Another Rhyme of Mel

I know I haven't been doing very good at blogging this year. I was working on a project last night and wrote this poem. The first part is actually very similar and in some parts the same as I poem I wrote at least a year ago, but the rest is different. 

There once was a girl named Mel
She liked exploring quite well
One day she decided to stay longer overseas
so she moved to Southeast Asia with ease

The culture was very different from her own
and it was hard to be all alone
She met lots of great people
who she found to be her equal

She learned lots of new things
and to her old way of thinking she no longer clings
She took the opportunity to travel to new places
and all the new is what she embraces

She is glad that she was given this chance
to experience more of the world than just a quick glance
She plans to never go back to her old ways
no matter what happens during the rest of her days

She hopes to continue to explore

As to only stay at home is a bore

Her heart now resides in two places

Because she misses her dear friends’ faces

She has been called an old soul

Who happens to like rock and roll

Letters and old movies tie her to a bygone era

She is even named after a character close to O’Hara

She is strong and independent

But not extremely resplendent

Mature, yet hopelessly silly

But better to be that than chilly

Laughing hard brings tears and hiccups

To a girl who owns no pickups

Smiling is something fun to do

It happens a lot instead of feeling blue

To write about one’s self can be a chore

And can be a struggle not to cause the reader to snore

I hope if nothing else this makes you laugh

If not, I wouldn’t hire me to be on your writing staff

If you do like this poem hardcore

I may be willing to do an encore

Although it is not easy

To always be this cheesy  

Rhymes of Mel

There once was a girl named Mel
She liked exploring quite well
One day she decided to stay longer overseas
so she moved to Malaysia with ease

The culture was very different from her own
and it was hard to be all alone
She met lots of great people
who she found to be her equal

She learned lots of new things
and to her old way of thinking she no longer clings
She took the opportunity to travel to new places
and all the new is what she embraces

Even though she left Malaysia
she wanted to continue to live in Asia
The next stop on her journey was Indonesia
she hopes to always remember this time and never develop amnesia

When she returns home she hopes people will see
that she is a new Melanie
She has lots of wonderful things to share
and hopes her friends and family will care

She is glad that she was given this chance
to experience more of the world than just a quick glance
She plans to never go back to her old ways
no matter what happens during the rest of her days

Bali & Purple

We have been working on poetry this week and it has been awhile since I have really sat down an written a poem or two or three. Most of the time I like to start out by handwriting the poems. These are the two I like best so far.  I have done Diamante poems before but since I went to Bali last weekend this one is on Bali.

Bali

hot, sunny

walking, sightseeing, eating

waves crashing at night

shopping, relaxing, talking

peaceful, sandy

Bali

The next one is a color poem about my favorite color. I have written lots of types of poetry before but never a color poem. This is my first attempt at a poem about my favorite color, purple. I had a hard time with this poem. I am not sure if I have written about all the things that Purple is, but this is a good start. 

Purple

Purple is the color of royalty

Purple is sadness when a friendship ends

Purple is a long awaited hug by a loved one

Purple is a piece of fresh baked chocolate cake on the tongue

Purple is the sound of crashing waves on the beach late at night

Purple is the scent of a rose as one falls asleep

Purple is being curled up in a comfy blanket on a cold day

Purple is the purr of a cat curled up on a lap

Purple is the velvety feeling of my favorite dress

Purple is chocolate chip cookies hot out of the oven

Purple is hands on my skin during a massage

Purple is the content feeling after waking from a nap

Purple is the right song playing to go with my mood

Purple is when I am feeling confident and beautiful

Purple is a walk at night in the mountains under a canopy of stars

Purple is dark chocolate melting in the mouth

Weakness is a Strength or Not?

I read this blog post about weakness as a strength and it has been tumbling around in my head ever since. I thought it was an interesting perspective and at first I thought I disagreed.  I really enjoy reading Adrienne's thoughts and they are inspiring. There have been several that have made me dig down deep and really look at things I have not looked at for awhile. To pick up things that have gotten dusty and brushed them off to see what is underneath all the dust.

I have been composing a response the last few days and just now I went to re-read the post to make sure I address all the different things I disagree with and now I have picked up on some things I didn’t notice the first time. So, maybe it is not that I disagree but instead that a person needs to have people to be ok with them showing vulnerability. I know from experience and observations of others that the same behavior or traits is not acceptable in everyone. It could be a positive trait or negative. One person might get away with being lazy because they are very charming. While another person might be just as lazy but not charming so they don’t get away with it. (There are many examples but that is the first one that came to my head.) So, in order to show vulnerability a person needs people that support in that way, not saying that people can’t be supportive in other ways, but in order to feel comfortable showing vulnerability a person has to have the other person think it is ok. I realize now that that is what I haven’t had. I have grown up with people always expecting me to be the strong one and to not complain or be vulnerable. So, since people expect that of me if I show the smallest bit of vulnerability they don’t react positively. I have shown it in trust, but many people have abused my trust over the years (taking that vulnerability and using it against me to get something they want) and it has actually widened the gap rather than bringing us together.  I am a person that will trust easily when I first meet people, but if you hurt my trust it will take a long time to ever get it back. But for this post if I don’t even dwell on when I was growing up but just in the last 3 years I see that I am still expected to be strong.

Last fall I reached out to a few people about some problems, letting just a tad of vulnerability show and the response I got from all of them was that I needed to be stronger. I know that I have always been friends with people older than myself and most of the time people think I am older than I am, so I think sometimes people forget that I am not as old as they are. The people I turned to are older than me and have lived overseas much longer than me and have way more experiences than I have. So, I don’t know if they have forgotten being fairly new to overseas and what they really felt like experiencing problems or they really think I am just a wimp for thinking that the problems I have experienced are bigger than stubbing my toe. After showing just that tad bit and getting that response I haven’t shown any more because I know now with those people it is not welcome.

Even with the death of my grandpa earlier this month I stayed strong and didn’t show how much of an effect it had on me. I went to work every day and if it hadn’t been for one person who I finally told because she was perceptive enough to pick up on my wearing all black and looking not so upbeat, no one would have ever known. I was still given that it happens to everyone and it is just part of living overseas. So, I stayed strong at school and waited until I got to my house where no one could see me before I gave into my tears and sadness.

I rarely show vulnerability to people back home. They think that I am brave to be living overseas and many of them admire that I had the guts to do it. I rarely post about problems I have experiences living overseas or I joke about it like it is no big deal because I am trying to show strength to those people back home. I don’t want them to think it is hard and I can’t handle it. I don’t want people to feel sorry for me. (There is more of a back-story there for another time.) I have friends who a missionaries in Africa and they tell people back home about the good and bad, but for them it is ok. People are ok with it and send them words of encouragement. I wonder sometimes if they weren’t missionaries would they still get words of encouragement when they deal with a difficulty living overseas.

I took a risk awhile back and showed some vulnerability on my blog after I was inspired by the Where am I from poem. I have had lots and lots of people read that poem, but not a single person has left a comment. It has made me a little nervous. There has been no encouragement and I don’t know what people think. I don’t know if they see it as positive thing or negative thing. Part of me wishes that I had never been caught up in the moment of writing a poem for the first time in years and the encouragement to post it on my blog. Sometimes I worry that it will have a negative impact on me, but it is there for all to see. Even if I took it down now, so many people have already seen it.

For the last few months I have been trying to make a big life decision. It has been hard. I have thought that people back home might think that I am not strong if I choose path A over path B. I have also thought about the people that I look up to overseas that they will think I am not strong enough if I choose path A. But then I realized that to the people I look up to overseas I am just a small blip on their screen and they are not my support system. They do support me in some ways and are a great PLN, but they don't provide it in some areas where I need support. We are in different places in our lives and have different ideas about things, so I shouldn’t make a decision based on how I am worried that they will view me as weak. As for the people back home, well I have done what most of them have only dreamed about and when I am an old lady looking back at my life I will have no regrets. I have done all the things that I set out to do. Now I can just enjoy the rest of life’s ride. So, it shouldn’t matter then what they think of my decision. I also have a better support system back home. There are those people that I can be vulnerable with: my parents, brother, and best friend who always have my back whether I am strong or weak.

So, my take away is that for some people it is ok to show vulnerability and for others it is not unless they have someone who is ok with that and gives them the support to be vulnerable.

Letters (more thoughts from the Pen Pal post)

Yesterday I got a handwritten letter from back home from a a friend and it was so exciting. Even though I have been playing around with how to combine the old and new, handwriting and technology when it comes to letters. I have to say getting a letter in the mail will always be my favorite way to communicate. I follow The Clever Sheep's blog and when I was going through my reading list I came across this blog post "The Power of Handwriting" 

This echoed some of the thoughts I have had but maybe didn't fully express in my blog post about pen pals. I remember in college having to write letters to myself for various lessons and classes. Some of those letters were really hard to go back and read.  I was always able to see how much I had grown and some of them surprised me as to my thought process at the time of the letter. When I taught in the US, both in Idaho and Wyoming, we had older students write letters to younger students giving them advice. It was always an enjoyable activity and meant a lot to the younger  and older students both.

This also got me thinking it would be nice when a teacher is doing his/her student teaching or when he/she gets her first job if a mentor teacher wrote the student/new teacher a letter to encourage him or her about the profession that was chosen. It could actually be implemented in several professions.

In both International schools that I have taught and am teaching at I have had students write letters but they don't ever given them to the person, so I don't feel it is always taken seriously.  I did write in my Pen Pals post about how in Malaysia I tried to have my students becoming pen pals with students from the US, but due to miscommunication it didn't work out. For one of my summative assessments at my current school for my year 8 students I had them write a letter to Petra Anderson, the person a news article had been written about as a victim of the "Dark Knight Rises" shooting. We had read the article previously and had used it also for a previous summative assessment, so I thought it would be a nice tie in to then write a letter to her. I noticed that several of my students struggled with writing a letter even though we had practiced prior to that in class. Since I had not lived in Indonesia for very long when we wrote the letters I didn't know how to mail letters, for one, and second, I didn't know if there was a way to actually mail the letters to this Petra if we worked on improving them so they were better. Time got away from me and I didn't remember until just now that I had thought about doing that. Some of those letters were really encourage though, and I wish now that I had looked into it. Since we change students at semester I no longer have those students to go back and do it this semester.

I think there are ways even with all the technology today to take the time to hand write a letter and mail it to someone, it might brighten their day. Instead of always texting, picking up the phone and letting the person hear one's voice, and laugh. One may never know how much that means to that person and how much they love their friend or loved ones' laugh. Instead of always using Facebook messenger, having a friend over for a cup of tea and visiting. I think letters, e-mails, twitter, Facebook, cell phones, visiting/having someone over, sms, etc. all have their functions and places, we shouldn't exclude any of them but should use all of them to better connect us and enrich our lives by those connections to others.

Pen Pals

I am on Facebook, Twitter and I have a couple blogs. They all have their purposes, but what I really love to do is write letters. I have been thinking about this the last few days. I like to write different things, but letters are my favorite. My second favorite would be poems; however, my poems are very personal and I don't like to share them. I took a poetry class and thought I could divorce my heart from my poems that I had to share, were critiqued and that I had to change. It was too painful and one of my favorite poems was ripped apart so many times that I could not even identify my original poem, and I evntually wrote another poem about how the first poem had died and would not be torn apart anymore. I haven't really been able to write a poem since and that was back sometime between 2003 and 2005.  I would love to write a book, but after the gripping beginning the story peters out with have crappy middles and lame endings. I enjoy writing essays, but with some much on my plate these days when do I have time to study something and write an essay. Since I moved overseas I have started a couple blogs about my experiences and my thoughts. So far, I have been more faithful to blogging than I ever have to keeping a journal. I even tried a new tactic of a journal called snap shots that were supposed to be like a picture, only with words, of events I had experience in Malaysia. It was hard for me to not fully explain the event. Although my blogs do get views it rarely gets any comments. So, they do not start any conversations.

My love affair with writing letters began when I was eight years old. We were on vacation, although I don't remember the location. I met a girl Amanda, I think from Colorado, at the hotel pool. This was before the traumatic move where I was picked on for the rest of my school years, so I was not yet shy. Amanda and I became friends quickly and were sorry when the vacation ended, so we decided to become pen pals. I can't remember any more how long we wrote each other, but I know it was for a couple years. With each person that has been my pen pal I have always continued to write as the other person's letters have slowly dried up and died usually due to busy lives and knowing we would most likely never meet. I had a couple in high school in Germany that I got through my German class. A friend in college and I wrote back and forth one summer. She had the coolest handwriting, but our friendship ended later. I still have her letters and have gone back to read them again. In my late 20's my best friend had me correspond with this guy that she wanted me to meet when I came to visit her, but we were on different paths in life. Even when I was in Malaysia I corresponded with a person for a short time, just a few weeks, giving an insight into life in Malaysia. That person gave me a compliment  that I wrote in great detail with depth and honesty, so that the person had a vivid picture and my "stories" interesting. Throughout my whole life, even to this day, my grandma and I write letters to each other. The only problem is that being on the other side of the world from her it takes a long time. My best friend and I also write letters. Many times though our letters have gotten lost and never made it to the other person.

When I taught in Malaysia I was taking an online class and through one of the conversations another teacher and I started talking about having our students be pen pals and write letters to each other. I talked about it with my students and they were really excited but there was some miscommunication between the lady and I via e-mail, so my students and I were waiting and waiting for their letters only to find out that she wasn't planning on doing this idea until the next school year. Needless to say my students and I were very disappointed and I never heard from that teacher again. 

I still send postcards when I travel. When I was in Seoul, South Korea in October I sent 18 postcards to different people I know.

One part I love about letters is that I can share stories about events in my life. As an avid read I enjoy telling stories. I used to tell stories in PE when we had to run laps around the track. It kept everyone entertained and got us through those miles. With letters though they are a story about a part of my life that I have decided to share with the other person. It is one way I show a person that I trust them. I also enjoy getting to know more about the other person.

I am a person though no matter what I write the process takes hours to accomplish. I start with composing in my head. I go over every line or sentence in my head repeating it over and over tweaking it until it sounds just right, then I put it down on paper or type it up and then I spend several more hours composing, rereading, tweeking until I think I have it say what I want it to say. One I post or save or e-mail I will take a break and come back to it and see little mistakes I have made that I automatically corrected in my head when reading through it, and I have to go back and make more changes. I do the same thing with letters and sometimes I will rewrite them. You are probably wondering why I spend so much time on letters when the other person may only read it once and may even throw it away after reading. I just like to make sure I am very thorough in my explanations as the other person has no other clues to help them interpret my words: no body language, facial expressions or tone of voice. I do not want them to misinrepret what I am saying because I didn't take the time to explain myself clearly. Of course, there is never any guarantee.

Back to my story on Pen Pals. So, I was lamenting that Facebook and twitter just weren't doing it for me and wondered if people correspond any more by letters not just posting or blogging. A fellow tweeter (I did not ask persmission to use name before I wrote this) suggested that a person could handwrite a letter, scan and e-mail to me. That is a brilliant idea, but neither my grandma or best friend are into technology, so they would not make use of this idea. I then thought that I would need a scanner as well, but the same person suggested that I could use a tablet and stylus. I thought finding a stylus would be hard to do as some things here that I thought would be easy to find have not been found. I was wrong and found one easily. Not many choices but I now have one. The next step was to figure out how to find a pen pal. I googled pen pals and they actually have several sites, I was surprised. In taking a closer look though many seemed like they were looking for romance. It was almost like online dating only under the name of Pen Pals. Then, I had the idea to maybe see about becoming a pen pal with some soldiers in the US military, but it appears that due to new regulations those services have been suspended. Many of the sites ask people to write letters and provide care packages every month. If I was in the US, I think that would be an easy thing to do, but with customs here I have a hard time getting packages and have a feeling there might be lots of complications trying to get care packages out and to those men and women. I feel like I am trying to force a pen pal into existence where in the past it has always happened naturally with no planning. So, I have decided in the mean time that I should find another outlet for writing until another pen pal comes along, because I know with my love for letters one will indeed come my way.