My Southern Experience

I've been thinking about it and I believe I need to reflect on my experience in the South and share the story of how Joe and I can to live here and how we came to leave here.

Joe and I met about 4 years ago, really almost exactly 4 years ago. I arrived fresh from 2 years in Austria and was planning on simply renewing my E.U. Visa by staying in the USA for 90 days and then crossing back over the pond. Little did I know I would marry the man that I met my first night back in Boise.

About 6 months into our relationship Joe said to me that we would move to Nashville. Now it was late at night, late, like 3 am late, and I don't think Joe understood the repercussions of saying such a thing to me, Jennifer, the girl who moves when the mood strikes. We laughed, we hugged and we carried on with the rest of our night.

The next day I looked up Metro Nashville Public Schools website and found they needed Spanish teachers. At the time, living in Boise, I was struggling with the fact that I was working selling restaurant supplies and teaching adult education in the evenings, but not doing what I wanted to be doing, which was teaching full-time. So, I applied.

Within 2 weeks I had the principal of a school calling me on a Saturday morning. I took this as a good sign. Let me tell all of you newbies to the profession, this is NOT a good sign. This is a sign of desperation. They could not find anyone else. But, I was also desperate. I wanted to teach full-time.

I didn't get that job. But, Joe and I flew out to Nashville in April 2008 and I interviewed in 3 schools in Nashville, in Memphis and completed half and interview with Teach NOLA in New Orleans. I say half because I realized pretty much upon touch down of my airplane that I didn't want to live in NOLA. It smelled too much like San Juan, Puerto Rico. So, I left the interview early. They people from the organization understood.

I got a job offer at McMurray middle within 2 hours of leaving the interview. Again, this was desperation. I was told I would be teaching 3 Spanish classes and 1 English language learning class. Great I thought, that is exactly what I want to teach.

Joe and I packed up and moved to Nashville on July 6, 2008.

I'm not going to get into what happened in the 3 years that followed at the school. I will only present the positives and unexpected benefits of working there. Life is too short and I still need to pack.

3 years later, many wonderful things have happened to Joe and I. I was forced, when I say forced I mean I was told I would not have a job if I didn't, so it was get the degree or be out of work, to me that is forced, to get certified to teach ESL. So, I got my M.Ed. from MTSU. I really enjoyed studying and the coursework. It was a great experience, but I think I still have not recovered from working as a full-time teacher and studying masters level classes full-time in the mornings and evenings. No, I know I am still tired from that.

I have met some truly amazing people, most of them teachers. I met Cori on my first day at the "McMurray Family Retreat". Family - HA! We have been pretty much inseparable since. I honestly do not remember how Mr. Robin and I became friends but that doesn't matter. She's that one friend that every girl must have that never says "no". And in turn gets wrangled into all of my crazy ideas, and then we bully Cori into coming with us too. Olivia, well I met that gem of a woman by chance. She's just as crazy as me and moved in the middle of the school year to Nashville to be with her now husband. We just decided she was our friend, whether she liked it or not. We spent a lot of Friday evenings at Johnny's recovering from weeks from you know where at school.

Through the last 3 years we have bitched, moaned, cried, yelled and were beat down together. I would not have survived without those 3 women!

I also never expected to have my life changed by my students. I always heard of a special teacher who took students under her wing, they had her phone number, and she had theirs. She took care of them, bought them food, clothes, and did lots of other things for them. Sirci I am talking about you. I don't know if I ever expected that I would get this close with a student, or if I would need to. But, this last school year I did. A little Karen girl, a refugee from Burma, who had lived in a Thai refugee camp waltzed into my classroom and into my heart. I think of her as my first child, I don't have kids, but she is just about that to me. We exchanged gifts and spoke quite a bit. But, it really began when she needed help with medical stuff. I have advocated for that child, taken her to the eye doc and searched for used fridges with her and her father. Yesterday, we said good-bye. Her father was so kind and gave us pictures of the family and my little one just sat and translated. I still have to do a couple more things for them, so we will talk again, but that child made me realize why I teach and who I need to focus on. As I reflect on the faces of the family in the door, waving as Joe and I drove away, I get all teary eyed. But, I know if any kid is going to be okay, it will be her. She is really smart. She wrote in a note to me "thank you for making me like to read". My mom thinks the "making" part is really funny, like I just sat there and told her you will like to read over and over until she was so brow beaten that she submitted. That is not the case, I like to think I just imparted my love of reading to her. Either way, she reads all the time now, so mission accomplished!! That is all I ever wanted as a teacher, to share my love of reading.

My am I long winded today. This is cathartic for me, so deal with it! No one is "making" you read this ;-)

So, to sum it up:

Things I learned living in Tennessee - the South is poor, much more than anything I ever saw in Idaho.
Cicada bugs come out every 7 years and are weird and reek havoc on the area for weeks, people also eat them.
My students were not scared of anything in Nashville, they used to "play in the jungle with tigers in it. They can climb over a fence, it is no big deal, quit freaking out Mrs. Lassen."
That white stuff growing on your walls is not mold, it is just something that grows on areas that have been damp, it is not mold, and don't call the news about it.
Morons are running the education system here.
Getting a Masters degree isn't that hard.
Olivia can't find anything and thinks Boise is like Peoria, Illinois.
Core is allergic to everything.
Robin doesn't want you to touch her feet, under any circumstances.
Heather is the best baker EVER.
Sitting on hold for an eternity is common, and when someone says I will return your call shortly it means if pigs fly or hell freezes over, but it doesn't mean shortly like that day.
If it snows an inch school is cancelled for at least 2 days, if not longer.
Pickles are really good when fried and dipped in ranch and considered a serving of vegetables.
Bar-b-Cutie gives vegetarians free Bar-B-Que for a year and doesn't see the irony in that. Yeah, that actually happened to me.
A moment of silence every morning at school is not considered breaking that silly old separation of church and state clause.

I will miss Nashville and the friends I made here. I might even miss teaching here, maybe just a little. Now I have to pack and move to Puerto Jimenez, Costa Rica. I'm going to be the director of a school there. I am excited for what is next for Joe and I and am also blessed (that is a Souther saying) for the time I had here.