We started back to school, well almost. We teachers came back and did some cleaning of the outside of the school. Monsoon season has hit Korea kind of hard, and the plants are growing like weeds! Does that even make sense? It's definitely a jungle out there. So on our first day back, we worked outside sweeping, cutting back weeds and picking up dead branches that had fallen from the trees due to high winds and rain.
It was a great workout especially after not doing much of any physical activity all summer. It certainly helped me to sleep that night!
The rest of that day and the following day I spent cleaning up and kind of reorganizing my classroom. It wasn't easy. I have accumulated so much junk over the past 5 years. I filled up more than half of a huge garbage bag with trash. Sometimes, being over here, I want to say that I need to keep things because you never know when you will need it. But in the end, if I haven't used it in 5 years, it's not going to happen. Purging is a pretty good thing. I didn't finish doing all that I'd wanted to just because of time and jet lag, but there is plenty of time in the school year ahead to throw more stuff away!
This summer I was so busy, there wasn't any time to miss being away from the classroom. So at first I wasn't really excited about being back. I wasn't upset about it either, but I don't have those returning to school excited feelings. Little by little, though, I'm starting to feel it. It's going to be good :)
Well I've started off again, back to Korea. I love going back to El Paso, but it gets harder and harder to make that long journey. I am blessed by having the opportunity to have modern technology that allows me to go from one side of the world to the other. But as I get older, I grow weary of spending so much time on an airplane and in the airport. Ultimately it does serve a purpose, but I feel like it is such wasted time.
But. I feel like maybe this post should be called but.
Anyhow, my trip was pretty uneventful. I actually slept on the plane here and there, a couple of hours at a time. It was good.
As soon as I got off the plane and into the airport, I headed straight to customs and got on the airport's free wifi. I immediately got some really good news I had been waiting for! It was awesome and I was praising the Lord, but man how quickly our attitudes can sour.
I started to get into a complaining type of mood. Being super tired and dealing with long lines, long waits, things not going the way I expected, and Korean culture, I started to get into a bad mood.
But (there's that but again) the Lord gently reminded me that I didn't need to be in a bad mood. I didn't need to complain. I didn't need to focus on all the things that weren't going my way. I certainly wanted to, but I didn't need to. So I had some practice taking every thought captive and doing everything without grumbling. It was so easy for me to forget that God is good, that He is faithful, and that He loves me. I had just received some really awesome news, and my attitude quickly turned sour like that never happened. I really do believe we can control our reactions to what happens to us. Being mindful, prayerful, and thankful can really humble you.
Honestly, a lot of the things that were happening to me just couldn't be helped. Getting upset about them helped no one, especially myself.
I literally have not posted anything on here in about 2 1/2 years. That's a long time. I'm not good at being disciplined about updating stuff regularly, but I'm going to try something new to keep people updated.
For some reason when I am directly face to face with someone, it's hard for me to speak about the things that happen here in Korea. It's not like I am going through traumatic stuff here; I'm just not the type of person who likes to talk about myself very much. Now, there are those moments where I have diarrhea of the mouth and everything comes tumbling out. But that doesn't happen too often.
So in order to keep people up to date and remember for myself the things that happen, I'll possibly be posting a little more frequently. But what is a little more frequently when you haven't posted in a couple of years? Well that has yet to be determined.
What I want to do is type a little at a time as things happen. Then, when I feel that there is a sufficient amount of information, I will publish it all. We will see if that works. Like I said, I am not good at keeping these things up.
So here's to new beginnings in blogging and so much more.
