Thoughts About Learning

Well, I have been trying unsuccessfully to post on my blog for a week or so now. Something always gets in the way. Last time it was the computer itself. But that is beside the point.

Connor and I had our first day of classes yesterday. He is taking three dual credit courses this semester and I'm just taking two regular courses. Part of me would like to be doing a lot more, but this is how it works this semester, and in the end, I'm happy with it. I get to supervise Ethan's schoolwork and plan Mattie's English and Spanish work for the year, and I love doing that. It might not count as college credit, but I enjoy the experience.

So, the classes. I went into this with a biased view of Kilgore College. Most of what I'd heard about the school was negative. That, coupled with my propensity for expecting the worse, set me up for a very pleasant surprise. The buildings were good, the people were really helpful, and the teachers actually acted like they wanted to help us succeed. I was stunned. First impressions may lie, but basing your impressions off the impressions of other people isn't the way to go either.

Of course I'd love to be at a four year university right now, but that's not what I'm doing. So I figured I may as well swallow my pride and appreciate what I get. There are a lot of things I'm going to like about Kilgore. I love to learn, and I've always tried, (maybe not always striven,) for excellence. I'm not going to Kilgore so that I can shirk. But, it did occur to me yesterday that perhaps a bonus to attending Kilgore instead of a more challenging school would be that I can relax and enjoy learning instead of continually scrambling to make top grades with a really high standard. Enjoying what I learn is more important to me than earning the highest grades, and I think it's the key to retaining information anyway.

Our history teacher emphasized that she believes in redemption, and as I understand it, giving us room to fall and pick ourselves back up again. As a person who wants to try hard anyway, I appreciate that. I have spent way too much time kicking myself over mistakes, and it helps not to have someone else kicking you too.

I've been reading a book on probiotics (almost the opposite of antibiotics, but not quite!) that I got from the library. I love it. I love learning about my guts. I love learning about other peoples' guts. And all the little bugs. I lovingly refer to them as my "internal garden" and have had a great interest in promoting the health of my microflora lately, mostly with yogurt. I found a recipe on line for making it (very inexpensively) in the crock pot. It's delicious. It's almost scary how important the balance of bacteria in our gut is to the health of our whole bodies.

Anyway, all that is just to say that I've been learning far more about biology from that book than I ever did from my high school science curriculum, and with 100% more enthusiasm! I was never interested in biology in school, but now I'm almost looking forward to the college class. Massage therapy is next on the list.

Well, at this point, my only issue with college, besides the fact that it costs both arms and both legs, is that I need to pick only one or two majors...because suddenly, the whole world looks like a new and fascinating place, full of so many things to learn.

New Starts and Memory Blanks

This week I've been pouring my time into the details of getting into college. Yes, it's a bit late to be "starting" on this. That shouldn't actually be in quotation marks. I literally started on Monday looking up information on Kilgore's website. I wasn't prepared at all. I met with several large roadblocks. But after seven hours on the computer, phone, etc., and some sweat (jogging to loosen my tense shoulders) and blood (cut my leg on the metal filing cabinet while locating SAT scores), I was able to make great progress and somehow the worst of the roadblocks melted away.

After I finally quit for supper, I got a particularly encouraging bit of news concerning funds and promptly burst into tears. I'll never understand girls. Hold out under all kind of pressure all day, and when something good happens, we start bawling.

There's a long way to go, but I feel amazed at how God is making my paths straight. I am not Miss On Top Of It, and I'm not Miss Self Sufficient, either. I didn't "do my homework." And compared to "everybody else," I'm behind. I'm not even planning to take a full load this semester, but I keep on thinking of the Tortoise and the Hare! God has provided just right for the amount of work I feel comfortable with during this transitional time. Right now I'm Miss Standing In Awe.

I've been driving Dad's truck (I expected it to have died in my absence). But it's still chuggin'. Driving comes back to me with surprising ease, but directions...not so much. I sometimes draw a complete blank when trying to picture roads connecting. I keep getting lost on the way to places I used to know how to get to. It's a strange feeling. As if I'm trying to remember a map in a dream world, except this world is my real world. Oops.

The Rains Came Down and the Floods Came Up

Well. The world continues to turn. And although I haven't continued to blog as frequently as I'd like, I continue to want to blog...

I've been back from Ukraine for two weeks today. Dwelling on the adjustments only confuses me, so I won't. But I like being back, and I'm excited for the future as I look into courses at Kilgore Community College and think about options for work.

Today Ethan and I started reading lessons. He already knows some, but with the topsy-turviness of Mom working, he hasn't practiced in a while. So we worked on sounds for a bit. He's so serious that his subtle humor takes me off guard. It creeps into his eyes under the long lashes when I'm in the middle of an explanation, and then I look up and find him cracking some joke. Which takes me off guard, because I'm being serious too. And then I remember that silliness is a greatly underestimated part of education. Not constant silliness, but a healthy sprinkling to loosen things up a bit.

He wanted to go and build things in the creek. After a year in the Crowe household, the lack of boy around here is absolutely alarming. What? Only one? You need two at least, preferably five...

I am a sad substitute for a boy, but only Ethan and I were home, so we went to the creek to build things.

Since I've been home it's done almost nothing but rain. When I left Ukraine it had been raining, and Dad told me to bring some with me, because they hadn't had rain in weeks. As soon as I arrived home, storm clouds began to gather and within two hours there was a shower. Then we went to Glen Rose, TX for the weekend, where they hadn't had good rain for a month. It rained two days. Incidentally, the evening we got home, it stormed violently at our house again. Dad said he should send me on a world tour :)

Well, yesterday and the night before we had five or six inches. Afterwards, it was so humid out that our windows fogged up. Naturally, the ground couldn't hold it, so our lowland lot became a wetland lot, with an island of sagging vegetable garden and an island of house. The creek, which normally runs at only a few inches, was flooding its ten foot banks for a few hours.

This left a nice scene to be explored this afternoon, and some pleasantly squirchy mud to be tested by feet. The water has gone back to almost normal.

(and here I wanted to insert a few pictures I took, but alas...)

One is of Ethan beside the water with the yellow sun on his tanned back mingled with shade, and the coffee-and-milk creek flowing by. Another is of the two of us, and he is making a face. And the last was of the miniature (3 inch high) hut I made out of reeds woven together. We were the proverbial (parablial???) man who "built his house apon the sand," and Ethan spent as much time repairing his house as he spent building it. He dug his out of the shifty bank. By the time we finished we had had three leaf boat races and a million mosquito bites.

In Which I Lose the Rest of my Dignity and Arrive Home Happy

Well, I'm back. No, I'm not threatening anybody :)

I can't believe only a week ago I was in the air probably over an ocean, wishing I could sleep but probably reading Flowers for Algernon instead. (I picked that book up at the airport...it was really interesting, but I would be very cautious in recommending it.)

I have to relate one last Ukraine incident. I suppose I was bound to close my time there in style...my style...

After hugging the sending off crew goodbye (Deb, some of the kids, and Simeon & Asia, who were going shopping with Deb) I got through checking in just fine and got my boarding pass, then sat down in the lounge area to wait, staring for a while at the wavy lines in the roof design and the blue ones of the walls with names of cities painted on.

I discovered that I was suddenly very hungry, so I went over to the little cafe type place across the room. I saw kefir there and, thinking "When am I going to get kefir again?" I decided to get one. In Rzhishchiv it would have only cost fifty cents or so, but this one was four "stinking" dollars and I was a little affronted to find that I had not only been grossly overcharged by also badly ripped off with a bad exchange rate. But I figured that breakfast is breakfast, and I would rather have a four dollar Kefir than a four dollar anything else. So I was a sucker and bought it.

I returned to my seat, as usual trying to act more graceful and composed than I really am, and as usual, not succeeding. I tried to pull off the tab that sealed my kefir, but instead of peeling back, it broke off. Result: sealed kefir, no tab. Unwilling to sacrifice four dollars to a kefir never to be drunk, I pried it open with my fingernails with some trouble. It opened with a sudden burst, spraying kefir onto my face and down my shirt! Dignity...composure...grace...

Well, I managed to clean it up and drink my kefir from the awkwardly designed bottle before boarding the plane. What better way to exit the country? I told myself.

I settled onto the plane, relished the lift off, and spent the next half hour nursing a surprise nosebleed that shattered the rest of my dignity. So I gave up on dignity and composure for the rest of the trip and had a great time, happily joking with the Gatwick checking people, who shocked me by being very nice to me, and laughing almost out loud at the ogreman who yelled at me and everyone else throught the line at JFK. Somebody was having a bad day, but it wasn't going to be me!

I arrived home after a long and sleepless journey, and delighted in the hugs and raptures of my family members. We spent a night in Dallas, then came home for a day or two, then went away again to Glen Rose, TX for a few days.

And now we are home, and I feel like I'm standing on the edge of a cliff with blankness before me. All the nicely formulated plans I had back in Ukraine now seem to fade to mere ideas and wishes, and at least for the moment I feel the need to look down at the ground to steady myself, because looking out THERE is making me dizzy. We only get one day at a time anyway. God is good to keep me trusting Him.

More Later...

A Raw Sort of Love

This morning was my "last" church service with my folks here. I am leaving on Wednesday.

If I've learned anything about God this year, it's that He's a faithful provider. He gave me this family that I love and belong in. He'll make a home for me everywhere I go no matter who I am with.

All week I was sensing that something was going on behind my back, especially when Masha begged me not to go away on Thursday night, because I had planned to visit Nadia at a camp in nearby Baliko Shuchenka.

So I stayed home and Nadia came for supper and then we went over to my house for Thursday night prayer meeting. I already knew something was up, but I didn't know what. I came into the living room, which was rather fuller than usual, to be greeted by a lot of goofy looks, and balloons and something behind the semi-see through guest room door, which Masha was diligently guarding.

Then Cheryl asked me to go get my Bible, so I went to open my door, and Bam! The door flew open and out flooded a dozen or more people! I screamed and then started laughing and we had a hugging assembly line because they could only get out my narrow bedroom door in single file.

I was a little shocked to see most of the church there (about 30 people,) because, having rather limited ideas about parties, I had imagined a small quiet get together. And then this. I was so blessed and I felt blanketed in love. I just have these awesome sneaky friends! I tend to be uncomfortable in groups, but this was a very good kind of uncomfortable, a raw sort of love, one that we could all share. The Body of Christ is precious and I feel so privileged to be a part of it. I love it that even when I wasn't a very sociable person, people loved me into the family anyway.

The only thing that saved me from crying was the fact that I was laughing almost the whole time. They said a lot of really nice things, and there were poems and a song, and we prayed, and they Cheryl and Deb served up banana splits. Ruth said they were talking like it was my funeral, but I didn't mind. Yeah, what's with all the past tense, anyway??

So I am very happy, and very at peace. It's like what Simeon said in his message this morning at church, that we are like sheep, and sheep need the shepherd to take care of certain things for them so that they can relax, like protecting them, finding food for them, making space for them, etc. They get really nervous and freaked out about just about anything. But they know the shepherd so well that just his presence on the scene is enough to calm them.

And I guess that's what I felt this morning as I sat in the upstairs of the Gollan's house with these friends, listening to Simeon talk about the Good Shepherd. God's comforting hand soothing me, completely resting me.

My Weird Dream

Last night I had a very weird and detailed dream.

In it, Masha and I woke up very early and we drove Gaven’s mo-ped to the bus station. I discovered that it is nearly impossible to be ladylike while riding a moped in a skirt. When we got there, we met Gaven and took a bus to Bila Tserkva, where Masha used to live. We went shopping and I found souvenirs for my family and Gaven picked out shoes for Masha that she liked and she bought them. (Weird or what?)

The next thing that happened was that we were in a pizzeria and ate you guessed it, pizza…and then the lights turned off in the toilet while I was there and I was left in the dark.

After that we went to a park where Masha and Gaven went on a spinning-round-and-round-kind-of-ride, but I didn’t do it because just watching it made me feel sick. So instead I took pictures of them, and of the colorful zinnias along the fence. They got off and my nose started to bleed, so I had to sit on a bench with my head cocked back, waiting for it to stop and trying to clean up with Kleenex and water.

I said that it was like a weird dream, and they said that maybe it really was.

When the “leak” as Gaven put it, had stopped, we rode a decrepit ferris wheel that was slow enough that I didn’t get sick but had plenty of time to think about the distance between me and the ground. I was scared silly but it was a nice view.

After that park we went for a walk in a foresty park and saw pelicans and lions and statues we didn’t want to look at, and I ate a hazelnut snickers. Masha hit Gaven a lot with a bottle and I laughed a lot. We were so hot and tired and happy that we dozed on the way home in the marshrutka. And that was that.

Actually, it wasn’t a dream at all. It was all real…except that the lions and pelicans were not real, they were statues. And it was a very nice day.

St. Sophia's

Here are actual pictures of St. Sophia's cathedral. I didn't take very good ones because I was so embarressed at being caught "touristing."

This picture was taken from the other side, right above the entrance.