SOLSC '19 Day Seven: Come for a picture, leave with some books

At the end of the day, they remembered what I had forgotten (even though I just sent the email yesterday).

"We're taking the Book Lunch Bunch picture, right, Ms Margocs?"

(Ooops, yes!)

They trickled in twos and threes, until eleven of the twelve were present. "Grab a book on the way to the Book Nook," I suggested.

"We're not even eating lunch," one mentioned, but I shrugged the comment off.  "We didn't have a chance to gather all the groups at lunch," I countered.

As we waited for my assistant, several of the students started talking about the books they had randomly pulled.  
"I didn't know we had a graphic novel of Snow White!"  
"Oh, I've read that, it's really good!"  
"Ms Margocs, do we have a second copy of Malala?" (Disappointed look when I said no.)
 "I'll check it out this time and share it with you," said the Malala holder (smile regained).

My assistant joined us in the Book Nook, and I took a seat on the lower bleacher with the students sitting behind.  Posed with our books, the pictures turned out great.

And then I headed back to the circulation desk to check out Snow White and I Am Malala, smiles on faces all around.  The joy of avid readers finding new books to read is infectious!

 

SOLSC '19 Day Six: I see kind people

We ate our traditional Mardi Gras pancake dinner at IHOP last night, co-celebrating my birthday with clink of mugs filled with decaf coffee.

We had a cheerful waiter, a young man who smiled from his eyes and checked on us just enough times.

A few rows down from us, an older couple sat together on the same side of their booth, the man in a newsboy cap, the woman with a shockingly full head of jet-black curls almost covering her eyes, talking and smiling.  A family was sitting behind us, and a few minutes after they left, the older gentleman scooped up a scarf they left behind and delivered it to them in the parking lot.

Separated by a half-wall of etched windows, the family next to us played games while they waited for their food.  Down the aisle from them, a father read something from his phone to his teenage son.  A younger father ate with his red-headed little girl, quiet and smiling.

I heard chatter in the foyer, and looked over my left shoulder to see a young boy dancing around, his sibling calling out from a baby carrier in not-yet-intelligible speech, their unperturbed mother conversing with another adult.

Our bellies full and our waiter generously tipped, we left the restaurant with contented smiles.
********************
During this SOLSC, I'm trying to be more observant of my surroundings, hoping to catch a story to tell.  Last night's observations are more vignette than tale.   

SOLSC '19 Day Five: Coffee ice cream in a plastic cup

It's my birthday today...but I basically celebrate all month long.  I began a few days ago by indulging in some coffee-flavored ice cream, a local store brand that adds chocolate chunks to the mix--heaven on a spoon.

**************
It's a summer day in Naples, Italy, and I'm pretty sure my mom has had it with our shenanigans in the house.  She tells us to pack our swimsuits and a towel, loads us up in the car, and heads for AFSOUTH, the military base where my dad works.

After my mother negotiates Italian traffic with aggressive driving tactics learned by necessity, we arrive at the base.  If it's brunch or lunch time, we get to eat at the cafeteria--yummy, greasy diner-style grub.  Next stop, the bookstore: a paperback Harlequin romance for my mother, and comic books for my brother and me.  Then it's off to the pool.

https://virtualglobetrotting.com/map/allied-forces-southern-europe-afsouth/view/google/

My mom settles in by the circular baby pool with its sloping sides, while my brother and I venture back and forth to the big pool.  When the heat gets to us, mom gives us some money to buy ice cream from the poolside snack shop.  My favorite flavor is coffee; it's served in a small, brown plastic cup with a handle.  Attached to the paper lid is a wooden spoon, offering up bites so tiny that it takes a quarter hour to finish the cup.

************************

Coffee ice cream: a delicious memory from 1974 and still a favorite way to celebrate, 45 years later.

SOLSC '19 Day Four: The sway

The baby cried out
Kicking, foot poking
Through a gap in the swaddling blanket
Of white, pink and blue

"You can love on him," the nurse said.

I redid his wrappings
Failing to contain that kicking leg
But no matter

I scooped him up
Left hand under his head
Right hand sliding under his body

To my left shoulder?
No, he wouldn't have it.

Lowering his head to the crook of my left arm
His body snuggled against 
The light blue of my volunteer scrub top

I began to move
First side to side
Then figure eight

The foot stopped kicking
His eyes open, looking at me
Before closing, succumbing to the sway.

Is there any better dance than this?

SOLSC '19 Day Three: What a difference support makes

Dressed in a red-and-white striped top with a bright red cardigan, I drove back to school  yesterday morning for our two Texas State Teacher Fellows' Saturday Seminar.  The breakfast opener was being held in my library. Since the event just happened to fall on Dr Seuss' birthday, they had decorated the space appropriately on Friday afternoon.

We were greeted at the library door by our kindergarten and first grade Fellow teachers,who were sporting fun Dr Seuss headbands.  The library was full of members from their program cohort, their professors, several representatives from our district's Central Office, and our own kindergarten and first grade teachers and administrators.  I thoroughly enjoyed my coffee, breakfast taco, Round Rock doughnut, and cinnamon roll while listening to the welcome speeches from the teacher mentor, district and campus administrators, and Fellows.  We made a cute notebook in the shape of the iconic Seussian cat-hat, and were directed to the first presentation in the classroom.

As familiar as I am with our Fellows--they visit the library with their classes every week, and I've supported them with both children's and professional book and material selections--I don't get to spend time observing my teachers in their classrooms.  I was blown away by their presentations.  From the looks of their classrooms, the routines and communities they have established, the effective teaching and learning strategies they modeled--they presented as experienced educators, not as the first-year teachers they are.

Sitting in the back row of seats in each room, I reflected on my own first year of teaching.  Alone in a portable, assigned no mentor, not even really knowing what questions to ask...I had to figure a lot out on my own.  These young women had a library full of people--classmates, professors, an on-site experienced teacher mentor, our own campus new teacher mentors, their teammates and administrators--helping them overcome every hurdle they encountered over what is arguably the hardest part of teaching: getting through your first year. 

What a difference support makes.  Perhaps our legislators, currently working on school funding yet again, should take note.

SOLSC '19 Day Two: Puffy eyed blinks

There is something mesmerizing in a newborn baby's gaze.  They fight against puffy lids to open their eyes just the teeniest bit, pupils looking huge and mysterious, knowing and curious at the same time.  Those eyes pull me in; a soft, higher pitched "Hello, sweetie!  Whatcha looking at?" falls from my lips. 

I have spent the last three Tuesday nights training to volunteer at the same hospital where my daughter lived for the first sixty-five days of her life, and where I later worked for three years as a NICU unit assistant and desk clerk.  It's hard to believe that it's been almost twenty-six years since the former, and twenty years the latter.  I was hoping to volunteer in the NICU, but weekend slots aren't open at the moment, and so I am down the hall in the newborn nursery.

It is strange and familiar at the same time.  The nurses are in the same blue scrubs I wore years ago; my scrubs are now a light blue embroidered top and khaki pants.  There are open warmers and bassinet cribs, but no isolettes.  Babies come and go, spending most of their hospital stay in their mothers' rooms.  And, of course, they are born at term, unladen with the  IVs, CPAP cannulas, and pulse-ox monitors that accompanied my own child who lived down the hall.

This afternoon, I'll meet my regular shift nurses for the first time.  Then I'll get to work--cleaning cribs and warmers, restocking supplies and linens, delivering lab samples, changing diapers, and hopefully cuddling a baby or two before delivering them back to their mamas, their postpartum experience already so different than my own.

SOLSC '19 Day One: Friday night hangout

The sign that said "Please seat yourself" was turned around tonight, to read "Please wait to be seated."  Our favorite neighborhood Mexican restaurant was unusually busy this Friday, and we were led to one of the few open booths in the far corner.  With my back to the bar and facing the front door, I had a sweeping view of the small main floor.  

A small square table in the middle caught my eye.  A young couple occupied two chairs, a woman on the left, and a man to her left, facing me.  They were both casually dressed, their body language relaxed, calm conversation unheard over the chatter of the restaurant.  The chair to his left was turned sideways, holding a car seat with an adorable, several-months-old baby girl, equally calm and relaxed.  She alternated looking around with taking drinks from her bottle or chewing on a snack, perfectly content while her parents enjoyed their dinner.

Other tables held larger extended families having animated conversations, laughing men and women in groups of twos and threes presumably enjoying a guys' or ladies' night, older couples like us eating in comfortable silence.

We filled our bellies, and went home to video chat with our daughter, our Friday night her late Saturday morning in Japan.  She has another two-and-a-half years with her job there, and is already thinking about what she wants to do when it is done.  Her Japanese friends, well aware of American news reports of political strife and general unrest, have asked her why she wants to return--and she's wondering if she wants to wait awhile longer to do so.

Agreeing with her friends, I hesitated to respond.  But then I thought about our restaurant.  It was busy with all kinds of people--white, black, Hispanic, old, young, and in-between.  My view for an hour held no animosity, no rudeness, no incivility. Just neighborhood folks eating good food and tipping their smiling waiters. 

I assured my daughter that no matter what she saw on the news--there are still plenty of nice folks here in the U.S.  I could vouch for that with my own eyes.