As much fun as I’ve had during this Presidents’ Day weekend, one would have thought that I actually had a long 4-day weekend like my students. Truth be told, without the responsibility of supervising students, I enjoyed spending Friday at an all-day professional development series of workshops. I was a little late to the first session, but walked in as if I were on time. After all, if I would have had to teach on Friday, I would have taken the day off since I attended a concert the night before.
I’d heard Trombone Shorty and the Orleans Avenue band nearly a year ago when they rolled up in Austin to open for another band. This time, they were the headliners. Their high-energy Louisianan soul music was just what I needed after two days of grading mountains of makeup work from students who had surprisingly squirreled their assignments away to hand them in at the last moment.
I arrived in the mezzanine section during the middle of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band’s set. I had a terrifc view of both the stage and the crowded floor. Many concertgoers wore Mardi Gras beads, which I had not thought to bring. My mind had been so preoccupied with the end of the marking period that I could not spare half a brain to maximize my concert outfit. I also saw two women who I know from the samba school and even a coworker on the packed dance floor.
I texted one woman to let her know where I sat and ask her if she planned to stay on the floor. When she replied that she would, I made my way down to the floor to join them. Ha! The person working the door politely told me that I could not join the people on the floor since my ticket was for a mezzanine seat. Somewhere in my twisted logic, mezzanine seating is much better than a standing room only floor; so anyone with a mezzanine seat should have a virtual access pass to the floor. Apparently the venue’s logic didn’t bend like that.
Instead of trying to talk my way in, I remembered my usual complaint about how women tend to be problematic when I work security during Carnaval and thanked the attendant for letting me know. I returned to my mezzanine seat and continued chair dancing. All went well until an entertainly inebriated woman turned around and shouted at me, “Hey are you OK? I worry about you sitting back here all by yourself!”
Gee, thanks. Up until that point, I wasn’t aware that I had the whole row to myself, separated from my friends by a cruel interpretation of ticket purchase. I didn’t burst into tears or anything girlie dramatic, but I did reflect on how I used to be the unofficial social director when I lived in both Egypt and Mexico and to a lesser degree in Honduras.
Something happened along the way to curb my enthusiasm for arranging things, but not for attending events. I made up my mind to do the sociable thing next time and invite some friends to go with me for the next big cultural event, which turned out to be the upcoming Cirque du Soleil show. In less than 24 hours, three other capoeiristas excitedly emailed me back about attending the show.
Since I didn’t attend the concert after party, I was able to sleep in an hour later than usual and still feel refreshed for the professional development workshops. My favorite things about the day, besides not supervising students, were the chance to win one of 25 raffle prizes, receiving a free class set of rulers and a 12-pack of scotch tape and lastly a luxurious 1 1/2 hour lunch with some of the other science teachers. The workshops themselves weren’t too painful and one in particular, truly helped me understand a new online service that the district has already purchased. I’m going to get my Physics students on top of that this upcoming week.
Our PD ended an hour earlier than my regular workday. I celebrated that by making a “Teresa Hot Chocolate” (chocolate syrup, Baileys and Kahlua) and reading several things that I had received via email. Even with that afternoon mini-vacation, I still made it to my capoeira class on time.
My capoeira teacher had us to wear ankle weights and hold 2-lbs hand weights as we did various capoeira moves. Then he picked up a PVC pipe that was about 4′ long and 3″ in diameter and proceeded to swing it at us as we did the ginga, the basic capoeira step that looks like dancing a jig.
Although I was not wearing any corrective lenses, I managed to keep my eyes on the pipe and never got hit–unlike some of my capoeira buddies. One actually dodged when the capoeira teacher swung the pipe in one direction, but rose up in time for him to hit her on the side of the ear. She was awake then!
After the weight training, we did 3 sets of 40 of my favorite spin kicks, armada. During the middle of the second set, those 2.5-lbs ankle weights truly began to kick in. By the third set, I felt that I was getting too much of a good thing.
The next hour, we trained several acrobatic moves. Normally, I stay for about 15-30 minutes of this, but I stayed to practice several moves, especially the handstand. We started off attempting to walk on our hands, then kick our legs in the air while balancing on our hands. My favorite exercise was going into a handstand and slowly falling into a backbend. I practiced kicking my legs up to flip over backwards out of the backbend, but felt like an elephant trying to jump.
I slept soundly that night! I woke up, drank my morning smoothie and swam laps. I’m glad that I chose to stop torturing myself at night to swim during the week. Swimming works so much better for me in the morning. Yet, whenever I change one part of my routine that usually means losing something else.
When the weather grows warmer, I’m going to be tempted to paint out on my balcony. Somehow, I need to work painting back into my schedule during daylight hours when there’s a nice shade on the balcony. That may mean buying a shade…
I attended my tango class later on, dressed in my capoeira uniform. My plan was to dash from tango class early in order to participate in a capoeira performance at a nearby middle school. That presentation was cancelled due to a mixup in dates. Nonetheless, some of my male tango friends were amused by my corda. I whipped a few of them with it. Well, it was there!
Thursday through Saturday were dreary rainy days. (I know we need the rain, but I prefer a warm spring and summer rain.) I had a few tempting things to do Saturday night, but in the end, I treated myself to dinner and a movie at home and went to bed early. That was a wonderful call since I got up at 5:30. I’d signed up to work at a water station for the Austin Marathon. Sometimes, I just like to do something different for a change.
God must be a runner since there was not a raindrop in sight, but I was still plenty cold. As a matter of fact, my toes did not fully thaw out until I attended my bikram yoga class afterwards. I helped set out three layers of plastic cups half full of water. Then without warning, the woman in charge of volunteers made me the water wench.
Of course she didn’t call it that, but she needed someone to monitor the portable watertank and had the technician who’d brought it give me some pointers. There was nothing too hard about the job although I still managed to screw it up. When the announcement came about breakfast tacos, I abandoned my post ahead of everyone else and got two freshly made breakfast tacos.
After telling a few of my “teaching in Honduras” war stories, I looked around at the church family room where we ate and realized that everyone who had been using the water hoses to fill the cups were inside eating. I dashed out to check the water tank. Yup, it was full. I walked over to the spigot to turn it off only to discover that it had already been turned off. I felt a little bad that someone else had done my job, but felt even worse when the volunteer supervisor excitedly told me that she had to turn off the faucet because the tank had overflowed. That’s when I noticed the big wet spot on the sidewalk.
A good natured volunteer asked, “You ever notice no matter how much you water a sidewalk, it never grows?”
Yeah, well embarrassment does. The volunteer supervisor then asked me several times what the water tank level was. I can’t say that I blame her since keeping the water at a particular level and all the tables full of water cups were the two main reasons we were there.
In the meantime, I joined in with the cheering and applauding crowd as the runners arrived. I marveled at how several of the runners still had a brisk pace, a smile on their face and interacted with us. And we’re talking at the 20th mile! I kept hoping to catch a glimpse of someone I knew, but I only succeeding in thinking I knew some people at first glance. The two women who I knew were running, only participated in the half marathon. More power to them. I wouldn’t even care to run 13 miles.
Then again, my life is one marathon of juggling various activities. Like those athletes, I sometimes wonder how much I can take before my routine gets the better of me?