Positive Thoughts

Now that I got that last post out of my system, I think it's best to move on to more positive thoughts. I learned something from a friend the other day. The way that she deals with bad days or slumps is to focus on good things. She has a poster of things that make her happy, even very simple things. I've decided to learn from her, and do the same thing. I guess I'll start here and now. Things I like about myself, and things that just make me happy.

Train rides
Road trips/train trips
English
Speaking Polish with a native without any/many problems
Talking about Bible related things with my students, and answering questions about things that matter to them.
Helping other people, especially when I've been through the same thing they are struggling with, or need help with.
Happy students
Students who draw me things on the chalkboard before I get to class
Ice cream
Dove chocolates
Chocolate chip cookies
My mommy and daddy
My nieces and nephews
My brothers
Driving
Watching movies
Singing good Lutheran hymns
Hearing good Lutheran sermons
Theological discussions
comfortable shoes
summer
tulips
orchids
purple
blue
facebook
hardunger
Melvyn Bragg (author)
good books
a nice walk with a friend
a nice talk with a friend
my cat sleeping on my lap, or my arm like now :)
a clean apartment
a warm, fuzzy Christmas with family
Thanksgiving
pumpkin pie
turkey
the scene of a Christmas tree with pretty decorations on and presents underneath
swimming
being fit :)
a Meryl Streep movie
Mamma Mia!
ABBA
FEEL
Doing an activity in class that makes my students feel special and smart
getting dressed up to go out
dancing
singing
washing my car (when I had one)
getting a postcard or letter from a friend
playing the piano
playing the violin (don't know if I still can!)
sharing something about God/Jesus with someone and getting positive feedback
mission trips to poor areas of the world
visiting old people in nursing homes (they LOVE it!)
my great-grandma Luckow (she's 85! and a ball of fire!)
coloring
drawing
flying
listening to a good friend play the organ (he's awesome!)
looking at pictures
wasting time :)
mowing the lawn
cooking or baking with or for someone, but not alone or just for me
Pani Sonia's buleczki (Mrs. Sonia's sandwiches)
Palermo pizza (I live above this pizzeria)
knowing my family and friends are safe and happy
being a student!! I love it!!
hugs
decorating
journaling (used to...haven't done it for a long time)
talking education with people
the first snow of the year (only!)
springtime
summertime
flowers
lilacs
The Sound of Music
London
Krakow
Lebanon
learning languages
surprises
surprising people
making a difference for the better
good leaders
Nebraska
Minnesota lakes
the Northern Lights
Driving a backhoe, excavator, or dozer
Driving my dad's work truck, a one-ton
writing someone a letter
getting off an airplane (especially the long ones) and walking through the tunnels
walking on those walkways or whatever they're called at the big airports...they help you go quicker...love those things! I couldn't stop smiling, laughing the first time I walked on one (maybe in Minneapolis)
word finds
mountains
fishing
hiking
taking pictures
my college English professor
weekends in Slovakia :)

New things:
Roasted chestnuts-yum!
Vienna


Well, that's all I have time for now, and probably more than you have time to read! I'm going to try to keep adding things... I'm already in a better mood! :)

Now I think it's showertime, wash dishes, and head to bed time.

G'night y'all!

Thoughts Which Plague Me

So, the most recent plaguing thoughts have been rooted in time and how I spend it. Quite often, I feel guilty about how I spend my time. Some would say I waste my time, even I might say this. I only say it's wasted because I could be getting other things done that are, perhaps, more important, not because I don't enjoy wasting time (mostly). But what I can't understand is how my flat can get so utterly messy in a matter of a couple of days, sometimes not even! This leads me to another frustration: I used to be a neat freak. Now, I am neat, or try to be, but it's not high on the list of important things. I credit a few things to this change: having a total opposite for a roommate in college and having to compromise my cleanliness for something in between. There's also the fact that I've realized there are much more important things in life than keeping a spic 'n' span residence...that came after my "vacation" to Lebanon. For those of you who don't know, I traveled to Lebanon about two years ago to do some mission work with a friend, to arrive and days later, have a war start between Hizbollah (the guerilla army in Lebanon) and Israel. Well, that ended in me being evacuated with most of the country (except for my friend and her family, friends, co-workers, etc.). After which I experienced what the doc said was Post Traumatic Stress Disorder...or shell shock. Well, anyway, back to my point, cleaning didn't hold it's high position like before after that experience. However, it is still important. But how can I convince myself to not make a mess? Or to simply put something back after I've used it?

Does this change after you're married? Or after you have kids? Do you become a cleaner, neater, more organized, disciplined person? If so, I want a husband and child right now!

Even my thoughts aren't very organized tonight.

Well, there are several things that I don't like about myself. Lack of cleaning often enough that I don't have to make a day out of it when I do is one of those things. Not working before playing is another. Not sitting up straight another. Hating to cook is yet another. Being disorganized when I used to, as a kid, be so so so utterly organized it was sickening is another. Not being so good at math these days... forgetting things as though I'm an 80-year old woman with Alzheimers... being grumpy sometimes... not knowing what I want in life... not knowing where I'm going... being in a culture other than my own and feeling like everyone hates me--and letting that conquer my thoughts more often than not. Writing posts like these.

I continue to hope that marrying and having children will change these not-so-good qualities into more loving, self-sacrificing, God-centered thoughts and qualities.

The next post will be more uplifting, I swear.

Twenty-Four Hours

There's never enough time in a day for everything. That's what I decided.

The Movement to Bring Back Arranged Marriages Starts Here

That's right. I'm giving up. I quit. The end. El Fin. Koniec. Stop.

I'm impatient. Granted, I'm not feeling and I haven't been feeling all that impatient lately, but this is an occasion to blog about something I think we've lost in our culture (on a semi-serious note): arranged marriages. Life would be so much easier if we still practiced arranged marriages. Granted, this could mean our parents picking out our spouses, but I've talked about this with my mom, even asked her (recently) who she would set me up with if this were still the practice and the norm today. And I confess: not a bad choice. A sensible one. The guy she picks is a guy I've been friends with for, for about 7 years. We're good friends. It's a good place to start, right? We don't have to know everything or like everything about each other...that's what marriage is all about anyway, right? (Ok, that and procreation.) But people change through the course of a marriage anyway, so why not marry someone when maybe you don't know them very well, and when they've been hand-picked by your parents who probably know you better than you think they do?

So, basically, if my parents had a dowry for me (or whichever way that works) I'd be okay with it. Granted, kids may not be something my parents would get for a long time...

And on top of that, I could quit worrying about being an old maid, and get back to focusing on life at hand. Right? Or do we always worry about the future?

Cultural Pet Peeves

You want to know what annoys me? There's quite a list, but I shan't mention them all. And I do not list the following to be snide or rude or culturally insensitive. I have never done anything intentional to be culturally insensitive (though I have been tempted!). Nonetheless, these are the things that still get to me after living in this country for more than a year (for a year and three months, to be exact).

I'm still a baby in this culture, still oblivious to some things, yet so uncomfortably aware of other things. This, in and of itself, is an annoyance. I think it would take a lifetime to get used to another culture, even one that seems to be, on the surface, so similar to my own. On to the ones that really get me...

• I speak Polish...well enough. But it's not enough anymore to understand all of my surroundings, including, for example the following situations:


• I still don't understand everything in the church services. I go to church with my friends. My friends speak English. My friends don't translate. Sometimes they help me find the Bible references, if they were paying attention long enough to get it. Generally the pastors are either so elloquent with their words that I can't understand a thing (or only a few words and what good is that?) or they speak slow enough, simply enough for me to get the picture, and understand about 80% of what they are saying, which is pretty good. This leads me to the next one...


• When I do understand, and on the rare occasion that my reliant translator comes to church anymore (she's a pastor's wife, so she visits other churches with him...her husband is American!) I never hear the Gospel message! Law, guilt, Law, guilt, mixed in with a big dose of more Law! It's getting really irritating. No wonder these people look so oppressed all the time. Maybe it's not simply because they are still remembering the Holocaust (which they do), maybe it's because they don't hear the message of Salvation, Justification, Grace, etc... and neither do I!


• The "hymns" here. They are not hymns at all. They are Hillsongs praise songs sometimes set to organ music. Sometimes keyboard and violin. It's beautiful. (sarcasm) I'm not going to rip on Hillsongs right now, but I just don't think a worship service is the place for them. Me, me, me, I, I, I. No. Stop it! It's about Jesus! I want my good LSB hymns back! I want a meaty, substance-filled church service for a change! I want the Gospel, and I want it now! And I want it and long for it for all of Poland.


• Now onto other situations... But let me first tell you that my Polish language skills were once really good. They impressed people, lots of people. Now that I'm back to teaching English every day in the classroom, I'm not using it. Therefore, I'm losing it. So, my friends that witnessed firsthand how great my Polish was coming along, assume still that I am still just as great if not better. Well, that's just not the case, as much as I wish it were. It's worse. I feel like a year ago I was doing better. (I wasn't really very good last year Novemberish.) Anyway, I continue to go to their Bible study. I hardly understand what's going on. I end up getting frustrated, and then I get angry with myself. And then I disengage from the group mentally and start thinking about what I need to do when I get home, what lessons am I preparing for the next day or week, etc. I hate myself for it. One place I really need to be is in that Bible study, building relationships with those ladies, studying the Word (if in fact we did study the Word--another pet peeve)...


• Normally at these Bible studies, the ladies turn it into social hour. After our social hour, it becomes a topic, sort of related to the Bible, maybe based on a Bible reference, and then they ask how we can compare this to our lives today (add in another social hour).


• SCHOOL - Again, with the language barrier. I understand pretty well. Ok, really well (when I really try and when I can ask for a repeat, or if I know, generally, what the subject is). Soo... my kids. They talk about me. And I hear it. And it upsets me. Then I get cranky and it's hard to teach them, especially when they continue to talk about me. If I ask them about it, of course they deny it, or they say I misunderstood. How am I to know for sure. If I ask another teacher about it, they will deny everything. What can I do? How can I get over it so easily when they do not change their behavior and I know they are talking about me?


• I'm a missionary, but I'm not exactly allowed to bring the Bible into what I teach. Strange, eh? I know. I try to talk about my faith with the kids, or ask them what they would do in certain situations, but at the same time, I don't want to turn them off to it, so I don't push it. But it's frustrating to be here, doing something very different than what my picture of what a missionary is. I feel useless. No, I feel like a native English speaker being taken for granted. The schools see that someone is willing to come as a volunteer and they say, "hey! We want one!!" So they get a missionary, but upon arrival, they tell the missionary to leave God out of it. Great. And on top of that, they want me to teach the kids British English. Riiiight. It's charming, but I can't teach it. I still have conversations with British friends and don't always understand what they're talking about--we have different idioms, different forms, etc... AND on top of that, the kids don't care. I teach conversation. It's an easy class. I can't assign homework (not supposed to), no tests, just conversation. Easy, right? Not when they don't talk. Try leading a discussion on that!

Well, that's all for now....all that are related to culture. I'm not proud of these things, and I'm not proud to say that these things are annoying or that they hinder my work here. I'm not even saying that I've got the right lenses on to be seeing everything clearly. BUT, this is the way I see things, and that's what makes living in this culture hard. And this is what eats at my soul every day. This is why I am so disappointed when I go to church, feeling so guilty about being cranky with my kids, and don't hear the Gospel, and then start another week feeling down, and then hear my students, get cranky, go to church.... you get the picture. And I'm not so blind that I don't see that this is a spiritual battle, because it is. So pray for me, if you will. Pray that I would be stronger, that I could have the power to say, "Get behind me, Satan!!" Pray that the emptiness, despair, gloom, and dark history of this country wouldn't get me. Pray that homesickness won't overtake me. And pray that I would have friends to encourage me, so that I can be an instrument of God, like He intended me to be.

Trying to Find a Teaching Style

I teach 8-12 graders. They are Polish kids, and I teach them English. Or rather, English Conversation. It's a broad topic. And it's not what I went to school for. Teaching, yes. Teaching EFL, no. I've been here for more than a year, so I know a good amount of Polish, though I don't use it in my classroom. It's disadvantageous to do so. Anyway, I digress. It's my second year of teaching, so better than the first, but still pining to find my very own effective teaching style. The school systems in Eastern Europe are so much different than those in the States or in England, so it's hard to even figure out my place with the other teachers (culturally, professionally), let alone the students. It's a struggle, and every day I hope I'm a step closer to being a better teacher. But it's not enough to hope, and most days it seems it's not even enough to love those kids. Some hate me, some love me, some don't care. I can't help but wonder if this is what life's all about: struggling to find your place. I hope not. Though it sure would be easier to find your place in life if we still adopted the practice of arranged marriages. Again, I digress. But my poor students. They have to deal with me trying out new practices on them. Some require me to be strict, others I hardly need to use discipline with, and with others, nothing seems to work. Maybe it's because of cultural differences, and the differences in the systems that we're used to.

Maybe it has more to do with the subject matter: conversation. Since we can talk about anything humanly imaginable, no one can think of anything to talk about, OR they don't want to (usually the latter).

No matter what the cause, it's a struggle, and it's my cross to bear with a smile. I just pray the day comes soon when I can reach out to those kids effortlessly and more importantly, effectively. Until then, I will continue to struggle, I will continue to pray for those kids and for myself. And I will do it knowing I'm another day closer to being a better teacher...and to retirement.

Beware: New Blogger

I'm welcoming myself to the blogging world, not knowing yet what I'm going to write about or why. And this is the very reason I named my blog "Two Cents." It will be whatever is on my mind: politics, work, life, you name it. So, if'n you care to read this, enjoy the random collection!