Somewhere Between Nirvana and a Nervous Breakdown

Yep. As I suspected it's been months since my first and only entry. At this point in my life I'll just have to accept this won't be a regular thing. Which leads me to this entry.

Since I began teaching (8 months ago), life has been overflowing. I wake up in the morning and find myself instantly "going" until I fall in bed at night. I am continually reminding myself that I have chosen this pace and that everything I'm doing is all good stuff. Still, I feel like maybe it's too much of a good thing...

I've realized that I'm often going to work (teaching) to relax. I have an amazing job at an alternative high school where my job description is to make art with the kids. The art room has become the ultimate studio for creating work that is spontaneous and inspired. Unlike my own studio where I often feel like I have an agenda, the art room at school is all about being in the moment.

Lesson plans don't work there and I never know who is going to decide to be in class on a given day. It's a lot like parenting. Having a plan is good, but be ready to throw it out the window. I can't imagine a better recipe for art making.

Last Friday was a particularly frenetic teaching day for some reason. The weather has been warming up and I think we all have Spring Fever so there was a lot of energy in the room. I have to throw in here that my family and I are also in the process of trying to find a new place to live. So in the midst of fielding a phone call from a prospective apartment complex (between classes), learning from my principal that I would have two new students (Zack and Zack) sitting in on my class, and answering a plethora of questions from my existing students, I found myself starting to giggle. Almost uncontrollably...but not quite.

In that moment, I couldn't think beyond what was happening right then. Amazingly, it felt exhilarating. It also felt absurd, hence the laughter. What went through my mind was that on the one hand I felt like I was on the verge on attaining enlightenment. On the other, I could have been on the verge of a nervous breakdown, and I wasn't clear on which side I was going to land.

So maybe, they're closer than I think?