The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same…

Those who know me know that my favorite book is Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist:  the story of a boy who goes in search of his destiny — his “personal legend”.  After several years, many mishaps, many lessons learned, his journey leads him back to where he started. 

I’ve recently become a Facebook junkie.  I set up an account about a year and a half ago, but really didn’t do anything with it.  Most of the people from whom I received friend requests were acquaintances from high school, and, honestly, I wondered why, since I really didn’t know many of them that well back then.  Eventually, though, I started exploring the site, searching out people about whom I had fond memories as well as people I interact with daily in my present life.  My friends list grew (and continues to) and now includes my own children, some of their friends, a few of my students, several colleagues, former colleagues, and many people from the various stages of my youth — college, high school, (including my high school band director) and even elementary school.  I haven’t spoken to many of these people in over twenty years. I admit that, while they are on my “friends” list, I don’t know if some of these people ever were my friends, or even if they were, if they still would be.  I don’t know what to say to them to break the ice, and I assume they feel the same about me.

However, I have re-developed relationships with a few people from my distant past through the nifty IM feature on Facebook, and I am surprised at how much I still like the people that I liked as a child/adolescent.  Susie and I (who were inseparable in elementary school, but haven’t talked since maybe 1984) chatted about our children and our romantic interests as though we still lived across the street from each other and spent every weekend night together.  Bruce and I caught up briefly on what has happened to each of us over the past 20-something years, then talked about things that were important to us now.  Amy, a high school friend and my roommate during my sophomore year in college, dared me to analyze her, though I haven’t seen her since 1987, and she said I hit the nail on the head.  Bart can still make me giggle with his snide sense of humor, even if he’s not putting Mr. Smith in a vacuum chamber. Tom still makes me smile with his eclectic and eccentric musical choices. It’s somehow comforting to know that the people who meant so much to me in my youth have grown up to be people that I’d still like to be friends with.  We have so much more than our past experiences in common.

I don’t want to suggest that these people have not changed since the 1980s — far from it– but who they are at their core has remained surprisingly constant over the years.  Apparently so have I.  No one so much as raises an eyebrow when they learn that I became a teacher, or that I’ve raised two highly gifted kids.  They tell me that I was always smart and nurturing, as though they expected this of me.

It was a conversation I had with a friend from my last year in college that struck me the most ferociously, though.  We lost touch after college, but met  again for an afternon  in 1993 in Texas, then lost track again until just over a year ago.  Now we talk or text almost daily.  One night when I was feeling really low, he called and told me that of his friends from that time period, I was the one he never worried about making something of myself.  He described me as strong, independent, intelligent, and sensible when I was 21.  He knew that I would fall down occasionally, but that I would always get back up. I didn’t see myself that way at all back then, and have spent all of my adult life trying to become that.  It was quite a revelation to me.  I wondered if, had I known then that I already was what I wanted to become, I would have taken a different path in my life, perhaps one not so difficult.  Would I have chosen different men to date/marry?  Would I have avoided the heartbeaks and disappointments I suffered?  Would I have done it all differently?

Of course not, I now realize, because the journey that I took in order to find that truth — that I always was who I wanted to become — was the journey I needed to take.  While the treasure that Coelho’s shepherd, Santiago, dreamt of was actually right under his head, it was his destiny to work in the tea shop, cross the desert, meet Fatima, become advisor to the chief of the oasis, become the wind, and get his ass kicked by robbers in the shadows of the pyramids.  He wouldn’t have found his treasure if he hadn’t taken that journey.

I’ve taken my own journey, and continue to, but  I know now that the treasure I seek very well may be right where I began.

Defining myself

One of the many great things about being a teacher is, as you might imagine, having the summer off.  I really don’t know how people work year round!  I put so much of my heart and soul into my work for ten months of the year; I really need those summer months to recharge my batteries and take stock of my life.  I try to spend that time thinking about me, since I spend so much time taking care of the needs and demands of others, and often lose sight of who I am, what I need, what is important to me.  By the end of summer, I am inevitably ready to go back to work, to immerse myself in the daily madness of a public high school and the myriad of crises that my students find themselves involved in.  I realize each fall that that is where I find myself.

This summer was very intense for me, self reflection-wise.  My sons spent two months with their father, leaving me all to myself.  I thought it would be great — 60 days with no responsibility to anyone but myself!  No defining myself as mother or teacher!  I could stay out all night if I wanted, eat popcorn for dinner if I felt like it, I could walk through the house naked and not worry about traumatizing my teenage boys, I had no schedule, no obligations!  The joy of that lasted for a few days.  Then I realized that without my students or my kids, I was only flapping in the wind.

That realization horrified me.  I like to think of myself as a very independent, strong, well-adjusted woman who is comfortable in her own skin.  After 10 years of marriage, I had just recently discovered myself as a woman separate from my job and my role as a wife and mother, and I was pleased with that.  I didn’t like that I felt so lost without someone needing something from me.  I was a disappointed in myself for needing others to validate my worth.  “I must learn to be okay with myself!”  I told myself, and so, spent three full days alone in my apartment, literally not speaking the entire time.

Being okay with myself, I discovered during that time, is learning to accept who I am, not trying to be who I think I should be.  “Who I am”  is a mother, a teacher, a friend, a mentor, a role model (not always a good one!), a caregiver, an occasional lover.  I am who I am because of the relationships I have with others.  The sacrifices I make for others are neither a sign of weakness nor a cause for sainthood.  They are not intended to ingratiate me in the eyes of others or to establish credit in the “favor bank”.  I give my heart, my soul, my energy, my time, and my sympathy to others because, through doing so, I meet my own needs, and thus become more of me.

I had a rather long IM conversation with a friend whose lifestyle may very well cost her the chance to be ordained in the church to which she dedicated much of her life.  She seems okay with that, though, for she said something to the effect of  “It is through our relationships with others that we find our spirituality; not inside some church.”  Let me be clear:  she has in no way rejected her church’s teachings, nor has she turned her back on her calling.  She just realized that she was most able to really understand the idea of “God’s love” through a relationship that, while not unacceptable to the church, was too controversial to condone, and that teaching needy teenagers was a more effective way for her to share this love than through preaching to a congregation.  It was through her relationships with others that she found her true purpose, and in that sense, became closer to God than she might have otherwise.

Another friend of mine is going through some pretty rough times, and intimated that he hates asking others for help.  This is something that’s tough for me, too, but I’ve recently been forced to rely on others for assistance, and I’ve found that my really good friends are not only willing to help me in any way they can, but are hurt when I don’t ask.  They tell me that it gives them pleasure to know that they can ease my burdens, that they can be useful.  It gives them new energy to feel connected to another human through helping.  Giving assistance serves to refill the well.

So, I’m no longer disappointed in myself for defining myself based on my relationships with others.  I’m good with the fact that my needs are met by making others, if not happy, better equipped to face their own challenges.  I’ve accepted and embraced the notion that I am revitalized by knowing I’ve done some good for someone else. 

Given this, I’m ready to face the madness of high school again, ready to be at the beck and call of a host of needy teenagers.  This is what will really recharge my batteries, and I sure need it, because this summer spent with myself drained me!