May and Music

May has been pretty good to me. It brought me warmer weather. It brought me the end of the school year. It brought me a new haircut. It brought me new music and...it brought me a nice cold (Thanks May, for helping me be more grateful for health.  You're always teaching my great lessons...).

The last week of school was a celebration of all sorts. I embraced the upcoming summer months with blonde highlights on Tuesday, beautiful live music on Thursday, and rowdy teacher-student four square on Friday.

Let's backtrack to Thursday for a minute, though. I was lucky enough to get tickets to the SOLD OUT concert by The Civil Wars. Aubry (who I released I've known for 6 years!) came with me...smart woman. We were worried about getting close, but when the time came, we were literally lounging on the stage.  Elbows on the stage, pianist in reach, eye contact made.  It was pretty ideal.  We had never heard of the opening act, Milo Greene, but we are definitely fans. These guys rotate lead singer between the 4 members up front, and they like to switch instruments between just about every song. They're an alternative group that you may classify on the edge of folk? I don't know; check them out.

The Civil Wars, of course, sound incredible live. They sound exactly like they do on their record. Joy has a mesmerizing voice and personality. She's a month away from having a baby, too.  Besides being a dead ringer for Johnny Depp, John Paul rounds out the sound of the duo with his high yet soft voice and guitar skills. These guys are minimalist, folkish too.  

Crap...it just turned June! The majority of this blog was written in May...so it still counts.

Anyway, Sara Bareilles came out with a new EP as well, which is pretty great. I've got 2 out of the 4 concerts for this year down. I'm totally rocking this New Year's Resolution thing.  I am free of school/work for the next little while, which is great for my sanity. 

If this cold doesn't cripple me, I'll be running 5.5 miles for the Dirty Dash on Saturday...but that's for June.  Stay tuned.

April. That was a quick one!

I've got about 22 minutes before April is over, so I think this last minute thing is becoming a bit of a tradition!

April is National Poetry Month, and in honor of a medium that is greatly under-appreciated and widely misunderstood, I'd like to share one of my poems. Yeah, you read that right, one of MY poems.

Before I do that, I'll give you a quick update on the few things you need to know about my life in the last month.

                  1-I went to the Ingrid Michaelson concert with Emily (also ran into 3 fellow ward members that let me jump into the line with them). Ingrid was AMAZING. This red-headed girl can sing her precious heart out. Harper Blynn opened, and they were quite good live as well. (Their cd is free right online!) I don't have any good pictures, but I lived the moment.

2-My cousin Monica painted my fingernails with sassy blue and black zebra stripes. I rocked them, and my students loved them.  Who wouldn't?

3-Spring Break happened.  There was a lot of sleeping, running, reading, and lounging.

4-I ran the Color Me Rad 5k with good friends, my boss, and my sister Kara.  We made sweet team shirts and spent a beautiful Saturday morning throwing and inhaling colored and perfumed corn starch! It was RAD.  Check out Kara's account of the event here.

Without further ado, a poem:

In the Middle

 

In this giant puzzle of a world,

This piece fits right in the middle.

My boney edges and awkward expressions settle in quite snuggly,

Snapping into place somewhere between the socially inept and those who know how to fake it.

On one side,

The surefire signs of success and confidence grace the faces of the well adjusted.

On the other side,

The sheer fear of a conversation grips the lips of the submissive and insecure.

Still, I sit in the middle.

My pointed shoulder brushes the Harvard bred intelligent,

While my rounded toe taps the hard-hitting athlete.

The million-dollar degree versus the million-dollar swing,

Both betting on their dreams in the land of the free…

Still, I sit in the middle.

My pulsing hands get to touch both sides of a system that provides the silver spoon and the power line shoes.

Confused by the hard working souls that yearn for more,

Receiving tragically different results.

I’m still, sitting in the middle.

Yeah…in the middle,

Where I revolve with the world and its’ many puzzled sides,

So, when I try to hold the hand of the suffering, I can’t get any closer.

Try to shout praise at the worthy and my words won’t get any louder.

Two tangible planes that we make sure to separate

Stay in our places,

Accept our fates.

How do I break the borders of this jagged piece?

Quake until we’re all jumbled and forced to meet,

Or just say, “Come together, right now, over me!”

I’m in the middle, yeah,

I touch all sides with my boney edges and see with…

Somewhat unbiased eyes.

So, I might do something about this segregation of sorts,

I just might say it,

But maybe I’ll just lay back and encourage everyone to hold their place,

Because…no one likes a puzzle with an empty space.

March and its Madness

I have to start off by saying, Go UK!!!!!!!!!

This month has gone by insanely fast. Between watching NCAA games, work, running, and play, life seemed to be pretty busy. I'm only hoping April goes just as fast because we're in the last term of the school year, and the end is in sight.

One of the major projects for my students this term is to make a podcast, so my preparation for the unit hasn't been too painful. I've been exploring popular podcasts and learning some pretty interesting things. The other day I was listening to a Freakonomics Radio episode called, "Save Me From Myself." The podcast explored the idea of commitment devices, explaining what kind of restraints people put on themselves to ensure they WON'T do something. For example, one man signed himself up for the gambling ban in Missouri because he knew he had a problem. They referenced marriage and gastric bypass as forms of commitment devices, as well.

I found that I've implemented a commitment device into my own life lately without even realizing it. No, not gastric bypass. You remember that exercise 2 times a week New Year's Resolution? About three weeks ago I decided on a whim to participate in the Rex Lee Run 5k. This, of course, would help me have motivation to continue running. The week of the race I ran a total of 9.9 miles and earned my shin splints back...yay!!! (sarcasm) I did, however, enjoy myself. I finished the race with a time of 29:29, and my roommates were there to cheer me on, sign and all.
That night I searched online for more races and quickly became convinced that I needed to do more. Shortly after, my roommate Kyna and I signed up for the Color Me Rad race, April 28th, and The Dirty Dash, June 2nd. I called Kara to see if she would want to do the Riverton 4Life 5k, March 31st. AND the next week I volunteered to start a running group every Tuesday night for my calling...commitment device after commitment device.

Kara and I showed the pavement who's boss today.
We finished with a time of about 27:20! We earned ourselves some third place medals in our respective age divisions!
IF I somehow end up not meeting this New Year's Resolution, I'm thinking it won't happen until at least June...but I don't know, Kyna and I are looking into The Warrior Dash in October too...

Other commitment devices? Those dang drum lessons I've been paying for. It turns out that it's really hard to give up on an instrument when you continue to invest in it. I'm getting better, though, especially when you look at my video from a year ago! Check out the video below to see some random beats that I spliced together.

Untitled from Jessica Dixon on Vimeo.

In other news, I had the opportunity to win $1,000 by throwing a football into a sunroof at the Blaze game and missed by about a foot. So close!
Also, some of my students tried to suck up to me by giving me this award. It totally worked.
Last but not least, Spring Break is in a week, and I think I might weep tears of joy. What should I do? Come up with more commitment devices?

(GO WILDCATS)

Those Who Teach

Here I am again. Last day of February.

Today, Leap Day, my coworkers and I sat in staff meeting for 2 hours. We heard the gritty details of a new student's past, got over the return of an old student, became updated on both the improved and decreased testing scores, listened to a presentation on time limits and, mostly and predictably, fretted over the kids we watch struggle on a regular basis. This is normal for a Wednesday, but similar conversations permeate every school day, every week. Possibly...in the morning when I'm still puffy eyed and my bag has just hit my desk, in the mid-day as I scrape my sometimes unrecognizable food from the kitchen tray, during shift change as my coworker switches back and forth between his opinions on pop culture and a choice student or two, or after school, as we all fit in one more concern before we can go home and attempt to shut off completely.

It doesn't sound glamorous, and it doesn't even sound worth it, but the people I surround myself with for 8 hours a day are either impressively dedicated (coworkers) or desperately in need of help (students). Today was a regular Wednesday, but it wasn't. Looking around the room, I saw a look on most of my coworkers' faces that could only express sincere distress. I heard, "I know we've tried a lot for so-and-so, but there has to be more we can do." "Yeah, we haven't done everything; what can we do?"

We think about these kids all of the time. We adapt lesson plans. We listen to their interests. We build a rapport. We take their backlashing. We stand up as their advocate. We see them as kids, not criminals, or failures, or whatever else they may have ever been labeled. Us teachers, we give a lot. And yet, what more can we give? In that moment, I'm pretty sure the room could have exploded by the amount of heart being poured into our low salary jobs.

Now, I'm not saying that I am or that I work with the most talented teachers ever, there are great teachers everywhere, but we are a super group of people dedicated to a cause. If I'm going to spend my days doing something other than dreaming about the beach, than I'm going to be working for a cause.

I keep telling myself and my students, "There's no end in sight, waiting on a free ride."
(Sara Bareilles "Free Ride")

Update: I've done great on my exercise resolution, exercising not twice but three times each week. My shin splints still persist causing me to sport super cool purple tape on my legs. The February Fitness challenge has been fun, and my last three days of the month have been refined sugar-free (serious feat for me, sadly). And, this post is completed a whole 40 minutes before March.

Procrastinaire

Procrastinaire...you see what I did there? Procrastinator Extroadinaire? I know...

I am happy to say that we are one month in and my New Year's resolutions have been in full force. One of those resolutions may have been to write at least one blog a month...and January's is being fulfilled 30 minutes before it's February...but still, I've totally got this covered! My other resolution that can be quickly tracked is doing cardio two times a week. I have done surprisingly well at this (even though both my cardios had to be done on Saturday last week). My right shin is angry with me for all of the attention it gets from drumming and running, but I'll take the pain.
Bring it.
Meanwhile, work has been busy and dramatic. Besides dealing with unfounded accusations of racism and various levels of student apathy, my job continues to give me a nice sense of purpose. In the last month, I wrote a rap for my students using their 51 vocabulary words. They somehow convinced me to record the rap as well. (D-Scribble is the name, thank you very much.) As the term came to an end, only two of my students failed my class! Also, I had my first evaluation of the year and passed with flying colors. It's a seriously great day when you get validated for all of your hard work.

There are only 7 minutes left in January, so I better finish this quick. February's blog will be more profound and maybe there will even be more than one! Things to look forward to for the next month? I'm participating in a Fitness Challenge with my roommate Kyna and other girls in my ward. I will hopefully attend my first concert of the year (resolution requires 4 in 2012), and there is a nice trip to Texas waiting for me at the end of the month for Keyan's baptism.

Until my next update, you may want to look up Jason Mraz's song " I Won't Give Up." I'm slightly obsessed. (February in 2 minutes)
Love you all!

CaaaaaliforniaAa

Recently I made a week trip out to Southern California for some fun in the sun. My roommate Chelsie and I headed off in hopes of warm weather, crazy adventures, great food, and good company. I had never been to Los Angeles, so I was eager to experience the hustle of the big city. My friend Leigh, who I know from my DC excursions, lives in the LA area as well, and a reunion was extra motivation to head south.

We packed in plenty of adventures during our LA stay:
1. Church with Leigh in the Valley (Where were the celebrities?!)
2. Stroll Venice Beach and Santa Monica Pier (Beautiful and full of bums)
3. Disneyland and California Adventure for 2 days (Lots of standing and childish squeals)
4. Walk up and down Rodeo Dr. in Beverly Hills (I may have spotted Keri Russell)
5. Eat at Famous Phillipes Restaurant (Ate fab French Dips and met DJ Walf/Wolf)
6. Tour Homeboy Industries (A nonprofit for people needing jobs out of prison)
7. Stop by the Stables Center (No one wants to represent the WNBA)
8. Drive in and survive bumper-to-bumper LA traffic (SO funnnnnnnnn)
9. Eat at a food truck in Leigh's Hood (Good stuff! Also, attempt jumping photo)
10. Stroll Old Pasadena (I want to live there. Now. We ate at the best bakery ever, too.)
11. Quick walk through Man's Chinese Theater and Walk of Fame (Asian Invasion)
12. Lose reality at Magic Castle with Chels, Leigh and Heather! (Not sure what to believe anymore)

Needless to say, we had a blast! I was not happy to return to frigid weather, work, and a cold that kicked my butt. Here are some pictures from the fabulous week!

Chelsie and Me at Venice Beach. Don't I just look like I belong?

Soooo beautiful.

Cinnamon Roll French Toast at Disneyland. Ridiculous!

Cinderella's Castle. Awww cute.

Space Mountain is the BEST...so are we.

Buzz Lightyear Ride. I kicked Chelsie's trash.
Splash Mountain. I sat in the very front and got SOAKED!
World of Color at California Adventure. Very very cool!
Messing around at the ESPN store by the Staples Center. We're pretty tough.
It's just not a visit with Leigh without a jumping photo. These shots were tricky at night by the food trucks.
Outside of the Magic Castle. We had no idea what we were about to see!

There are so many more pictures, but these highlight some great moments. Thanks to Leigh and Chels for making it a great vacation! I think I need vacations more often; California knows how to party.

Words of Reminder

My beautiful and extremely talented friend Kristen has had guest bloggers on her site all week. She asked me to participate, and I couldn't have felt more privileged. Her request couldn't have come at a better time, and her blog was the perfect venue for some words that have been on the tip of my tongue all week!

Check out my message on having love for yourself here:
http://kristenashlyn.blogspot.com/2011/08/words-of-reminder-by-jessica.html

Feel free to check out the rest of her blog and guest bloggers while you are at it!