Part of Slice of Life by Two Writing Teachers March Slice a Day Challenge! I’m slicing every day this month. Thanks for stopping by. 🙂

This hotel is a little fancy. I mean, thank you hotwire… but it is a little fancier than we are used to, with the marble floors and all. When we first walked in the kids were all wide-eyed looking at the shiny things and all the well-dressed people.  “Mama! You didn’t tell us to wear tuxedos!”

This morning I took the kids to the indoor saltwater pool downstairs.

As we walked to the elevator – in our Target bathing suits under our old navy clothes, I thought about hotel pools. As a kid on vacation, I would hang out at the pool for as long as I could, and befriend other kids, I guess.  As a parent, I’ve taken kids to hotel pools to fill an hour, a day,  and to try to tire them out when they were little and had slept for a whole car trip. Hotel pools smell of chlorine, have a selection of strangers around and do not have a lifeguard.

This fancy indoor saltwater pool at this fancy hotel didn’t smell of chlorine, but there was a selection of strangers around, and no lifeguard.

Other than the salt water, it was just the same as any other hotel pool, really. We put the towels on a little table, next to our bag, our shoes, our water bottles, my phone.  I watched the kids try to play while a few people were swimming laps, and a set of brothers raced and splashed with their dad. We watched a fancy family walk around with the hotel staff, and I wondered why they were touring the hotel pool in their winter jackets still.

After time in the hot tub and the pool, I told the kids we had just a few minutes left, and they started to get out to start drying off at the side of the pool. We watched a man get out of the pool, walk over and take one of the towels that we had set by our things.

I tried to convince myself that this had nothing to do with the fanciness of the hotel, the entitlement that people might feel. “It must be an honest mistake,” I said, “although my stuff is right next to those towels.” And we laughed a little. We watched him gesture to his sons where they too might get a towel. H started to say something like “Hey! Those are our towels.” But I shushed him. I’d rather us be the kind of people who don’t yell across a pool when someone takes their hotel pool towels.

We dried off in our respective locker rooms and dried our bathing suits in that shakey bathing suit thing. We put our old navy clothes back on and walked to the elevator. A woman and her dog walked up to the elevator and asked if it was okay for them to join us.

“Of course!” We all said. Lucky us, getting to meet a pup in the elevator of a fancy hotel.

Part of Slice of Life by Two Writing Teachers March Slice a Day Challenge! I’m slicing every day this month. Thanks for stopping by. 🙂

So. March again.

I have forgotten how to write on command like this. Daily.

I searched for slices today, and I wonder if maybe it’s harder now.
There are so many stories each day that aren’t my own to tell.

I walked down the steps, laughing at myself for being scared to fall down the steep steps… scared enough to put my hand on the railing – the one that hundreds of kids’ germy hands have touched.

“A slice!” I think.
Maybe.

I walk out of the building with a teacher I’m getting to know this year, and we chat about our spring break plans, and thank each other for the great work these days.
“Not really a slice.” I think. Although it was a nice chat.

I walk to my car, and realize it is almost pinned in by the car behind it.
I hate backing up so close to another car, but thank goodness for the backup camera.
It’s touch and go. But then, I go.

I search the street as I drive for a little slice of life.

At home, my kids have slices. But they aren’t mine to tell.

So. March again.
This is going to take practice.

Part of Slice of Life by Two Writing Teachers

In the car, we talk about quitting karate.  He tells me he doesn’t understand why the karate teachers can’t start from the positive and then help him get better. “Why can’t they say, ‘You are doing that kick great! Now let’s work on this other kick?'”

“Actually,” I say, “You are kinda describing a teaching philosophy where you teach from areas of strength. Jennifer Serravallo says –”

“Is that the one with the dark curly hair that wrote the books you love?”

I just nod. Yep. That’s the one.

“Why do they have to say you are on the test list, or you aren’t on the test list?”

I just shake my head, “I don’t know…”

“I mean, couldn’t they just say, ‘The test is on this day.” Then I’d be motivated. It’s so un-motivating to be told all the things I’m doing wrong. Why would I want to try?”

“You are really motivated by positive feedback.” I say, and he nods his head.

“Can I write about this in my blog?” I ask him.

He wonders why, and I try to explain that I think a lot of kids are motivated by positive feedback. And then I wonder, who isn’t?

I’m lost in thought. A few years ago I deliberately changed my teaching language. I started saying things like “I’ve gathered you today because your work in this is awesome, and you are ready for this next great thing!” When I first started, I thought kids would see right through my language switch. What I didn’t count on was that they saw right through my language switch to the very core of what I was doing —  knowing what they could do, and believing in them. Starting from a strength makes a kid smile, it makes them sit up a little straighter, believing in themselves. In karate, it might make them kick higher, practice more, or even not quit.

“Okay.” He says. “You can write about this.”

Part of Slice of Life by Two Writing Teachers

True confessions. I’ve been a little grumpy this holiday season. The kids’ bickering, the to do list… it had me in a little funk. Then I watched a beautiful sappy video on facebook about how now, as the parent, I am in charge of the Christmas Magic. So, I took a deep breath and took a step out of my funk.

That’s when the Christmas tree was declared officially dead. It wasn’t sucking up the water… despite our best efforts and constant vigilance!

Fortunately, the tree place agreed to exchange it.
Unfortunately, the tree had to be undecorated. Including the lights.

Before this, we had lived with a dying tree, we had hoped, and crossed our fingers.
Before this we had decorated it with lights and special ornaments.
Before this, kids were crying as I smiled and told them it was okay. 
Before this an entire box of ornaments crashed to the ground, breaking one of my most cherished ornaments from my childhood that survived moves and toddlers and the puppy trying to eat the tree when he was just a baby. 

The kids agreed to undecorate the tree, while I went to pick a new one.

“Pick a good one!” they called after me as I drove away.

I’d already been to the tree place twice this season for this Christmas Tree… 
The first time was the day we had promised we’d go and get the tree. The 12 year old kept having premonitions of things going wrong. 
The van wouldn’t start, even with jumper cables. We should have known then. 
The tree place was closed when we finally go there. We should have known then.
It was pouring rain the next day. We should have known then. 
We made a quick tree decision and had an 8 year-old crying, “That’s not the tree! You didn’t even ask me!” We definitely should have known then. 

Fortunately the tree place still had 2 concolor firs to choose from.
Unfortunately another family arrived minutes after me and chose one of them while I was deciding.
Fortunately, the one left was beautiful.

When I got home with the new tree,  the old tree’s needles were all over the living room. So of course, the 12 year old had a little fun.

And then we stuffed the tree out the window, so I could return it.

I was able to easily lift it into my van. Because it was so light. And dead.

That’s me, smiling so I don’t cry. And also laughing because as stressful as the holidays can sometimes be… as mean as my kids might say I sometimes am… I never felt so much like the Grinch until I stuffed my Christmas tree out my window and into my van.

Back home, after my fourth trip this season to the tree place, I took a deep breath.  I reminded myself (again) that I am the magic of Christmas… and then I forced everyone to help me put the lights on (again) and the ornaments on (again) and the candy canes on (again).

A wise friend on facebook commented that I had been lucky enough to get the joy of decorating two trees. She’s right, of course. That’s the whole point … try to #findthejoy. Be the magic! 

I looked over at Mr. Thought and said, “You know? This new tree is even better than the first one!”

“Well…” he said, “That one was dead.”

… The next morning he texted me from downstairs, “This new tree really sucks.”

Thank. Goodness.