After yesterday's post, my feeling today is pretty much like I'm the one who suffered a beat-down. Not over anything related to yesterday's post, mind you, this is completely different. With this, I will make it known widely that I have signed up to take the Michigan Test for Teacher Certification. I realize it is not the be-all, end-all in terms of becoming a "real" teacher (I still despise the concept that some might perceive me as somehow not a "real" teacher, I work hard doing what I do, and I enjoy it immensely.) I still have a lot of work to do, and I'm entirely willing to do it. With a Bachelor's Degree, even one in Journalism, I am legally able to do what I intend. It doesn't mean that I still won't have to work for more, I'd still have to finish my Master's to keep a certificate, and being a secondary certificate (maybe,) I'd only be able to work in middle schools and high schools. None the less, judging by the response I've gotten, apparently the only one who believes in my dream of becoming a teacher is me. That's right, my dream. Okay, yes, it happened in mid-life; so now I should be doomed to be a permanent schmuck because I'm the only one around me who's had the nerve to go out on the limb that I have?! If you don't understand the nature of the experiences I've had to this point in my life, there's very little now, frankly, that shocks, or even remotely excites me. I've almost died. I've spent a year of my life in a culture so totally foreign, there was not a moment that I wasn't "on," so to speak. I have had my children, whom I both openly treasure, ripped from my grasp, essentially, with little recourse, and much on my part to be recompensed to them. God knows I've tried. I have endured innumerable varieties of physical and emotional pain. The only thing that has remotely rocked me since I've been home is....well, there have actually been a couple of things. First, if you've never been around children with severe cognitive impairments, and perhaps equally severe physical disabilities, well, I can only tell you that, at least in my case, it left an indelible mark, first time out. You truly grow to value the health and intelligence of your children that much more. The second, that which required perhaps a bit of pondering to come to, was realizing that a teenager or pre-teen's responses can be, different, shall we say. I have stood in front of classes red-faced and screaming trying to retain their attention for more than a few seconds, only to be greeted by laughter. There were multiple instances when this occurred, but when it finally dawns on you that this isn't the way to get the results you're hoping for, that the mind of a student like this truly is a different place than the mind of an adult, believe me, it's a rocker. At any rate, my feeling right now is nothing so much as just being alone. Alone in my dreams, in my thoughts, in my responses to everything that goes on around me because, unless you've lived it, you'll never get it.

Additionally, there's more things that have just flat-out gotten to me, not the least of which is my father's state; it's painful as hell to watch, and if Parkinson's is as genetic as I've heard it is, is this what's coming for me?! Theoretically, you can understand my concern here.....maybe. And I've groused about the struggle I go through all the time with being ADD. Once again, if you don't live inside my head, you don't know the half of it, and you probably never will. I try to live with a brain that, of it's own accord, will not shut off, ever. I either have to be physically exhausted or medicated to get more than a few hours of good sleep. Apparently, to a lot of those people around me, none of this is new or different than anything that has ever occurred before. But I'm still wondering who doesn't "get it;" them or me? Not much I haven't bi*ched about previously, so apparently, I could say whatever I say till I'm blue in the face, and people still wouldn't understand why I feel the way I do. I'm tired now. Exhausted, in fact. And, no, I don't know what to do about it. Can I do anything? Or am I destined to just feel "caged up" the rest of my life and die in a heap somewhere? Answer the question honestly about what I can do, discounting theoretical possibilities, those based on my past history, and other non-realities, and it doesn't leave much. Or wait a minute; shouldn't I be the one doing that? Have I not made the effort to do so? In my own mind, I have. But I guess the real question is......who's right?