Failure

This morning I got the official email from a school district saying "thanks for applying but we've decided to move forward with another candidate." Yesterday I realized that the backup "safety" job I'd applied for, a long term sub position with a district I've worked with for the past two years, had been posted for over a month and I hadnt even gotten an interview.

Last week, one of my Facebook friends had a post about the Atlantic responding to a pitch she'd sent them and another post about having two more articles boosted on the Medium. She joked about her husband telling her "people are supposed to struggle." 

I'm happy for her. I am. ... I am? 

I am. But.

Right now I feel like a big old failure. 

I feel like no matter how hard I try, no matter how hard I work, I'm not getting anywhere. 

And also I know that I'm not trying as hard as I could be because deep down inside I still believe that trying and wanting is shameful. 

Deep down inside I'm still the gifted seventeen year old straight A student who sat down on the curb and cried the day she got three thin envelopes in the mail. 

Deep down inside, I just want to feel validated and wanted and loved. Deep down inside, I'm tired of being nobody, I'm tired of not existing and having anything that's mine, that makes me me. Deep down inside I always assumed that after staying home and raising kids for ten years, I could jump right back into being me, right back into things being easy and not having to try too hard.

Deep down inside, I have been ignoring for a long time all the things that I just never did because I was afraid they would be hard.

I don't wanna put myself out there. I don't wanna be vulnerable. I don't wanna get rejected. I don't wanna fail.

But I don't wanna be invisible forever either.

The work

 

“Should I stab my own eye out with a knitting needle instead of writing?” says the 14 year old sitting so close to me on the couch, I am reminded of the time when she lived inside my uterus.

I mean, I understand the question.

She reads this over my shoulder as I type it and murmurs. “Mmm hmm. There’s two. Now we can share” as she hands me my own knitting needle.

She’s writing a novel. She’s 2% into it and so far the characters have laughed 18 times and haven’t made it past breakfast. It’s the end of the world.

As she decides that maybe - MAYBE - someone will come to the door before they even have a chance to START eating breakfast and she’s back off and running, I stare at the google doc on my screen and think about how I too would like to write a novel. Or a memoir. Or a single blog post really. But it’s hard and it’s scary, and the knitting needle is looking surprisingly tempting right now.




All day I’ve felt on edge, tired and wired, certain that I want to be doing SOMETHING but that I have no idea what that is, that I am somehow falling behind, that I will never accomplish anything in my life. And the more I think about that, the more I freeze, the more I sink, the less motivated I feel to even do a single thing.

I want to write a book. I want to write articles and get them published somewhere. I want to find my voice again. I want to create things that people find meaningful. I created this human who has informed me that there’s no doorbell because OBVIOUSLY these are medieval teenage friends having breakfast together, so clearly I can create ANYTHING.

I just have to put the knitting needle down and get back to work.

Well, hello Summer. Hello self - what? Yes, there's yogurt in the fridge. Yes it's. Oh never mind I'll be right there.

 My summer vacation (and the end of my temporary teaching job) started on Friday. Today is Tuesday. 

I laid out a plan for myself in my notebook yesterday. 

1. Start the day writing.

2. End the day reading.

3. Clean something every day.

4. Make something every day.

5. Do something you've been avoiding every day. 

6. Do something fun every day. 

This is the summer that I'm going to find myself, find my voice again, figure out my life purpose, recover from burnout, get enough rest, heal some of my autoimmune diseases, improve my mental health, and remember how to have fun.

In the past two days I've gone to 3 therapy appointments total for my two kids, visited two different public libraries, driven at least one kid to theater rehearsal every day and both to piano lessons once, folded four baskets of laundry, and run the dishwasher at least 527 times. 

I feel like something is going to have to give. I don't want it to be me this time. 

Starting over. Again.

 Today is my first day of summer vacation. Yesterday was my last day of school in a permanent sub position, at a school I've been at for two years that will not have a position available for me next year. Yesterday was also big girl's last day of middle school. Yesterday I got confirmation that I did not get a full time contract teaching job I was hoping to get.

I have a lot of feelings.

I left school yesterday shortly after the kids left. I had comp time to use up and I was finished with my grades and my (her) classroom. I tried to duck out without seeing anyone, but I didn't quite succeed so i got a few hugs and teared up a little. There were a lot of people I didn't see though. People who have kindly accepted me as part of their community, treated me like a real member of their department, made me feel like I really belonged there.

I guess I never really did belong there though. I was always just filling someone else's place.

There's a long term middle school job available in the same district next year, and the department chair is making phone calls for me. There are people hoping for me to get it. But really I have no idea if I'll get it because for the first time in my life, at 44, I'm getting rejected a lot.

And I hope I get it because it's a good district, because it's a job, but also I'm dreading getting it. I'm dreading going into a new building with people I don't know, with kids I don't know, with a curriculum I don't know, and starting over. It sucks. I'm much too old to still be doing this every year. I'm too old to keep starting over.

I thought when I stayed home with my babies that teaching was  a thing I could always just walk back into when they were old enough. I thought I would still be able to do it, still be able to get hired and be treasured. I'm not.

It's my first day of summer and all I want to do is curl up in a ball and cry for at least two weeks. But I have to pick myself up, dust myself off, and get ready to start over. Again.

My place

I am 44 years old. My baby girl is 14, and her 8th grade recognition ceremony is in an hour. Little sister is 12. It's been a long road. 

When I had babies, I opened a blogpost and started writing because I just didn't know what else to do. I poured out my soul onto the screen. I reached out into the world and the world reached back and for that I will always be grateful.

And then one day I stopped. Blogging wasn't a thing anymore, there wasn't a community, and I didn't think I had anything left to say. Except I did. Of course I knew I did. I just didn't want to say it. 

Almost two years ago, I saw a long term substitute teaching job posted at a place where I worked 14 years ago and almost on a whim I applied. And I got it. And the past two years I've spent in a classroom again with 15 year olds who aren't mine. And it felt like coming home.

But here I am now, finishing another long term sub job, applying to more jobs, and I don't know where I belong. No one wants to hire me for a permanent job. I'm never going to find anything. Why would anyone want to hire a 44 year old mom with a 14 year resume gap? There are 30 year olds with more years of classroom experience than I have. It's frustrating. It's lonely. It's exhausting. I'm tired of getting rejected. I'm tired of trying.

But I keep looking, keep going out there because some day I'm going to find my place.