Diary of a Wom'n

You do well when you are in control and operating only on blind faith for a short while, but a situation can become uncomfortable if you have to pretend that everything is okay. Instead of covering up your uncertainty with foolish behavior, try being honest and letting everyone know exactly where you stand. Fortunately, this strategy takes little effort on your part. An additional benefit is that others will like you more if they know that you are being authentic.

I do feel like I'm operating on blind faith a little sometimes.  With Dj for instance, I'm hoping the vagueness will lead me and us to some kind of certainty down the line.  It's hard to express yourself and be honest over email though, because there is room for misunderstanding and you can't pick up on the tone through email.

GW

Today, Mustafa says to me, "Ms. G, you've got swag."  I'm usually in tune to the slang words but this one I wasn't sure of.  When I asked what it meant, he said it meant "style".  What can I say.  It's in my walk, it's in my talk.  Do I love it?  Totally.  I am totally the stylish teacher.

And yesterday, I couldn't help myself but tell one of my grade 6s to take a chill pill because they were being too anxious and hyper.  They're getting me to speak like them these days.

I love being young.

GW

Over the past few weeks, that’s how I’ve been described by 3 different people; Dj, Mo, and Kei - cool. Several years ago, I used to be considered “pure”. Now that has been replaced. When Dj went on about what he likes about me, he said I was cool “as a girl and a woman”. When Mo was trying to analyze me about how I’m not anal about my friends calling me right away or not often enough or….and that I don’t assume anything or jump to conclusions…., he said I was really cool and that he wants to be cool just like me. When Kei was telling me what she did over the March Break including some things I shouldn’t know about, her friend asks her, “Why are you telling the teacher that?” to which Kei responds, “So? Ms. G is cool.” Awww.

I like that this is how people see me. I have been making an effort to be cool and easy going, not high-maintenance or uptight. Even though sometimes in my mind, I can be very very uptight and anal about certain things. But nobody needs to know about that part!

Candee called me on the weekend to get advice about job hunting for teaching jobs. She is in her last few months of teacher’s college at Queens and will be graduating in June. I think her division is in P/J. She really want to start teaching right away but unfortunately, she didn’t apply to the TDSB hiring pool around January. She feels she missed her opportunity to be on the ETH/supply list for this year. I’m afraid she’s right but I didn’t discourage her about it.

Talking to her brought back memories and the feelings of anxiety of when I was in her position; about to graduate, REPEATEDLY being told about the dismal job prospect as if it’s a new national anthem, going through a state of total defeat and hopelessness, applying to vacancies all over the board and in other boards in vain, attending interviews without any results….. better to forget those times! In retrospect, I’m so relieved about the position I’m in right now where I have a permanent position, I’m settled and I don’t have that stress of job hunting. I have other stress at work but it’s not as bad as the stress of not having a permanent job I think.

GW

But wait...where's the beginning? and where's the middle? ...well there is a beginning and a middle but I'm going to sum it up very fast below.

I liked this March Break.  You can't ever hate a break from work really.  Well, I'd planned on making this week a productive one and I'm proud to say it was.  I didn't get to complete everything but I completed the important things.

So to start, I did my long range planning for grade 7 and 6 Literacy.  I marked everything except the grade 7 guided reading stories.  And I did a lot of relaxing and emailing to Dj.  I'm not anxious to return to work tomorrow but I feel less overwhelmed for sure.

Over the break, I also saw Mo.  I haven't ever gotten around to updating this blog about him.  I guess because he didn't matter to me much.  Well, around August, he started to get very insecure about himself around the time I was buying my apartment.  He wasn't happy for me from the day I mentioned I was looking for an apartment and when I bought it, the green monster finally came out.  He picked at something to argue with me about one evening (i.e. not initiating conversations with him) and finally I stopped talking to him.  And note that this was all on BBM.  He even apologized over BBM

Then around new years, he writes me happy new year and we started talking again.  I debated whether I should reply but the sick part of me wants to see him fall for me so that I can have the glory to tell him I don't want him.  I want him to see what a huge mistake he made, I want it to eat at him and make him grow up a bit.

Nothing has changed with him.  He didn't date anyone during the time we stopped talking.  He isn't looking to buy his own place.  He says it's cheaper to rent with a roomate.  Whatever.  He said he missed me a lot.  I think he just misses being with somebody to be honest with you.

Djibril is the one I'm intrigued about.  Part of it is he's a new person, at least new from the point of when we met in person.  I feel like there's so much about him I don't know.  I know factual things but I want to know him in action.  I want to see how he treats me in person, how he interacts with me when we're not limited by time, how he solves a problem he's faced with, how he gets angry, what makes him smile...He says he "likes me" and that attraction "grows more and more" everyday.  That`s not happening for me.  But it's hard for that to happen over email.  I hope that in April, he comes down here to visit, where we can get to know each other for real.

GW

If there was a time machine, that's the day I want to return to.  That's the day where I would decide to delete Isaac's messages to me on Facebook, cut all connections with him and never explore a rollarcoaster world with him.  I wouldn't know him, I wouldn't love him.

And I wouldn't be here years later missing him.

GW

So it's been a week since I last saw Dj and we've been emailing each other every day.  We like each other and I think we have a lot in common.  I'm hesitant to say whether I really like him or not.  His history with relationships is making me very guarded and I can't fully trust him.

Dj says we have a lot in common and hopes our relationship will grow.  I wish I could speak French so I can understand the depth of his feelings and what he truly wants to say to me.  Right now, he's very limited in his ability to express himself in English.  He repeats himself a lot because he doesn't know how to extend what he wants to say.

He plans on coming here to see me when he can work it into his schedule.  He's already working on his resume right now he told me.  He wrote it in French which means he's probably going to find employment in Quebec.  Which means he might start to wall me out because of the distance factor as soon as he realizes he doesn't want to do the long distance thing.  Until he can show me that he can totally commit to me, I'm not going to commit to him.  I'm going to be casual and date other people as well.

Something hit me last night where my boss had told me something about my fortune.  He once had my fortune read a few years ago (2008), and he found that my life is currently seeing difficulty at that time but it will gradually turn around and in a few years, around 2012, I will get married in that year.  I was intrigued when he first told me, but I soon forgot about it until now. I wonder if that will be how my life will unfold.
GW

So I talked to Salima about Dj and she gave me some things to think about, not that I haven't already been thinking about it, but this time she gave me a guys opinion on things - Kevin's.  I don't really want to go into it here but I just want to reflect on the fact that something is definitely missing. 

For example, normally I would be anticipating and waiting for the moment a guy calls me or writes to me, but this time, I could care less.  And it's because he didn't show me the attention I wanted during the gala, specifically.  I didn't feel close to him.  I sometimes felt like I was just there.  He didn't compliment me on how I looked or any of that or make me feel special in any way, except for holding my hands.

Secondly, he seems detached from relationships.  I didn't like that he easily moved on from his previous two serious girlfriends when he made the decision to move to a new country both times.  I don't like that he left them behind like that.  It makes me feel as if he could easily do that to me.

And finally, although nobody seems to think so, I feel the fact that he can't speak English well is a barrier.  It's mostly on his part.  To me, it's sexy but to him, it seems difficult even though he told me it's not a problem.  His lack of English seems to impair the way we communicate a bit.  Instead of having deep, complex conversations, it's often cut short because of it.  He struggles a little to understand me.  And I know he sometimes just nods his head pretending he understands when he truly doesn't.  And in a group setting, he doesn't know what to say to me, so he talks to others instead in French.  And neglects to translate a little of what he talked about.

So those are my thoughts and observations about him.  I don't want to over-analyze (that's what we do best anyway), but I want to be careful if this is headed towards a relationship.  I can't get hurt. 

GW