us over shared words.

Just reading poetry helps my words flow.  Poetry, poetry, poetry.  Such a simple, often overlooked piece of the writing world, yet home to so many wonderful secrets.  I never thought I liked poetry until just now.  Turns out I've liked it all along.

Any poets out there?  Any poems to share?  I can feel a new obsession brewing.  A goal, perhaps, of one poem read each night.  New inspiration.

On the inside front cover, the name Frank Schmold is written in cursive, a mysterious figure in my imagination.

One of my grandmother's favorites I read aloud over and over as a melancholy teenager.

Rose petals from those melancholy teenaged years, pressed for posterity.

Last, but not least, the poem my grandmother glued to the inside back cover.  I've always wondered who or what it made her think of...

100th Post: Writing Business Plan!

To keep myself focused, I made a writing business plan for the rest of the year:

May - June 7:  Research one agent/day to add to my query list.  Create spreadsheet to record submission guidelines, contact info, why I selected each agent.  I already have a list of 7 agents that represent authors that either are young/up-and-coming or wrote books that I enjoy.  Goal is to have 30+ agents on my list for summer.

June 8 - June 22:  Hello summer vacation.  Two weeks to edit/revise my manuscript before submission.

June 23 - 30:  Perfect my basic query letter, (to be tweaked based on information gathered on individual agents above).

July 1 - 31:  Submit query to minimum one agent/day, making up for any days missed on subsequent days.  Goal 31+ agents in 31 days.

August:  Post pitches for next book to blog, commit to next book idea, (I have four!).  Even if nothing happens to the first book, I am determined to keep moving forward.

September - October:  Research background information for next book, read similar books, non-fiction texts to support experiences in book.

November:  Nanowrimo!  Time for another 50,000 words!

At this rate, I should produce at least one book/year, (last book began in July, got rolling in November, will be finished June).  

Last, but not least, I have to celebrate that this is my 100th post!  It has apparently been a very wordy year.

I love lists/plans/notes/calendars.  They give a sense of control over the future, making huge tasks feel attainable.

Travel Bug.

Growing up, I was obsessed with travel.  Scrapbooks full of travel magazine cutouts.  Subscriptions to Conde Nast and Budget Traveler.  A constant barrage of pleas to my parents to take me somewhere, anywhere, everywhere.

In college, I got close to living my dream.  I submitted a dorky audition video to a Travel Channel show.  To my amazement, I was invited to audition in LA.  I didn't get picked.  Instead, I was interrogated by a panel of producers about my boyfriend situation.  Apparently having one wasn't very desirable for "reality television."  Oh well.  I would not have traded my boyfriend for the gig.  He's now my husband.

Today, I am still obsessed with travel, but in a more subdued way.  The characters in my book travel for me.  Of course, I'd love to take their places, but my priorities have shifted.  Gone are the days when I would spend every last dollar in my savings account to run off on some adventure, or at least gone for now.

Instead, one trip at a time, as I work my way through an always changing list.  This YouTube video reminded me of how I once purchased $5k in film equipment in hopes of becoming a travel filmmaker.  I admire these guys for actually making it work.  It's important not to let dreams die.

Here's my top 10 dream travel list:

1.  Missoula, MT (Home to my aunt/uncle, scary grizzly bears, yummy beer, and beautiful wilderness)
2.  Gothenburg, Sweden (Home to my lovely cousin, her family, and midsummer)
3.  New York, NY (Still never been, want to see my cousin dance for the New York City Ballet, and live out Anthony Bourdain's Layover food itinerary)
4.  Barcelona, Spain (My favorite city in Europe, Alex hasn't been, I want to relive its Gothic streets, Mediterranean beaches, and vibrant markets)
5.  Tokyo, Japan (I still have a Lost in Translation fantasy of this city, I want to wander from Karaoke bar to Karaoke bar in the middle of the night)
6.  Buenos Aires, Argentina (From Evita to Las Madres de La Plaza de Mayo, Buenos Aires is darkly mysterious and reputed to be the Paris of Latin America)
7.  Paris, France (Yes, I've been, but a good deal of my book occurs here and I've been following the blog of a young family that moved to Paris, which is exactly the sort of thing that deeply inspires me)
8.  Maui, (Okay, I know I'm going to Kauai this summer and have been to Maui before, but I really want to take Alex on the road to Hana and to Mama's Fish House)
9.  Dalmatian Coast, Croatia, (Google image it for instant explanation)
10.  Prague, Czech Republic (Unbearable Lightness of Being is one of my all-time favorite books, takes place in Prague, MUST GO.)

What's your list?

Mom

My mom and I have the same hands.  She humored me for this post by letting me take these silly pictures to prove it.  Our hands are exactly the same size.  In fact, when pressed together, they are mirror images.

The older I get, the more of my mom that I find in myself.  Hands, laughter, kindness.  I owe much of who I am to her.  She influenced me to become a teacher.  She showed me how to be brave and not care so much about what others think.

"To thine own self be true."  The most famous words of wisdom from my mom.

For so many years I fought against all of the things that I admire most about her.  Refused to eat the right foods, scoffed at activism, pretended not to care about nature.  In all of my childish efforts to be different from my mom, I've ironically turned out in many ways to be the same.  

Better yet, I am now proud of these similarities.

Being a mom has to be one of the hardest jobs on the planet.  All of that waiting for your kids to fully appreciate, understand, and embrace your efforts.

Thank you Mom for your patience.

My mom and I are more alike than I realize.

Oh, May.

While other teachers count down the days until summer, I childishly declare my love for May.  In fact, May might just be my favorite month of the teaching year!  I think it goes back to that correlation between anticipation and happiness-- May is like the Friday of teaching.

Oh, May.

You bring two weeks of testing,
With four minimum days.
Oh, how I love thee,
Let me count the ways.

First there is time,
Each day out by four,
No more long evenings,
Watching the door.

Second there is sunshine,
Evenings stretch before dark,
Time to do yoga,
And take the dog to the park.

Last there is teaching,
With the tests over and done,
More time for history,
For art, and for fun.

Source: dearfriendrebekkaseale.blogspot.com via Nicole on Pinterest

Why my toes will be naked this summer!

I love pedicures as much as the next girl.  In fact, I anxiously await the warm months for the excuse to have someone rub my feet and make my toes look cute.  It's a cheap thrill.  In my circle of friends, it's also a social ritual.

However, this summer, my toes will be naked.

I make this declaration now because I know that it is going to take some serious self-control to decline the inevitable invitations.

Here's why I'm abstaining:

1.  When my last pedicure finally chipped away this fall, I discovered that my toe nails were half dead, suffocated beneath the polish.  Six months pedicure free, they're beginning to look healthy again.

2.  Prompted by my experience above, I decided to do a little research on the chemicals in nail polish.  Among my most interesting findings, I discovered that chemical-free nail polish, which I planned to substitute, often contains the same harmful toxins despite claims to the contrary, (further reading click here).  

3.  In college, my IR classes highlighted the unfortunate truth that many nail salons are part of human trafficking rings.  Immigrants are promised jobs in the US, then work as indentured servants to earn back their freedom.  The conditions of these arrangements often border on modern slavery, not to mention the harmful effects of breathing toxic nail polish all day.  Click here for one example in Ohio.

So, there you go.  Naked toes seem like an easy way to cut back on some of the toxins in my body, restore health to my sad little toe nails, and make a social statement that people shouldn't be forced to breathe toxic nail polish fumes all day as a job.

I promise, if you know me in real life, I will attach no judgment to whether you continue to use nail polish or visit nail salons.  Goodness knows that I still buy clothes made in sweatshops, talk on a cell phone that could debatably give me a brain tumor, and partake in all sorts of other activities that people disagree with on either health or moral grounds.  I can only handle a couple of battles at a time, so I chose this one.

Good-bye nail polish :(

Retail Therapy: Anticipation Purchases

I fancy myself minimally materialistic.  I won't lie and say that I don't like new things-- I do, but generally I avoid situations that make me want to purchase items that I don't need.  In other words, I consciously avoid shopping.

However, today I gave in.  Alex and I went to find new jeans for him and came home with goodies for me.  New running shoes, check.  Need those to run on the beach.  A hat to block the Hawaiian sun from my face, essential.  Flip flops to replace the ones rotting from yard work, yep.  1950's inspired D&G sunglasses to look cute, okay, I didn't need those, I just wanted them, badly.

Thanks to Nordstrom Rack I managed to purchase all of these items for around $160.  Not bad when you consider that the D&G glasses retailed for $155 alone.  In fact, it's a rare dose of retail therapy that so far brings zero remorse.  Usually, I have a hard time buying anything for myself, anything, and often I end up taking everything back.

I don't feel guilty this time is because I justified everything as "necessary" vacation purchases for our summer trip.  A stretch, perhaps, but I have always derived extra morsels of anticipation from buying little things to use on vacation.  Somehow, these purchases prolong the happiness derived from travel as their imagined use enhances the entire experience.

Maybe retail therapy is not the secret to lasting happiness, but sometimes, it really doesn't hurt.

My collected treasures...

Now I'm officially beach ready!

To sell or keep your wedding dress?

Most people sound surprised when I tell them that I'm selling my wedding dress.

"Don't you want to keep it?"

"What if your daughter wants to wear it?"

"I bet you'll wish you had it when you're an old lady."

Maybe they're right.  It is not an easy choice.  I am attached to it.  

However, it also bothers me, hanging there in my closet, taking up so much space for the sake of the past.  My real attachment is to the memories, the pictures, the day.  The actual dress is just one piece that happens to take up a gigantic amount of space in my bedroom's "quaint" 1950s closet.

While I understand the logic of keeping it, I also romanticize the idea of it living on as part of someone else's special day.  Perhaps it will be like the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants but with a wedding dress between strangers.  I almost imagine it becoming its own story, a book even.  Living on from love story to love story.  Ending its life well-used, tattered in some thrift store until someone finds it and decides to reinvent it again.  Maybe I have too much hope for my little old dress.

The hippie in me likes the idea of selling it though.  Let someone else use it again.  Reduce, reuse, recycle.

I know there is a chance I'll miss it, but I also enjoy the small act of rebellion in not holding onto it.  We'll see.  Someone actually has to buy it first.  

When I went shopping for a wedding dress, I thought I wanted something understated, tea length maybe.  I almost bought a vintage Audrey-Hepburnesque dress that hit at the knees.  I anticipated the shock value of defying tradition.  However, no other day in my life would I ever have the excuse to revel in such pageantry.  I didn't even want to try this dress on, but my sister Kaitlyn convinced me, and once it was on, I was happy.  Now, it would be cool if this dress could make someone else feel the same way!

Writing: Hope, Focus, Perseverance

Audrey Niffenegger, author of Time Traveler's Wife, sent out 25 agent queries before landing an agent.

I don't fancy myself at her level of writing, so I am prepared for the reality that finding a home for my first book may take forever, literally.  While I'm researching agents with similar authors and small publishers accepting manuscripts, I'm also anxious to start writing again.  Writing is the fun part.

My next book already lives inside my head and I'm obsessed.  It's very different than my first.  Darker, more developed.  This time, I plan to thoroughly brainstorm the characters backgrounds before I begin.  I'm excited to see my writing grow.

Last time, in the heat of 50,000 words in one month, (under Nanowrimo's tutelage), I knew where I wanted to go, but I didn't stop to plan along the way.  In some ways this was wonderful.  It got me past the first couple of chapters, where I usually get stuck.  It also surprised me as the plot unfolded, allowing me to live in the story like a reader instead of just following an outline.   

I've tried to outline write before, it didn't work for me.  I had fun writing the outline and then lost interest when it was time to write the middle chapters.  

Do you have a writing process that works best for you?  

I enjoy hearing how other people write.  I relate a lot to Audrey Niffenegger.  She wrote Time Traveler's Wife for herself, for the enjoyment of writing, in her moments between doing other things.  I could not help but note that she's older than I am.  This gives me hope that I can craft myself into a distinguished writer over time.

Now, all I need is a mantra...

Source: elissabassist.com via Avril on Pinterest

Happy May Day: Let's Bring Back the 40 Hour Work Week!

Life is so much happier when we spend 8 hours a day at work.  The days that I leave school at 3:30 feel so much more complete.  I have time for a nap, yoga, writing, walking the dog, and spending time with my husband-- all in one evening!

However, 3:30 days are rare.  And, I know I'm not alone.  Eight hour days were uncommon at my old job.  Friends all complain of being overworked.  Companies blame the recession.  A recent media debate exploded around whether people have to be parents to justify leaving work at 6:00.

I know that I'm lucky.  If I plan my time right, I can leave at 3:30 some days.  As a teacher, I also get breaks.  But, I sacrifice pay for these luxuries.

In honor of May Day, I proclaim my support of a societal shift back to the 8-hour workday!  Call me a Marxist, but we could all use a little more life in our life!