The purple flowers are starting to fall off the jacaranda trees. I stroll through their fallen petals on my walk to work sometime pretending that I'm in a far away magical land. I've been joined on my walks to work by friends and family over the last couple weeks. Dad came with me just about every morning that he and my mom were here. I showed him my new route, but he still preferred the old one through the woods and would go that way on his walk home alone. Our friend Matt has joined me a couple of times, and he's been able to see the characters that have become important parts of my morning walking ritual. He has met the tall, lean, old man who walks with a cane in one hand and his other hand on his hip. His face is lined with wrinkles and reminds me a bit of an Ent from Lord of the Rings. Then there is the little lady with her greyhounds. I think she has six now, and has to take two walks every morning so that she can take them three at a time. "Six was too many to walk all at once," she told me. She also has a little mix breed dog that she lets off the leash and stops sometimes to toss it a ball. The docile greyhounds always wait patiently for the little dog to run back with the ball so that they can resume their walk.
"Are you looking forward to being done?" I'm getting this question at school a lot now that the school year is drawing to a close. I have no idea how to answer. And I have no idea how to begin explaining it here. "Yes. Sometimes," I want to say. Those days when the students are being rude I think of my Seward students and miss home. The days when I feel like hiking a mountain or when I have a sudden urge to smell dried spruce needles (because, you know, those urges just hit people sometimes) I go to the calendar and count how much longer I have to wait. And, no. No, I don't want to go home. Many of my students here I dearly enjoy and will truly miss. There's the group of Year 8 girls that sit by the corner of my staff room and chirp "Morning Miss! Do we have you today?" I'll miss that. I'll miss the nod of the head my Year 10 boys give me from across the room when I see them in the library or while they are testing in the Hall. Each acknowledging me in their own way. I'll miss the staff here that have supported me so much: the lovely ladies from the land of literacy, the TAL and HSIE staff, and all the other individuals who have smiled my way, offered suggestions, lent me an ear, and puffed wind in my sail when I felt like I couldn't go on. I just finished my End-of-Year reports, really my last paperwork hurdle before I'm done teaching here. Oddly, I thought I'd be overjoyed when I finished my reports, but my walk home today was a melancholy one. I don't want to be done yet. While walking to school today with our friend Julie, I showed her the part of the trail where I got lost on my first walk home from school. "See how the trail splits and one path leads to the right? Well at the beginning of the school year I used to always just gravitate to the right side of sidewalks and paths because that was what I was used to. When I was walking home on my first day, I was so busy thinking that I just followed the path to the right and got a bit lost." But now I don't walk on the right anymore. Now, I naturally gravitate to the left of the sidewalks and paths, even the ones covered by fallen jacaranda petals. You know...maybe it's not my imagination. Maybe I am in a far away magical land. The land of Oz - and Dorothy didn't really want to leave either.
1 Comment
Candy
12/1/2017 03:30:00
Myla, I so have enjoyed all of yours posts and pictures of your year in Austrailia. Iam sure it will be bitter sweet when you guys pack up and go back home. Hopefully you guys can return at some point. Thank you again, its been a fun journey with you and your family.
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AuthorThe Liljemark's enjoy exploring the world. This blog chronicles our adventures. Archives
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