Being Deliberate

My second year of teaching came to a close three weeks ago, and I am nearly two weeks into my first graduate course.

My head and my heart are struggling to catch up. 

Adulthood is no longer something that I can smirk at and roll my eyes toward. 

It's real and it's here and it needs my attention immediately. 

As I slug through the motions of finding a new car (my car was totaled about two weeks ago when a massive deer decided to stand its ground in the middle of the highway), learning how to budget, reflecting on last year, and trying to honestly process the readings I'm assigned, I keep returning to the same thoughts.

Are my actions reflecting my ideals?

How can I make sure that all that I am learning changes the parts of me that need to change?

How the hell do I relax and find a healthy work/life balance?

I don't exactly have peace right now, but I know that deliberate decisions have to come before the peace does.

So, for tonight at least, I am making a deliberate decision to shut this computer down and run until my thoughts run out.

Oneida Street

I was seven years old the first time I heard a gunshot.

I'd waited for my parents to turn off their bedroom light

before quietly stacking my dolls under my arms to continue

my play by the light of the streetlamp in the living room.

Three shots were fired.

Rubber screamed against cement.

Three beats of silence and then sirens.

I don't remember the sound of glass shattering,

but the bay window from the house catty-corner from

my own was now scattered across the lawn.

My father ran into the room and I waited for

the furrowed brow and demand of an explanation.

His anger never came.

The doorbell rang and my mother jumped.

A tired policeman sat in our living room,

one restless foot crushed the arm of my doll.

My mother brought him coffee and

he asked questions that I didn't

know how to answer.