spring splurge

My high school classmates have begun the 10-year reunion planning for this summer, which leads to some reminiscing of course. Needless to say, I'm horrible at documenting it properly, but I couldn't believe that I hadn't written anything new here in about a year. Things have gone their roller-coaster way, full of unexpected twists, turns, highs, and lows.

After finishing the school year and my first year as a teacher (yay! I survived!), with a bittersweet graduation ceremony, I took the summer off from work. I spent a lot of time at the pool training for Pennock, which I successfully completed solo in mid-August with a time of 3 hrs 59 min. And that was in spite of running into a jellyfish during a practice run the week before, and 2 jellies during the race itself. Climbing through the kelp beds was a piece of cake in comparison to the painful sting of red jellies, even though that was my top mental barrier before the stings.

I was cajoled into signing on as head coach of the Kayhi swim team with the resignation of Coach in June, and we spent all summer searching for a new club coach. Thankfully, we found one who was able to move up quickly at the start of the season and I didn't have to cover 2 teams at once, as the high school team is a huge undertaking in itself (especially with a full-time job). Things didn't always go smoothly, and there were plenty of stumbling blocks along the way - for which I am incredibly thankful for and blessed to have had the great assistant coaches I did, the amazingly supportive coworkers and administrators who had my back, and a good group of kids who inspired me to continue working hard even when the other group were being jerks. Overall, now that the season is over with and I don't have the headaches, I can say I enjoyed it. Some highlights were meeting the other coaches from SE AK (some of which are more awesome than others), Regions weekend in Petersburg and the walks around the town, and the group of kids that went to State in Anchorage - the ones who worked their butts off all season and earned their berths.

New coach means I got pulled back into coaching KKW. Not sure that I was ready to return, but there weren't really any other options - and I was able to get my 10-12 year old group back. I've learned many new drills and techniques, am able to give input/insights/opinions that is at least pondered rather than rejected right away, and have a working relationship that (thankfully) doesn't involve personal feelings like the previous one. I'm not exactly thrilled about coaching 6 days/week compared to the previous year's 3 days, as I feel like I live at the pool if I'm not at school, but I can't say for certain that I'd be doing something more productive if I wasn't coaching. Besides actually being IN the pool, maybe!

"Growing up" means I was searching and scouring the island for a home of my own. This past summer involved several showings with the real estate agent, and none were great. One quirky A-frame off of Pond Reef caught my attention, though it definitely needed some TLC, and when I found out I could assume the loan (knocking a good chunk off the listing price), I jumped on it. I signed the papers at the beginning of September, didn't move in until Thanksgiving weekend (due to coaching - I wasn't home enough, and my parents graciously cleaned, fixed, scrubbed, etc. to make things move-in ready), but am now officially a home owner! There are some big projects and lots of small projects that need to get accomplished, but it's livable for now and slowly becoming my own. Kailua, my 90-lb black lab/German shepherd/Great Pyrenees mix that was adopted as a puppy in May, has a small yard and bushy area to explore and do his business in, with a fence coming soon so I can leave him at the house all day instead of bringing him into down for "doggie daycare" at my parents'. We each have our own couch (still thankful that I found a set of 2!), and are only a few minutes' drive from trails or the beach. I love being out North and away from the craziness of town. Hopefully this summer will involve lots of kayaking now that I have my own, as well as open water swims at Settler's or Totem Bight.

The school year is wrapping up, and while I haven't officially received a contract offer yet, I'm not expecting any problems with being re-hired for next year. Still need to study for and take the Praxis II for math if I expect to teach Math Lab again next year - ugh. Who in the world needs to know trigonometry/calculus to teach basic math and algebra skills?!? I also need to start thinking about continuing education credits, and at the suggestion of admin, I've been looking into a school psychologist programs - found a few that are online, which would be ideal. We'll see how things pan out, as I'd likely need to quit coaching in order to go back to school and work full-time. Right now, (New) Coach & I are planning on working together for the Kayhi season, and I'll likely take KKW again - I don't know how to say no. But I need to figure out a way to better schedule "me" time, as I haven't been in the pool much since Pennock and hate it. I'd love for Coach to take the Master's group so I can join it as a swimmer again.

So many "what ifs" and options get overwhelming. That's when I head out into the woods or to the beach and just enjoy the peacefulness that is the outdoors, communing with the natural elements that are strung together so eloquently...