Malfunctioning Heartstrings (June-a-Thon)

Malfunctioning Heartstrings 

The heart begins to tug, pull and twist,

as if trying to set itself free - by binding itself to another,

but I’m tired of her weary attempts to change, affect and twist my life around,

she will soon dwindle and fade into nothingness,

as passion always does,

leaving me

to pick up the broken pieces of my life.

I declare here and henceforth to tame the wild beastette,

to reason with her,

remind her of the calm and tranquil happiness we once had - not long ago.

She refuses to listen, an un-chainable girl,

knowing all too well what is “best” for her,

ignoring all requests, advice and reasoning I give,

jumping wild and free into a lake of emotional instability,

as if she herself is addicted to the chemical imbalance of the soul.

Treachery lurks beneath the surface,

unhappiness she is incapable of foreseeing,

and I shall continue to protect her,

against her own will,

locked away in the vault of my emotions.

Or like a child locked away in a sanitized play room,

am I crippling her ability to feel anything at all,

wounding her into reasonable happiness,

and submissive apathy?

Strangle (June-a-Thon)

Strangle

I wake up contemplating what I fell asleep thinking about,

what I will and have continued to continuously contemplate.

The spark of confusion that lit my heart and poisoned my soul,

attacking the love that once resided there.

Pulling out the love that remains,

with an infectious evil grin,

she knows she is dying,

as she flops like a fish,

gasping for water as air enter her lungs,

perhaps the jolting of the heart is an electrical shock,

meant to kill all emotions,

confuse the soul so as to make it submerge

into the unknown depths of the chambered heart,

tie itself down with the perpetual heart strings

that are only good at one thing;

Strangling.

Reasonable (june-a-thon)

Reasonable

You have taught me compassion,

how to see this place, this world through the other side of jaded eyes,

not a space to explore carelessly or people to play with,

but one to truly enjoy, experience in a way I knew impossible.

I know not what my life would be like without you,

and I don’t necessarily care to find out,

but I know that I Could if I had to.

Does this make me heartless?

or merely realistic?

Does this make me independent?

or incapable of fully giving myself to someone?

Does this make me reasonable?

or merely incapable of what people call - true love?

Is compassion love, or love compassion?

and if it is not, then am I to mistake passionate lust feeling heart throbs as love?

Love - makes me sick.

And not in the butterflies in your stomach sick,

nor the nervous sweaty palms kind of sick,

but the emotionally, psychologically, confused out of my mind - Sick.

Everyone tells you what love is,

television

and family,

facebook

and friends,

billboards

and coworkers,

magazines

and married people,

movies

and old people,

song lyrics,

and youngins with their ideologies,

but no one can tell you what love is to you.

No one tells you to work through your bullshit if you love someone;

No one tells you how to make that heart throbbing blood sucking heartfelt love GROW into mature and beautiful love;

No one tells you anything,

because they can’t.

But does that mean that we are to assume that only hormonal teenagers are capable of this - all giving, all fearless, all take on the world and bullshit like that - kind of love?

And those who missed out on finding that perfect match,

that only exists once in every twelve lifetimes,

when you both accidentally find each other in the map of the stars - here on earth,

and somehow immediately know it - when you make eye contact and your heart bursts into flames,

are screwed out of a lifetime of happiness?

Does that mean we, jaded “adults”, are stuck left with - responsible and only reasonable kinds of love that work with our schedule and chosen lifestyles?

Or does that mean we kick those little brat’s asses and grow a gorgeous Love Tree outback, with so many rings of wisdom, they couldn’t even begin to count them!?!

No one talks about compassion, because they are afraid someone will think them incapable of love.

Well Screw You World,

I’ll take my Love Tree, and plant it right in your garden,

and then we’ll see just what your rose patch thinks about that!

A natural love-tree

The BURG

Although I am ecstatic about having the summer to relax and go back to the states to see my family and friends, I am a little sad because - Today was my LAST DAY at “The Burg” or formally known as the Instituto de Educación Secundario el Burgo de las Rozas de Madrid or I.E.S. el Burgo de las Rozas for short - and now you know why I call it “The Burg”. 

Bitter Sweet

About a year ago, I received my letter to be an Assistant Teacher (Auxiliar) at a high school in Madrid; I was super excited to be in a school for more than 5 hours a week and to have more real classroom experience. However, I was a bit nervous, because quite frankly, other than speaking the language, I knew nothing about English. I have been teaching and preparing lesson plans on teaching English speakers how to speak Spanish, not vice-versa.  

The BURG

Contrary to popular belief, there are actually RULES to this crazy language that I was given the gift of speaking by my parents. It is also very important to note that not only did I not know these rules, but I did not know how these rules differed from British English either. I think I corrected at least five students and they were right - in Proper English.

I'd rather continue to learn Spanish under the strict teaching of Miguel and Sagrario!!!!

Furthermore, this year I was confused as the daughter of one of my co-workers Miguel, and on occasion we spoke with British Accents (his being far superior to mine, as they teach only British English in Spanish schools) even though I didn’t know much about “Proper English” other than imitating it.

Yeah, I see the resemblance... Flamenco dancing Spanish father who speaks with a British accent in English...

As the school year comes to an end, I am slowly accepting the fact that I really do love teaching *cough Miguel* and that even though it is an INSANE amount of hard work to be a Good teacher, I might just love it enough to tackle this underappreciated extremely fulfilling job and that I will be strong enough to say “those who Really can - Teach”. 

Rosa and Sagrario ready to tackle this noble task!!

I can also say that the past six years volunteer teaching for ESL programs, creating and running after school Spanish programs, working summer camps, and tutoring only SLIGHTLY prepared me for what I was getting into. My four week rotating schedule was absolutely insane, but I wouldn’t change it for the world. It allowed me to see the Spanish middle/high school system (they are together) as a whole picture rather than just having gotten to see how the Junior and Senior classes worked.

My beautiful and complex schedule. Rebecca made me snowflakes to make it better  : P

Seeing over 500 students a month taught me so much! I learned improv teaching, classroom management for a multitude of different classroom environments, lesson planning, grading techniques, found a way to bring my quirkiness to the classroom through fun skits and hands on activities for students of every level, and the list goes on and on. I honestly have to wonder if I was the teacher or they were.

I loved all my students, all 537 of them!!!

Not only have I learned from my students, but I have met some of the most amazing professors and learned more than I could have dreamed about the Spanish education system, discovered the amazing equation that converts American grades into Spanish and other 10 point scale system grades (it is not as simple as putting a comma between the percentage out of 100%!!!), and had a wonderful time watching students learn and grow.

And that is the greatest chart ever made!!!! Only because no one has ever made it before. lol

My co-workers, Blanca (also the principal), Concha, Eduardo, Lola, Luisa, Miguel, Rosa and Sagrario, have all been so much fun to work with and have each taught me something different about teaching. I could not have been luckier and I truly hope that I get to return to “The Burg” this coming year (I still haven’t heard for sure where I will be working, just that it will be SOMEWHERE in Madrid). 

 

Eduardo, Me, Concha, Rosa, Lola, Blanca, Miguel and Sagrario (Luisa not pictured)

If I don’t get to come back to “The Burg”, I will truly miss you all, I love you and this has been a wonderful year and a fantastic experience!

Jenni and Greg’s Awesome WEDDING!!!

DON'T LOOK! DON'T LOOK!!!! ... Okay you can look now...

There are few things in life that you can look back and say, that’s fucking right I did! Or maybe you are awesome and there are a lot of things that you would say that to, but this one ranks above anything and everything I’ve ever been a part of!

PS. Jenni's mother-in-law made her wedding dress!!

On the 24^th of May, 2012, I officiated Jenni and Greg’s Marriage. It was a truly amazing experience and I feel so honored that they would ask ME to be the one to marry them! There are no words to describe how absolutely wonderful it was to get to be the person to marry two best friends who share a love that we dream about as children; one you only hear about in true love stories. 

Greg and Jenni; their first dance!!! (click for video)

About a year and a half ago, Greg asked me if he would marry him and Jenni, and my immediate reaction was Hell Fucking YES I will, and then I thought, are you serious? I need to start looking into getting the papers done to make this happen! I couldn’t think of two people more fit to make a lifelong commitment to one another. And if you know these two, you know exactly what I am talking about. And if you don’t know them, just imagine the love story at the beginning of UP. 

So cute! *stole these pictures from facebook*

After many many hours on the internet, I found the Universal Life Church, and within an hour after that I was in my Minister “training” and had my certification from the church. Reading the laws and calling the state officials to double and triple check exactly what you have to do isn’t hard. Even knowing that if you illegally marry someone, aka do it wrong, you can go to jail, isn’t the difficult part.

Officiators can fix dresses too!!! I came in more handy than we thought...

The real hard part was finding the right words for the ceremony. Luckily, Jenni is awesome and I sent her the script here from Spain and she Google doc edited from Maryland and slowly it became something beautiful and amazing. Slider did a wonderful reading to open up, Jenni’s friend Stephanie read a beautiful piece about avoiding zombie-ism originally by Leslie Light and her sister Lisa read “The Art of a Good Marriage” by Wilfred Arlan Peterson later on in the ceremony. 

 

Plus I got to stand next to all of these sexxxxy men! *wink wink* (click for wedding ceremony video)

I was extremely nervous at first, but the ceremony was beautiful. The sand ceremony was unique in Jenni and Greg included their friends in the pouring of the sand, to represent their huge importance in their lives, and overall, it was just wonderful. The reception rocked an animation theme with stuffed characters on the tables and old film reels - oh did I mention they got married in the Armour road Screenland Theater!?! Great venue, great people, great fun!

The Marquee with their names on it outside the theater!

To end, officiating their wedding was one of the single most, greatest experiences in my life and I would fly half way across the world a million times to do it! 

Jenni and Greg, if you are reading, I love you guys, and I wish you the best in all the great years you have ahead of you!!!

Just HAD to put her amazing homemade brooch bouquet in here! Absolutely amazing!

PS. For those of you who do not know, Universal Life Church, who I fully support in their mission, has two main ideas and beliefs: We all have a right to believe in whatever we believe in, even if that means that you believe in nothing, and Treat people with RESPECT. I mean, basically, isn’t that what we should be doing in the first place? It’s a no-brainer to me for sure. So, they are more like a giant Human Rights Organization that fights for people’s right to freedom of religion, including those who don’t have a religion.

Universal Life Church Banner

For those of you in Europe completely confused, this is like your version of civil unions, but unfortunately for us, civil unions do not have the same rights as marriages through religious organizations, and therefore organizations like this one exist, and anyone is allowed to become a minister and perform wedding ceremonies, as long as you fill out all the right paper work. It is more like getting married by a judge, but not at a court house, although you can have judges come to your weddings, it just isn't as personal, nor as fun. Basically, we are awesome and anyone can legalize marriages if they do the paperwork correctly.

 

Even this guy or even YOU! Are you hardcore enough to officiate a wedding?! ARE YOU!?