Tango or Two-Step?

My pen has been on hiatus
My notebook in a box
Don't know what they been doing
But I know what they have not

No dancing across the page
Laying dormant
Sleeping in wait
Like spring's flowers during winter's snow
Collecting? Maybe.
Restoring? Recharging?
Who knows?
But dance I have not
No tangling with words
Uninspired busy-ness has kept me from the page

But now...
I've started reading
and proven that it's true
readers read like writers
and long to join in too

So...
My pen will take the floor
No more wallflower standing silent
A tango? A two-step?
I cannot be sure just yet
but dancing shall be done



Looking back, I realize it has been months since my pen last hit the page.  May, to be exact.  Part of me can't believe it's been so long!  Part of me isn't surprised at all! 

Since May, many things have happened in this little life mine.  In my last post, I showed the photo of the for sale sign in my front yard.  We cleaned, held showings, cleaned some more, over and over and over until I wanted to poke my eyes out.  In August, we accepted an offer on our house and put in an offer on a new home. 

In September, a new school year began.  I won't lie...it's been a roller coaster experience this year.  Three weeks into the school year, just as things are beginning to settle in a little, the administration in my district decided that the class sizes were too small in kindergarten (16-17 per class) to warrant 5 classrooms and so they cut one out and redistributed those students into the remaining four rooms.  My classroom absorbed four new friends.  They are great but it caused a shift in the classroom dynamics.  It lead to another beginning, another round of settling in and learning routines.  Along with those challenges, there are two students in my classroom with physical challenges.  One is physically unable to do many things but mentally is able to participate in most things.  She has a one-on-one aide that helps her through the day, which is an enormous help to me, but it's a challenge to rethink the how of each lesson and activity ahead of time to ensure her success.  I also have a student who is unable to process what she hears or speak.  She is learning sign language and has a full time interpreter in the classroom with her.  This also sparks some new challenges for me.  She is capable of doing every task that her peers can do, but there is often a language barrier because her signing skills equate to the understanding of a two year old's speech.  She just isn't experienced enough in language and the signs for things to understand everything we ask of her.  It involves some pre-teaching of skills, lots of vocabulary building, and much trail and error.  We are all enjoying learning signs though and the kids are soaking it in like the little sponges that they are. We also have the typical behavioral challenges, those students who's parents are uninvolved and those who hover.  It's a quirky little group but I love them all the same.  They are a neat bunch of kids but I'm exhausted at the end of the day.

At the end of September, we closed on both houses, moved out of the old house and into the new house all in the same day.  It was quite a day!  It was mostly a blur and I think I'm ok with that. 

Now, we have mostly settled into the new house.  Most of the boxes are unpacked (just don't look in the laundry room or garage please).  We even have pictures and some decorations hung on the walls.  We are settled back into a normal routine and are enjoying the newfound ability to stretch out a little at home without being on top of each other all the time.

And so...
I think the time has come for me to unpack my hobbies.  I have begun to read again and with that has come the desire to write again.  I have no plans for great works but sure does feel nice to tango with my pen again.

Slice of life...here I come!