What, doesn't your microwave look like this?
This is one of the things I love about kid art, specifically drawings. The way they are so literal about certain things. Seriously, look at that light bulb dangling down, it's perfect.
It's a good lesson for artists, in my not-so-humble-opinion. Why bother drawing a realistic microwave? (Or painting a realistic image or shooting a realistic photo, etc.) Why not interpret it in a new way? In this case, an amusing way. I like amusing. No, let's clarify, I love ridiculousness. Or absurdity. That's a good one too.
And by bad I mean adorable.
As always, special correspondence comes courtesy of Jane Legion. Thanks!
(P.S. Could this be the secret international twin of NOLA kitty?)
A week of teaching has flown by. I made puppets with kids ranging from 5 to 10 years old (okay, there was one 12 year old, but that makes for misleading data). This is my almost-finished puppet - I put that green felt heart on his tie with a little pink button. I haven't thought up a name for him yet. I'm now contemplating if I want to make more puppets or not. They're certainly cute and fun, but will they sell. Nothing sells nowadays.
I have lots of adorable kid-made puppet photos too. I'm trying to decide how to inundate this blog with said photos.
As far as teaching goes, I find myself being able to be more laid back with the kids. Sure, I try to establish authority and not lose control of a situation, but I also want to relax and not have to spend my whole day yelling at kids. That's certainly how I would describe my days at ZooCamp. Not totally, but still.
This past week I only really got grumpy with a class and it was the very last class of the last day and they were just too wound up, understandably so but still. Otherwise the week was good and not too taxing emotionally. So it came as a surprise when talking another teacher (who was new to teaching little kids) that she found a certain little rascal B to be too sassy and out of control. True, he was a handful, but I still adored him and didn't feel like he was a pain the way some kids I've had in the past have truly been a pain. Whenever he (or any other child) was sassy, I just threw the sass back a little and otherwise ignored it. How is it that this other teacher wasn't okay with it? Did B actually treat us differently? Did we just receive it differently? Have I gone soft? I just don't know.
I worry sometimes that I am not the good teacher that I think I am. Not perfect mind you, but doing okay for where I am in life. I don't get to experience others' teaching since I am always tucked away in my own class. I am considering taking a day or two this summer when I'm not working and visiting campus anyways just to peek in on other teachers. That might just been good intentions on my part, but I hope I follow through at least once.
Welcome to another session of "Cheap therapy for me, rambling whiny post for you." (And yes, let's just get it out there, I've had my share of not-cheap therapy.)
Okay. So I am again (still? more so?) hung up on the whole NPO thing. Blame it on the workshop thingy I attending this morning. I am proud of what I get done. (I beat myself up over not doing more.) I am secretly suspecting that I could be okay at doing this. Not great (do you even know how much it kills me to act extroverted?), but at least okay. However, there are two problems that would exist even if the organization were running smoothly and I had no worries about finances or tasks getting done or whatever.
First off, I don't get paid for it. Sure, I am pretty fortunate in life and don't have too many bills to worry about and therefore don't "work" too often, but I still have a few bills plus I have this crazy desire to be able to buy myself something nice once in a while. Secondly, even if I were a paid NPO person, I feel like I'm losing my identity as an artist. It took me some time to comfortably own that identity (i.e. not feel like a poser) and now it's slipping away. And, P.S., my goal was to get paid for making art, not for running an NPO. (Sure, we all have to change our vision of how our lives will sometimes, but I've had to do that a couple of times over pretty big things so I'm kind of hopng that the universe will give me a break on this one.)
Next item. It's that time of the year, I have teaching gigs coming up again. This is the identity I can grasp most right now - teacher. I am a teacher. I get paid for it. It happens semi-regularly. I think I enjoy it for the most part. (Ask me how I feel when the kids won't listen and we're running late and OH MY GOODNESS WHY CAN'T YOU JUST PICK UP THOSE SCRAPS SO WE CAN ALL GO TO LUNCH???!!) Perhaps a better way to say it is that it is very rewarding. Satisfying... fulfilling... whatever that feeling is when a kid gets it and is excited to learn. At any rate, soon enough being a teacher will all but consume my life. I'll get a taste of it in a couple of weeks during spring break, and then for real in the summer. Well, I'm assuming I'm hired for the summer, but there's no reason I shouldn't be. In the meantime, I need to actually figure out my class syllabi for the summer and, y'know, turn in my job application. Hilarious.
Is there a point? I don't know. I just needed to pass my anxiety onto someone else. You're welcome.
