Day 62- May 13, 2020

Day 62- May 13, 2020

My vision was normal all day, though I was extremely conscious about how much time I spent on computers.  Instead, I did the work I had to for my job, and once the "school day" was over, I turned off the computer, put away my phone, and avoided both.

Except for one minor exception.  Since our seniors can't graduate in the "normal" sense, the teachers are making a video for them, wishing them good luck.  So the girls helped me put this together, and we stood in the yard as I told them to seek out happiness.  It's a lesson that I used to teach my students regularly- don't look for the highest paying job, or the one that will give you fame, look for the one that makes you happy.  TRULY happy.  It's incredibly easy to fail- at something you love or something you hate- but to succeed, you have to strive and work, and put a lot of time in.  You should do something that brings you joy.  I feel like the longer we're stuck in quarantine, the more I look at what is important in life.  When you really examine this, you hold onto the things that are your "bliss"- whether it's family, travel, writing, creating art, working outside, etc.  Discovering your bliss it key.

E. seems to have found hers, and it involves running this diner out of her closet. Today, we received the order of plastic food she had secured with one of her Christmas Amazon gift cards.  I washed all of it thoroughly, then allowed her to take it to her room to organize.  An hour later, I was invited in for a "free meal" (sunny side up eggs, waffles, and croissants).  She busied herself like a waitress, and was thrilled to be able to "serve" at the tables she has created out of her desk and dresser.  The closet is still serving as the kitchen, and she's taken the food and arranged it by meal/type (breakfast, dinner, fruits and veggies, and desserts) on the green shelves that used to house her clothes (they seem to have been relegated to the floor in the corner and/or on the top shelf, hidden by a sheet that apparently helps create ambiance in there).

We watched a Disney Sing-Along show (apparently it aired a while ago, but we just caught clips of it today).  The girls belted out songs from Moana and Frozen, and I realized how strong of a singer Riley is.  She already loves theatre- she was in her first show ever this year, playing a Duloc citizen in the musical Shrek Jr (all the third graders were Duloc citizens- you could only audition for a speaking role/solos if you were in fourth or fifth grade).  I can see her finding a future in this.

I was in every play possible at my schools from second grade through 8th (I always loved to perform, and as one of the louder voiced kids in my school, I managed to pull off getting leads in a lot of those shows).  But in high school, I had to choose between theatre and soccer, and soccer took precedence. I did end up performing in a play my senior year, though.  One of my friends wrote it, and got permission from the school to have it performed for a limited run in February.  Since that was off-season for soccer, I was able to audition, and I still remember picking up the monologue before school, and memorizing it when I should have been paying attention in class.  There were a lot of girls who were part of our drama club, Gold Masque, who I knew would be front runners, but I had to give it a shot.  By the time I stood on stage during our lunch period auditioning, I had it memorized, and was able to impress the writer and producer enough to secure the lead. 

It led to me absolutely falling in love with performing, and a decade-long run of trying to make a go of it as an actor (after college, of course).  Alas, as much as I enjoyed when I was performing, there was a lot I didn't love about the business behind it, and when I started approaching thirty, I made the choice to switch to a more stable career, and became a teacher.  I never regretted it, because it allowed me to be a mom and to spend a lot more time with my family.  Happiness, to me, is being around people who appreciate me for me, not for someone I pretend to be.  Having a job with the same hours that my kids are in school, and gives me summers off to spend with them and my husband, is true bliss.

Speaking of which, the girls were also allowed to stay up late tonight, so that they could watch the season finales of The Goldbergs and Schooled.  I'll admit, I'm kind of a sucker for all things nostalgia.  Watching these shows inevitably brings back memories of childhood, since like the the main character Adam, I used to videotape a LOT of my and my family's exploits (of course- this is what performers do).  We've shown the kids some of the better ones (homemade soap operas, music videos, sketch comedy skits, news broadcasts), and my husband likes to tease me that I showed them to him right when we started dating.  I'm sure I had some legitimate reason for this, like I thought it would impress him, and to a degree, I guess it worked.  He's said that the fact that I was so transparent with him, and was my weird self, was one of the reasons he liked me so much.  I never tried to be someone I wasn't- I'm the girl who lip syncs to Madonna while wearing dress up clothes from the 1950's that I found in the attic.

Both these sitcoms make me happy.  I decided a while ago that if I'm going to spend time watching television, I'm going to look at shows that make me laugh.  There's enough drama and sadness in the real world- give me a sitcom where everyone hugs at the end of the half hour.