I realize that I am really a strange person by today’s standards. Now most of you probably already know that and wonder when I had the epiphany? Maybe it was the two-part Thomas Jefferson documentary that I just watched the past three days after the kids went to bed. Or the hummus I love to eat with cucumbers or quinoa. I rarely drink anything besides water. I love to read–I mean love to read so much that I could keep my tv locked up and only open it once a week and be totally content reading our school books. I love history, love Greek mythology and studying ancient civilizations like the Assyrians, Persians, Sumerians. Things I didn’t get when I went to public school back in the 80s or at least not much of. I did get some British literature and some classic American literature but there was just a lot of not so helpful stuff. Can I get an Amen?
I did’t realize it til we enrolled our children in a Charlotte Mason school shortly after I had Alex and was struck with debilitating postpartum. Charlotte who? Exactly. Look her up, it’s worth it! I had so much enjoyed, up to that point, homeschooling our children. What I loved most was how we learned together. So I missed that when they went to school and some identity crisis came along with it, but I am so glad they went. Because I love Charlotte Mason and her philosophy and I never learned about her in teacher college. Not even a tiny little bit. I love not only her educational philosophy but her life philosophy and I love how the two are so intermingled that you really can’t separate them. The Holy Spirit is the teacher in all things; we really do need to form good habits to carry us through not only our childhoods but all of our adult years.
The habit of paying attention? Holy cow–have you ever tried to narrate Charlotte Mason style? Most of you won’t have the faintest clue what I’m talking about and I didn’t either before they went to school. Read a paragraph or this blog entry and try to tell it to someone about it right after you finish. Not a summary, but with details, lots of details and original “author’s language” IT IS NOT EASY. Even if you are not in your 40s it’s not easy:) It sounds like memorization but it’s really more like learning how to paint pictures in your head or seeing a movie as you read and you know what? It works! It makes you remember so much more than just learning for the test! And you remember it for so much longer because it’s really in there. You have made it your own.
All my life I just learned to get straight A’s–now I am learning because I love to learn and I remember so much more than I use to. My kids have been exposed to 5 years of this constant mental workout in class and they could narrate me into the ground if they wanted to. Most of the time they are more gracious than that.
So why are my kids back home? I missed them. Seriously, it is a long, boring soap-opera type drama that makes me a little melancholy. Oversimplified–small school politics. But I’m glad had they had the opportunity to go there. Frankly, it makes me a better teacher to know what I know now and what I would probably have never known had they not gone. And as this is my eldest’s last year with us, it gives me more time with him. Time I will treasure forever. I asked him the other day how he liked being back home and he said, very sweetly, “I never wanted to leave in the first place.” Priceless.
I love being with my kids, I love being their mom and teacher and fellow learner. I love that our family is tight–really tight like only a military family can be. When you are the only familiar faces as you move to place after place after place. Starting over, again–with each other. Arguing passionately–with each other. Forgiving one another, sometimes grudgingly. I love eating dinner together every night and missing my eldest when he is at work. And NEVER getting used to my husband being deployed ( thankfully he isn’t gone much since retiring from the Air Force). I could spend just about 24/7 with this man that I have been married to for 24 years and never get tired of him. And watching HGTV and Netflix documentaries and eating broccoli every night (just about!). If all that makes me a little nerdy then I’m okay with that.
It’s just who I am. The bible calls it peculiar… and if I could pronounce it correctly, that’s most decidedly what I would call myself!
Decidedly Different 