Who would have thought?

Let's all breath a collective sigh of relief. Or, more appropriately, let's all give a collective shout for joy.

Although my semester isn't officially over until next Wednesday, I've turned in every assignment, dotted every i and crossed every t. I'm done. And my professor sent me an e-mail with a big fat A to prove it.

Hooray for being done with my first semester of graduate school!

Notice how I said first semester. Well, that implies there's more to come, right? Well, who knows what I'll do next...or when I'll do what next....but for now I'm just planning to enjoy having more free time and spending every second of it with my Blake.

I'll be the first to admit it. I'm a wimp. And this semester has been hard. Really hard. Having a full-time job and being a student (even part time) is exhausting! I like my free time. I like my Blake. I like my TV shows. Heck, I just like having a clean bathroom.

So we'll see where the next month of decisions leads leads me: more applications or another semester off.

I'm trying to keep as many doors open as possible. I'll be volunteer substitute teaching an English class at the public library. I'll continue to be working with several EFL students on writing, and I'll be working on my French as well. I've got a great thing going with an EFL student I met during an observation. He's an attorney from Senegal who moved to the US three months ago and is working on his English at breakneck speed. We decide on a topic, he writes a short paper in English, I correct it and give suggestions, then I write a response in French for him to correct.

(It's going really well -I'm glad you asked-...except for it's made me realize that I've lost a substantial amount of my French. It's coming back quickly, but I definitely need to make myself keep it in more constant use. Alas. Here we go.)

Anyhow, I am also planning to work with some of my former students on their writing, so that'll keep me busy enough. I am continually amazed at the "if is English, I like to learn all" attitude of my students. (Holy cow, everyone, the American dream is real!) I am also amazed at how much I love teaching. Who would have thought?

And for that matter, who would have thought I'd be moving to and living in DC, marrying a wonderful Blake, living in our very own house, working at Georgetown Law, and going to graduate school at Georgetown....really, who would have thought?

Not me. I didn't think. But I couldn't ever have thought up anything better...