I don't care.

There are lots of things that I don't care about any more. Things that I used to, at least mildly, care about, and recently realized that I just don't anymore. And kinda don't want to care about. Things like being knowledgeable, seeming intelligent, being described as "well read" or "articulate". Talking about interesting things for the sake of talking about interesting things. Being interesting. Anything related to how others perceive me, I guess. Fitting anyone else's definition of cool or popular or entertaining or witty or great. I don't care. Maybe it's age? Maturity? It's not that I want to be lame or boring - I just don't care anymore if that's what I am to somebody else. It seems as of late all I care about being is my own definition of a good person. It's kind of nice to have that one simple thing as a guide to being me instead of all those other things that people want me, and everyone, to be. Each person wants everyone else to fall into some sort of category they've created in their head. We make up our own definition of cool, of interesting, of boring and then apply that definition to everyone we meet. The thing that has always kinda bothered me about me is that I try to match everyone else's definition of cool as I get to know them. I lose track of my own definition. At least I used to. And now I just don't care. Everyone at the dinner table might be talking about ___________ and how great of a book/movie/tv show/animal/place/thing it is and I'm kinda suddenly totally okay with having absolutely nothing to say. Three or four or even two years ago, that would not have been the case.

This is all I care about:
Finding the positive in every person/place/thing and letting that be their defining feature. Shrugging off the negative, as much as possible. Interacting with the understanding that everyone is full of dreams and despair at the same time - including me, including you, including the people that nobody likes - regardless of the face each of us tries to show to the world. Loving and fearing and respecting the fact that each person, each brain, is a complex, convoluted world of its own and I'm never really going to understand anyone else. And no one is ever going to really understand me. And remembering that it's all going to be okay, in the end. Because lots of stuff matters to each individual person, but nothing really does actually matter. To everything. To most things. In the entire history of time, in the entire expanse of the universe, not one single thing that happens in anyone's life matters. At all. I find that comforting, somehow.              

The Current Dilemma

I can't decide which size bottle of contact solution to buy. Do I go with the super-sized bottle, which would last me months and would be impractical to pack for trips and is really only meant to be bought by someone who is staying in one place for a while. Someone who is content enough with their situation to renew their teaching contract for another year and store their contact solution on its own shelf in their admittedly spacious bathroom. Or do I go with the petite bottle, which is meant to be bought by people prone to moving, people who need a bottle that can go on airplanes and not weigh them down. A bottle that would fit in the tiniest of unknown bathrooms and would last a little over a month, just enough time to finish out my teaching contract and get me back home to America. By my estimates, I've got about 5 days till my current bottle runs dry...5 more days to decide which size bottle to buy. Oof.  

Where is my mind?

Normally, I wouldn't put a piano song here that I didn't come up with, but I've been a little bit obsessed with this one, and this question, lately. I've been working on it over the past 3 months and it has replaced Yann Tiersen's Comptine d'un autre ete and La dispute as the first AND last songs that I play whenever I sit down at the keyboard. And those two have been my favorites for YEARS. I always feel weird and show-offy putting songs on here, but I don't know. It's my blog...a place where I put thoughts and things that occupy my mind, and this is definitely one of them as of late.

As for where my mind is, I think it has fragmented into two and a half minds. One that has traveled into the past and sits nostalgically in the memories of being at the brink of this wandering life, before I ditched all my friendships and family for the sake of excitement, newness, and seeming brave and unique; one that has traveled into the future and dreams up all the other realities I could have, mostly involving a golden retriever named Ashby who'll read books with me and help me dig holes in my garden, waiting patiently for me to return from my slightly boring day job to go on a nice long adventure walk around my quaint city, dotted with local, dog-friendly coffee shops and friends; and the remaining little half lives here, in Antalya, trying to figure out what's up with the other two bigger and kinda obnoxious minds. Striving for rationality, shooing away distractions, and seeking out common ground from all of my minds. Good luck, little guy.

That's where my mind goes when I play this song. 

If you've listened to the Pixies, I'm hoping you'll at least sorta recognize it. It's written by Frank Black, arranged for piano by Maxence Cyrin. Again, forgive the emotionless, tinny quality of my keyboard. I can't wait to play this on a real thing, with a sustain pedal AND weighted keys. Woah.

**(24 June 2014) I've replaced the emotionless version with one played on a more expressive, but still electronic, piano. It's not perfect, but I don't really want it to be.     

    

Yessssssss

Dear Erin,
 
It is my pleasure to offer you a summer internship with the TOEFL Speaking program in English Language Learning. The TOEFL Speaking team looks forward to your participation this summer.



Me, too, TOEFL Speaking team. Me, too. 

Lost in a dark thought

I imagine that Seda's day began fairly similarly to my own. We both dragged ourselves out of bed without enough sleep, frustrated by the alarm clock and 6:30am. We both did our best to pull ourselves together for the day, getting dressed, eating breakfast, drinking coffee, thinking about what all we needed to get done, wondering what the day held. Monday, bleh, we both thought. At about the same time, we both caught separate buses and headed towards the same place - our school. On the bus, we both mentally prepared for the day, and maybe even thought a little bit about our first class - intermediate reading and writing in A1-40. Preparing to be in class, wanting to be good a teacher, wanting to be a good student. Our bus routes wound through the city as we made our way closer and closer to our destination, closer together. Within 15 minutes of one another, we arrived. My bus a little early, entering the school and dropping all the teachers off, her bus a little late and leaving the students on the other side of the street. There. Right there on the other side of the street is where our days diverged completely. While I entered the school and went to my office to get ready for class, Seda tried to cross the street, the busy highway where cars drive much too fast, without looking both ways. 15 minutes later, while I made my way to the classroom, she was loaded into an ambulance with her classmates looking on, horrified. While I started class and took attendance and marked Seda absent, her ambulance rushed her to the hospital, where she would spend her day. Not in school. While class ended, the doctors determined that there was internal bleeding and that she would need a blood transfusion. Several students volunteered to go to the hospital at 11:30 to donate blood. While I and everyone else but Seda went about our days as best as we could, she was unconscious, in a hospital, life expectancy unknown. While I ate lunch as usual, Seda was in pain. While I held a level meeting and fed teachers more meaningless rules and announcements, one of my students was barely alive. While I rode the bus home, comfortable and calm, I wondered how Seda would spend her evening and night. Alive or not alive. In a dark thought or on a white cloud.            

The Dream Job

Today I had my first full two hour lesson with my new batch of intermediate reading and writing students. I had them do some diagnostics and one of them was to write a paragraph about their favorite person, their favorite vacation, or their dream job. Here's one girl's response, which nicely summarizes a common theme that I've noticed here:

"When I was a child, I read a lot of book. My favourite hobbie is read a book and write a something, so my dream job is literature teacher, but my department is tourism management. I want to be literature teacher, but my father didn't want. This department is his dream and I will be boss in hotel. Maybe I won't happy, but my father will be happy and this is very important for me. I like literature a lot of and I will always research writer, I will always read a book, I will always write a something, because this is my dream."

When I was a child, I loved maps and Indiana Jones. My favorite hobby was to find a remote location on a map and read about it and look at pictures of it and dream about going there, so my dream job was to be a geographer, a world traveler, an international teacher, but...my parents wanted me to be happy. Their dream was for me to be successful, and successful to them was defined as being happy, so here I am, in my own dream. All I've ever done is what I've wanted to do, all I've ever pursued is my own dream, keeping in the back of my mind what would make my loved ones proud.

For some of us, our parents raise us with the hopes of making ourselves happy, for others, they raise us with the hopes of making them happy. I don't know which is necessarily better, but it's good to be reminded that I'm so very lucky to be here, to be whatever I want.

 

Student Feedback

"You are so ruler. In my opinion, it's sometimes good, sometimes bad. But, your heart is rich with like."

Reassurance that I'm doing an okay job.