Spanish...a love story

In first grade I dressed up as a teacher. There was an apple on my jean dress. I also had a pointer to go along with it.

In fourth grade, I learned the basics of spanish through a SAMI named Bryan. He thought my pronunciation was decent. I thought he was going to be disappointed that he had to tutor a girl. I don't think he was, though.

I continued with Spanish in 7th and 8th grade with a teacher who didn't care about grades.

9th grade I took band.

Tenth grade I had Mrs. Schiller. She was a good teacher and I said that I wanted to take Spanish because it was "exotic." It's not as exotic to me anymore, but there are a couple of words that I like.

This was the year that I decided I wanted to be a Spanish teacher.

11th and 12th grade I took Spanish with Mr. Wilson. He taught differently than Mrs. Schiller, but it wasn't a bad different. It was a good different.

12th grade I became the SAMI (spanish tutors to fourth graders). I gave back what was given to me. It was the most amazing feeling in the entire world (there are other good feelings that aren't emotional, too. I guess).

Now this is where the detour comes in.

The first professor that I took at college didn't wow me. Nor did I do well in her class.

It took me a while to find the kind of passion that I had for Spanish that I did that senior year of high school.

I do want to be a certified High School Spanish teacher.

And it scares me to death.

Dreaming takes guts.

It takes a lot of guts to go after something that you really want.

Don't ever let someone tell you that you don't want it.

That's all.

I'd like it if you commented.

Unless this thing isn't on.

It better be.

Coffee Shop Blogging

Hi all. I'm in Carabou Coffee right now. In Clarkston. Blogging.

I decided that Carabou Coffee is my favorite coffee shop.

Hear me out okay. I haven't given up on Starbucks. I like Starbucks. They have good coffee. My favorite hot coffee drink of theirs tastes like a snickerdoodle. I can't remember the name of it at this point, though. I also like their shaken iced lemonades with passion tea, sweetened, light on the ice.

So I'm still a Starbucks fan. I just like Carabou more. The disappointing thing is I don't know of any in the Flint area. This causes problems for someone who goes to college in Flint.

I know, right?

So the reasons I like Carabou so much is because of their marketing. I have a napkin that is under my drink right now that tells me what life is too short for. The list includes cranky people and wifi you have to pay for. Both of these things are on my bad list, to say the least.

I just wanted to let you know.

I'm a friend of comments. I promise I won't bite your comments. Hard.

Maturity

So I went clubbing yesterday. It was quite an interesting adventure. More of an adventure than usual to say the least. I don't know why exactly I felt the need to go. It was probably because I wanted to hang out with my friends. I love my friends a lot. I'm not exactly sure why (kidding).

But anyways. Now that I am a senior in college (no pictures please) I am going to be faced with a lot of decisions. Most of them about career choices, extracurricular activities and what kinds of classes I choose to take in my final semesters. I feel like these are the choices that are going to shape the rest of my life. They will shape my life in ways that I do not know at this point.

I don't mind clubbing or bar hopping. I just don't like to do it too often. I guess I'm not much of a partyer. It's probably because I knit. There's a stereotype out there that knitters are very boring. I hope that I have proved you wrong (if you've met me that is).

I guess the point of this blog is that I don't really feel that I need to go clubbing too much anymore if at all. This is partly because of what went down at the club last night which I'm not going to go into (another post for another day). I'm a big fan of studying, reading, writing and that sort of thing. I guess you gotta do what you do best.

Anyways. Thanks for reading. As usual.

Feel free to comment. I'm a big fan of comments.

Here goes...

I just saw Eat Pray Love, the movie tonight with my mom. It was really good.

I'm not going to write you a review. It was good because of the meaning. Not because of the acting, writing or directing. Pretty scenery, though, just fyi.

The movie got me thinking about life. My life, to be specific. I would love to go and visit the places that the woman in the movie did. There is probably a lot of culture. That's what I love about visiting other countries: the culture and the people. I have been blessed to have been able to go outside the United States and meet a lot of wonderful people.

The thing is, I don't need to go someplace else. My life is here in Michigan. And what's weird is that I love it. I love Michigan. I have loved it my entire life and am always confused when people don't like Michigan or put it down because of the fact that it's a crap hole. I have pictures to prove that it's not, though.

I would love to get a job in Michigan when I graduate from college in May. I know there are no guarantees that I will. The job market isn't the best thing right now. Don't worry, I'm not that naive. I have to keep hope alive, though. Without hope we have nothing (that was paraphrased from Harvey Milk by the way).

It's so weird that I'm graduating in May. I feel like it's been more than four years since I started. I have one more year to go and then I'm going to have to deal with the real world and all it's crap. I'll tell you how that goes when I get to it.

But yeah. The movie and what it meant to me. The woman in the movie had to go to all those places to find herself and be able to eat, pray and love. I have already found myself. I know who I am and what I want out of life. I don't need to go some place else to do that.

I know I love food and I don't apologize for it. I love chick flicks because of the romance. Love stories have always been my favorite stories. I love wearing skirts because they make me feel like a little girl and I also feel flirtatious. I love swimming more than walking on ground. I feel like I should have been a fish but somehow it's okay that I turned out to be human. I love bike riding and I would love to get one of those vintage bikes with a little basket on it and ride on it in a skirt. I know this is not practical, but so much of living is impractical that I wouldn't care at all. I prefer buying used clothing than new clothes. Part of the reason for this is because I ruin a lot of my clothes by staining them. My washer's been doing this for me lately, though. I love singing and playing the flute and I'm a horrible guitarist, but I love the sound of the acoustic so much that I don't even care.

So now that I have told you all my little eccentricities, I'll tell you what I want to do with my life. First, though, I'll tell you what I don't want to do. I don't want to be a high school Spanish teacher. I don't care how amazing the job market is for this position. I don't care that Granholm just passed a law that requires high schoolers to take foreign language to graduate. I don't care that there are large sums of illegal immigrants in Michigan making it more likely that Spanish will be the dominant language of this state in ten years. Don't care. Seriously. I also don't want to teach English as a second language unless I am actually in a foreign country because I would love to teach abroad and immerse myself in the culture of a Spanish-speaking country. I'm not really picky. It doesn't really matter which one. I wouldn't mind returning to Costa Rica, though. I also heard Peru's nice.

My number one career choice would be a writer if I got to choose. I would love to write novels, short stories, poems, lyrics and/or magazine articles. At this point I'm leaning towards writing for a magazine mostly because it seems the most plausible.

So why didn't you know that I wanted to be a writer until this point? I guess because I had gotten used to so many people telling me how great the job market was for Spanish teachers that I didn't want to be disappointed by people telling me how horrible it is for writers.

I don't care about the job market. Why does it matter? This is what I want to do with my life. I have found a passion in writing that I never found in Spanish. Why would I want to go to a job that I dislike? What's the point? I'd much rather never make a dime writing than make millions teaching Spanish. It's just the way it is. There's more to life than money.

I know what you're thinking. Bills. They don't pay themselves. I'm sure I'll figure something out.

So yeah. Coming out as a writer. I'm here. I'm descriptive. Get used to it.