Rejected, Lost, & Hopeful

I woke up, and.... no wait.  Let me back track just a bit.  I love my job.  Truly.  Very often, when I pull into the parking lot each morning, I realize how very lucky I am to have the career I do.  I'm not the sentimental type; I don't get these feelings; I don't get overwhelmed by sensations of joy and being blessed.  But regularly, I get to work and get a happy-go-lucky skip in my step, because teaching children is a wonderful thing. 

Like any teacher, I love my summer; however, I will be the first to tell you that I spend my summer's lost.  I am not an organized critter, but I am a critter of habit.  Without the regular bells, meetings, and due dates, I don't know when or how to accomplish things.  Except for the weeks spent at writing workshops, I flounder around lonely and feeling unimportant in the summer.  I'm one of those weirdos who likes to return to school.

With that said, like any human, I groaned when the alarm went off this morning a good two hours earlier than I've gotten up in over two months.  Even the insomniac, dawn-worshipping toddlers were still snoring.  I did not want to go to work, but simply because I am lazy.  I knew when I got up and got moving I would be fine, and when I pulled into the parking lot, I'd be even finer.  So, now back to the beginning...

I woke up and found two rejection letters in my inbox.  Those who know me closest have been after me hard to submit for the past year.  I mean hard, so with my small semblance of success at Hindman I decided to go for it.  I know it is a game of statistics.  I know everyone, no matter how successful, will receive more rejections than acceptances.  That's only logical.  But truthfully, isn't it a small slap in the face that I get my first two rejections, on the same day, mailed within 37 minutes of each other, on my first day back at work after an entire summer off?  I mean surely at least one of them could have taken it's time dawdling through cyber-space and arrived after lunch.

So, I worked all day (and no teacher, even us weird ones, likes teacher work week).  I ended my day on the best news I've ever received while working at my current school.  It was so good, that I decided to leave work right then, even though I had plenty more work to do, just so I could end my work day on such a high moment.  I was barely 10 minutes into my 60 minute commute when a friend calls and tells me to abandon the shortest route home, and do it quickly.  Apparently, there was a family dispute including guns which had closed down the major, four-lane state road.  Sometimes, you just have to love working in the backwoods!

Now, I need to explain that I am not ignorant.  Nor, am I uneducated.  In fact, I'm a pretty smart chica if I must say so myself.  Unfortunately, I am so directionally challenged I would get lost trying to find my way out of a wet paper bag.  I had two friends from work and my GPS trying to get me home.  I was a lost cause.  A very lost cause.  People have a tendency to get frustrated with me when I get lost because I can't tell you where I am, I don't recognize streets signs, or business names or anything.  Last week, while driving down the aforementioned major state road that I have driven twice a day for five years, I looked up, saw a business and thought, holy crap, I've never seen that before.  Am I on the right road? 

Today, during the whole, where in the hell are you fiasco, my friend asked me if I just don't pay attention while I'm driving, and I guess I don't.  I finally found myself on a road number that I knew if I followed it west would eventually run into the city where I live.  I didn't recognize anything around me, and started thinking about what my friend said about not paying attention.  I decided I was going to pay attention the entire ride home (I wasn't sure how long it would be, I was very, very lost).

I looked to my left and saw a quaint country store.  It had a porch with rockers, and I could only imagine all the really neat things and people that could be inside.  There would probably be homemade jams and chutneys and maybe some local produce.  There would be overpriced essentials like motor oil, and dishwasher liquid, and nearly expired canned goods.  And then I imagined the little old family than would run such a place.  They would know the names of all the families that lived close, and they would put up a jar to collect change for any personally known tragedy.  And I kept imagining, the store, the couple, the setting, the characters, the twist..... the plot twist.... and I missed the turn two lights away from my house 40 minutes after I found the right road.

I have a new story.  That little old couple is sneaky and I can't wait to write about them.  And I still couldn't tell you a single landmark on my new (found?) way home.  I guess I just don't pay attention. ;)