Back to School

As tends to be the case on this blog, by the time I get around to writing a post, I feel obliged to preface it with “this post has been a long time coming.”

The Olathe North Eagle

[Picks up pencil, prepares paper, clears throat] “This post has been a long time coming.  So long, in fact, I’m not exactly sure which past even should serve as the starting point.”

Maybe I start in the fall of 2018, when, as a French II teacher at Olathe North High School, I reassumed the role of classroom teacher for the first time since I fled George Melcher elementary 8 years prior, with my tail between my legs, my head down and in the midst of the first and only nervous breakdown of my life.  As that fall semester and that long-term substitute position both came to an end, my supervising principal gave the direct advice to “finish your teaching certification as quickly as possible because a high school classroom is where you’re meant to be, you clearly have the teaching and relational skill set to thrive in that setting.”

Maybe I start in May of 2018, on a drive up north to visit my parents for the weekend, when my then girlfriend advised, “you’ve been talking about wanting to finish this French degree since we met.  I think you need to go ahead and finish it because, if you don’t, you’ll likely regret it the rest of your life.” Insightful woman, that wife of mine.

Maybe I start in the fall of 2017, when a friend of mine who is two years older than me started his Masters of Education program at Rockhurst University.  He started the program at 40 and by age 42 had secured a teaching position.  Two years later, I enrolled in evening classes in the same program, knowing that I was young enough to still put in a solid career as a teacher but old enough that my window for doing so was rapidly closing.

Tailgating before a Blazer football game
fall of 2006

Maybe I start in October of 2011, when I walked away from the Kansas City Missouri School District and Teach For America, regretting every having fallen for the recruiting propaganda of TFA, thus bypassing the traditional teacher-training program at Rockhurst (the same program from which I’m set to graduate in about six weeks) and wondering whether I’d ever again have the opportunity to teach.

Maybe I start in the fall of 2010, when I’m living across the street from Gardner-Edgerton High School, taking French classes in the evening, pushing my son in a stroller across the GEHS parking lot during afternoon walks, tailgating before Friday night Blazer football games and wondering whether dreaming about having the opportunity to one day coach football and teach French at GEHS.

2007 season

Maybe I start in the fall of 2008, when I took my first French class with Lorie Beckum at MNU.  At the time, I just wanted a new hobby and learning a new language seemed as good of a hobby as anything, especially after experiencing the disappointment of not getting to coach again that fall.  I do however, remember telling a person in our church who asked why I’d take the time to learn a new language, “I’m not quite sure why but it seems like the right thing to do.” 

Maybe I start in the fall of 2007, when I had the incredible opportunity to coach the Wheatridge Middle School 7^th grade JV football team.  Watching those kids progress from barely being able to line up correctly to winning their last few games was an experience to which I’ve kept hoping to be able to return, though many times over the past decade it hasn’t seemed very likely. 

Maybe I start over 20 years ago, when I’m a college student at MidAmerica Nazarene University, taking classes to prepare me to be a pastor while telling anyone who’d listen, “if I wasn’t going to be a pastor, I’d be a high school history teacher and football coach.”

All of the above options are great possibilities.  They have all been steps in the journey leading me to a brand-new (while surprisingly familiar) starting point.  After giving it some thought though, I think I’ll start my story just a few weeks in the past.  It was the Tuesday before Spring Break.  Just a regular day in my semester long-assignment as a Student Teacher in a French classroom at Olathe East High School.  Little did I, or anyone else, realize that would actually be the last Tuesday of the school year as, just one week later, the Governor of Kansas would issue a decree closing all Kansas schools for the remainder of the year.  

In the midst of that school day, I interviewed at a nearby middle school for a Social Studies position.  It was a great opportunity. I’d be working with some friends, for one of the best administrators in the district, with the opportunity to coach football again, as well as the stated hope that I’d also consider coaching track and helping sponsor the theatre department.  I came away from that interview excited about the possibility of teaching in that school.

After school was out that day, I had another interview.  This interview was at Gardner-Edgerton High School for a French position.  As I was driving from Olathe to Gardner, I couldn’t help but think to myself, “this was my dream job.  Yeah, it was about nine years ago but there was a time in my life in which I believed the chance to teach French at GEHS a possibility too good to even hope for.”  I found out during the interview that while coaching would be a possibility with this position, it wasn’t an expectation, which would certainly render my first year of teaching much more manageable. 

Later that night, per the advice given during one of the interviews, Sarah and I discussed which option would be the best one to take should I be offered both positions.  Actually, a better description of what happened would be to state that I talked out all the positives and negative while Sarah listened, giving advice or providing affirmations when she deemed it prudent.  It was really a matter of choosing between two great options.  It was a matter of finding out where my “true self” (to quote the book I’ll reference below) was leading. 

On one side stood my love of history, desire to coach football again, the chance to teach in the district where my son attends school and idealism regarding the chance to help middle schoolers successfully navigate that identity-forming period of their lives.  Not only is history such a natural subject for me that, despite not having taken upper-level history classes in college, I was able to ace the National Praxis Content exam, middle school social studies was the bait which Teach For America used to hook me into their program before switching my placement to elementary school when it was already too late for me to back out. 

Proud to be a Blazer... again

On the other side stood my love of all things French, the chance to lead student tours of France, my natural ease at relating to high school students, the professional challenge of continuing to improve my French proficiency, the opportunity to teach alongside friends I’d made from Gardner Community Theatre and the chance to fulfill what just a few years ago I’d considered to be my dream job. 

By the time I talked myself into making the following announcement, the lovely and intelligent ginger with whom I have the amazing privilege of sharing my life simply gave a knowing smile.  “I could always choose to teach history in the future, should I later decide that’s what I want to do.  This might, however be my one opportunity to teach High School French.  I’m fairly certain that if I pass up this opportunity, I’m likely to regret it for the rest of my teaching career (due to a limited number of teaching positions, “losing” my French, etc.)”.   The fact that Sarah’s knowing smile seemed to radiate less from her lips and more from her eyes revealed she’d been patiently waiting for me to come to the conclusion which she’d reached long before me.  Looking back, I realize she’d been discreetly clearing the way for my head to agree with what my heart had long ago decided.  I couldn’t NOT teach French. 

Two nights later, at the Lenexa Rec Center (a place I greatly miss during the Coronavirus lockdown) I was watching a French TV show on the history of Paris while striding in place on the elliptical when I was struck by a profound gratitude over the upcoming opportunity to teach French language and history.  While thinking of how I could possibly use this video for an upper level French class I was simultaneously relishing the assurance that I’d made the right decision.  In just a few months, I’ll be back in yet another French classroom.  This time however, I’ll be facing in the opposite direction.  

KU, fall of 2019

One final thought, let’s just state the unstated obvious; I wouldn’t be standing at the starting line of this mid-life career move had I not experienced some unexpected turns and face-planting failures along the way.  At the advice of a friend who has talked me through many of those turns and failures, I’ve just finished “Falling Upward” A Spirituality for the Two Halvesof Life.”  I’m actually a bit embarrassed to admit this is the first of Richard Rohr’s books which I’ve ever read.  

A cold January 2019 day on the
campus of the University of Kansas.
I took this pic thinking I'd be
writing the "Back to
School" blog post soon.

“That is why I’ve called [the second half of life and this book] ‘falling upward.’  Those who are ready will see that this message is self-evident: those who have gone ‘down’ are the only ones who understand ‘up.’  Those who have somehow fallen and fallen well are the only ones who can go up and not misuse ‘up.’”

“Sooner or later, if you are on any classic ‘spiritual schedule,’ some event, person, death, idea or relationship will enter your life that you simply cannot deal with,  using your present skill set, your acquired knowledge, or your strong willpower.  Spiritually speaking, you will be, you must be, lead to the edge of your own private resources… and you must ‘lose’ at something… let go of your egocentric preoccupations, and go on the further and larger journey. 
In the end, we do not so much reclaim what we have lost as discover a significantly new self in and through the process.  Until we are lead to the limits of our present game plan, and find it to be insufficient, we will not search out or find the real source, the deep well, or the constantly flowing stream.” 

As I enter the second half of life, I’m awe-struck by the positive turn my life has taken.  My marriage is far surpassing my wildest hopes for a primary relationship  My relationship with my son is the best it’s ever been and is getting better.  My relationship with my two step-children has developed into a place of comfort and familiarity.  I’ve made a peace with my past which now serves as a foundation for the future.  Finally, in a few short months I’ll be starting my “dream job.”  I’m giddy with anticipation over the second half of life.  Of course, that’s assuming COVID19 doesn’t erase humanity from the face of the earth…

We Missed our Train

As we sprinted up the last of several consecutive escalators moving travelers from the subterranean interchange between the Gare Montparnasse Train Station and the Paris Metro system to the elevated train platforms serving all points west of Paris, I quickly scanned the large digital schedule boards.  My rapid glance had the goal of, at best, discovering at which track our Rennes-bound high-speed train was waiting or, at a minimum, gaining an update on the time.  Upon acquiring the bare minimum of knowledge sought, 7:55, my heart rate slowed a little and we were able to downshift from a sprint to a run.  “We are not going to miss our train,” I confidently announced. 

The first time the remote possibility that we might miss our train began gnawing at the back of my mind was as we were pleasantly strolling along Rue Mouffetard, vainly trying to take in all that the oldest and most sumptuous street in Paris was offering up that sun-soaked July morning.  As the search for our metro station become more prolonged than expected, I realized I wasn’t exactly sure how long the trip from Place Monge to Montparnasse-Bienvenue, with its corresponding line changes, would actually take.  I started to wonder whether we might actually begin the first day of our honeymoon in Paris by missing the train to Mont Saint-Michel, the one part of our trip which my Bachelor of Science in Marine Biology-holding wife was in the highest anticipation. 

After switching from line 7 to the touristy line 6, my panic become both visible and urgent enough that I informed my wife I was worried we might miss our train, a train for which I’d bought non-transferable tickets months in advance, so as to save a couple hundred euro.  The bewildering disappointment which immediately crossed her face was painful to observe, knowing it was my nonchalant approach to our morning commute which had placed us in this stressful situation.  The nonchalance transformed into desperate intensity as we exited the subway and began pushing, spinning and dodging our way through what felt like a mile’s length of crowded, twisting underground corridors which would eventually spill out at the above mentioned escalators. 

It’s important to note that I’d never missed a train.  Not during the year of living in Paris nor the semester of taking college students all around Europe.  I’d been close, for sure, often too close for comfort.  The closest was that day in Budapest in which our group was scheduled to end the day of sightseeing by sleeping on an overnight train to Sighisoara, Romania.  For some reason, likely because we’d caught a different train at a similar time, I’d had it in my mind we were supposed to board that train at 9 PM.  As we were casually riding on the metro to another site, all of our luggage safely stored at our hostel, my conscious thought drug from my memory the realization that our overnight train was actually scheduled to leave not at 9 PM but rather 7 PM..  Fortunately, we still had plenty of time to board that train.  Unfortunately, the two of our group members who weren’t with us were still operating under the 9 PM time schedule and were unreachable due to our spotty cell service.  Fortunately, we never had to implement the plan in which the rest of the group went ahead as scheduled while I stayed behind with remaining two students, taking the next day’s night train, because they had both randomly checked messages in a wifi-equiped café, prompting them to return to the hostel with enough time to board the train with the rest of the group.  Other than Dawson throwing up on our luggage in the middle of the night, the rest of our train ride to Romania was uneventful.  Now the bedbugs we picked up while in Romania certainly created some uncomfortable complications.  That’s, however, a whole different story…

While you could argue I lucked out that day in Budapest, as we were sprinting up the Gare Montparnasse escalator, I was still the owner of an unblemished train-catching record.  Upon seeing we still had five minutes before our train left the station, I breathed a sigh of relief and wondered whether this story would top the Budapest story in the list of train near-misses.  As the title of this blog entry foreshadows, this day would end by topping the short-list of train actual-misses. 

Those five minutes remaining before our train’s scheduled departure were sufficient for locating and arriving at the correct track.  The surprise kick-in-the-gut, however occurred when the SNCF employee stationed at the track’s entrance explained to us, while simultaneously closing the gate, that the high-speed TGV trains close their doors to passengers two minutes before their scheduled departure.  She then directed us toward the ticketing office where we could, at a premium price, purchase tickets for the next TGV train which would take us to Rennes, where we could hop on a shuttle to Mont Saint-Michel.   

We bought the tickets.  We arrived only an hour later than the original plan.  We had a great day walking around the beach and the medieval abbey.  My wife didn’t hold my lack of thoughtful preparation against me.  Sarah also experienced her first encounter with the reason one always leaves margin for the unexpected in their schedule and budget when travelling internationally; the unexpected is guaranteed to occur in one form or another.  Missing a train scheduled three months in advance, though is something I never thought would actually happen to me.  I had worked too long to organize our trip and I am too savvy of an international traveler to make such an obvious mistake.

I’ve been mulling over this blog entry for months, stuck on how to seamlessly morph the above story into the larger point of this post.  Since I still haven’t been able to land the transition I’m going to have to make do with [insert choppy transition here].

As is quite well documented on this blog, several years ago I experienced something I never thought would happen to me, a divorce resulting from the death of a marriage.  Sarah has experienced the same thing as well.  Though this likely doesn’t make us unique among those who have gone through a divorce, neither of us had any thought that our first marriages would end by any means other than death.  That is, after all, the vow we both made and the commitment which our families have modeled for us.  I’m not completely sure how much of a role the mindset of “this could never happen to us” actually played in our respective divorces but I’m confident it was a contributing factor.  Similar to how the first tiny and almost insignificant moment of pre-panic, “we might not make our train” entered my mind while walking along Rue Mouffetard that first morning of our honeymoon, there was a similar moment during my previous marriage in which the wildly fearful thought of “we might not make it” first burrowed into the back of my mind.  I’m not sure whether the eventually divorce could’ve been avoided by that point but I’m confident I should’ve given stronger consideration to the fear which was likely trying to prevent shipwreck of a marriage which had entered some dangerous waters. 

As is also quite well documented on this blog, I’ve survived that unexpected life event and have come out much stronger on the other side.  I’m finally a few months away from fulfilling a goal I’ve had for the better part of a decade (more on that in a different post).  A little over a year after abruptly mashing them together into a new blended family, our kids are demonstrating the comfort, acceptance and significance that comes from the (relatively) healthy family unit Sarah and I have worked incredibly hard to foster.  Last, and possibly the opposite of least, Sarah and I are experiencing a unity and satisfaction in our marriage that neither of us dared  dream was even a possibility just a few years ago.  It’s in no way an oversell to share that I’ve never been in as good of a place in my life as I am right now.  Neither is it an overstatement to claim that I’ve done a LOT of work to get to this place.  On the flip side, admitting that I might have lucked into snagging an incredible life partner who is a tad bit out of my league could surely be deemed an understatement.

For this reason, it’s easy to understand why I’m committed to never again missing the train.  The false confidence of “it could never happen to us” will be thoroughly unwelcome in our marriage.  Experience has provided some painful lessons regarding what’s worth fighting about having fair but passionate debates about and what needs to be immediately dropped.  Our previous marriages have revealed the heart-wrenching reality of where a relationship could find itself if foundational aspects of what makes a marriage work are ignored or taken for granted.  We are currently experiencing the relational ride of our lives but we are painfully aware of the need to diligently stay on schedule because we’ve missed the train in the past.

In order to ride this metaphor to the end of the line, I’ll wrap up this post by reluctantly detailing how the day-trip to Mont Saint Michel which kicked off our honeymoon ended.  Due to my misreading of the shuttle schedule, we missed our return train to Paris.  So yeah, I was two for two in missing trains that day.  While the second mistake didn’t cost us as much money as the morning’s mishap, thanks in part to a friendly family from Minnesota who gave us two unused shuttle tickets, we did end up returning to Paris a couple hours later than planned, causing us to postpone the planned boat ride on the Seine to a different evening.  Apparently, it’s just as dangerous to assume it could never happen in the first place as to assume it could never happen a second time.  By now, I think those of you following along at home can make your own metaphorical connection.  I think you can also understand why, for the rest of the trip, my wife had me double-check and, occasionally triple-check, our remaining train schedule and flight schedule and cabaret show time and photo-shoot schedule and….  Fortunately, we were on time for everything else during the remainder of our honeymoon.  Hopefully, the rest of our honeymoon established a life-long trend.

The Fairy Tale that didn't get rained out

When I woke up at 3:58 in the morning last Saturday, I knew there was no way I was getting back to sleep.  I was confident of this unfortunate reality not only because the nervous energy resulting from the realization that I’d be getting married in just over 12 hours had already started coursing through my body but also because I couldn’t stop watching the periodic lighting strikes which, though a long way away, were already lighting up the early morning darkness.  

Our ceremony took place in a ravine (aka “the clearing”) at the far end of my parents’ farm.  Sarah chose that place not only for the natural beauty but also because it was there, on the back of a four-wheeler, that I first told Sarah I loved her.  As we watched the photographer posing Sarah on a bridge over ravine’s creek, my sister turned to me and stated, “she looks like a fairy and I mean that in a good way.”  It was at that moment that Sarah’s “vision” (as she kept referring to it) for our wedding ceremony finally made sense in my mind.  The arch, decorations, dress and even the wreath crown she was wearing all worked in unison to create a fairy-tale like aura to our ceremony.  The vision came together despite the fact that just a few hours earlier, we were quite concerned it was never going to happen.

In order to get back to “the clearing”, one must drive across a freshly plowed field.  After just a bit of rain, this field becomes impassable to anything heavier than a four-wheeler.  Eventually, the lightning which I had been watching at four in the morning brought along a downpour lasting almost an hour.  At 6:07 AM, my dad declared “the clearing” dead.  It appeared we’d be relocating the ceremony to the back-up spot, a shaded area on the bank of our farm pond.  While the back-up spot was an idyllic farm setting, it didn’t quite have the ambiance Sarah was going for.  By 6:08 AM, it seemed the only question we had left was whether the four-wheeler would be able to get through the mud and back to “the clearing” so we could pick up the arch frame we’d left there the night before.  

As my dad was driving back to “the clearing” to answer that question, he noticed the ground becoming less muddy, even turning to dust, as he drove further from the house and closer to “the clearing”.  In a surprising turn of events, “the clearing” had been resuscitated.  While we’d received over half an inch of rain at the house, “the clearing” (about a half mile away) had gotten just enough rain to settle the dust, which is the exact amount my dad had been hoping for (despite that “just enough to settle the dust” was usually a derogatory description of a rain shower when used by a famer).  As the ceremony began at about 4:45 PM, with the line of cars that had driven through the field parked along the top of the ravine, the weather was a perfect 82 degrees, partly sunny and with a gentle breeze.  While that breeze would eventually blow in a near tornado just as we were wrapping up the post-ceremony meal we’d shared back up at the house, at the moment our ceremony began, I was giddy with how we’d managed to pull off the perfect weather for an outdoor wedding.  

After a processional consisting of our elder niece carrying our younger niece, our daughter as a flower girl and our oldest son picking up and carrying our youngest son after he couldn’t convince him to walk, Sarah hugged her dad just as the medley playing in the background changed to “Bless the Broken Road.”  At that moment, my giddiness was overcome by tears of joy.  The real-time image of this beautiful woman, reddish-brown hair falling down onto a stunning white dress while flashing a smile lighting up everything in its sight, walking down the aisle with the intent of becoming my bride was, in my mind, juxtaposed along with the images of the “broken road” that had brought us to this point.  For a few minutes, the emotion was a bit too intense to keep inside, so it found an escape route through my tear ducts.  

Really, that “broken road” has been a large theme of my writing on this blog over the past couple of years.  Similarly, the theme of the homily given by my friend who officiated the wedding was “beauty from ashes.”  The time I spent in Breakthrough, four years ago this month as well as the therapist sessions before and after that intense month of counseling were, in a large part, focused on helping me acquire what I found formalized on my wedding day, a primary relationship that is healthy, fulfilling and mutually complimentary.   When I started that journey toward a healthy relationship, I had no idea what was coming at me.  On the other side of that journey, though I’m so thankful for how the pain of the past has contributed to the joy of the present.  Of course, now real life with Sarah (kids, bills, careers, annoying each other) begins continues.  I know enough about myself and my wife to know that this new journey, while not always easy, is going to be successful and fun and maybe even provide a few more moments which bring tears to my eyes.

In one of those weird twists to a story, two of my best friends who were both supposed to be groomsmen in my first wedding 19 years ago but, for various reasons, were unable to be in attendance, ended up being a part of this wedding celebration.  Michael, mentioned above, drove from California to Iowa to officiate the ceremony.  While I can’t state how grateful I am that he made it a priority to be a part of the wedding, I’m not quite convinced that his long drive gave him the right to declare “that’s enough” as I was enjoying kissing my new bride.  My other friend, Jason, came down from Omaha for the “before they say I do” party Sarah’s parents threw for us back in May.  Now that I’ve ensured that all my long-time friends have been able to participate in either my first or second wedding, I’m officially retiring from the wedding business… and continuing my life with one of the most beautiful and intelligent women this world has ever seen.