Day Two

Day two was far better than day one. I feel more rested. I'm more oriented. The sessions are a little more meaningful. There are still some frustrating issues surround time boundaries and such, but there's no need to rehash them here. I did a little yoga tonight, too, and feel a lot better, though I still need some real exercise. I'm hoping to get my bikes here this weekend.

I went to the gym here to check out the "martial arts" room they have. Turns out, it's pretty much a parkay floor, big mirror and a bunch of equipment storage. Ohh, how thrilling. I haven't trained in weeks and I'm jonesing. I can't even find a good place to swing my bokken around here. I might head over to Donovan Waite's place Saturday.

That's about it; same basic routine here on day two.

Welcome

It's 9:38 pm as I sit down to write this. My day began at 5am when the alarm on my wrist watch went off. I made a half-hearted attempt at doing some yoga in at attempt to awaken the spirit, especially since the rest of me was still fast asleep. I was pleased to see it was already beginning to get light out – I was afraid it would be dark in the mornings. By seven, we were on a humid, sticky, cramped, overcrowded yellow school bus on our way to Marîn Middle School, a short drive north of Temple.

I feel silly saying things like, "today was long" and "boy, I'm tired." No kidding. Everyone is tired. I do, however, have some frustrations over the focus of our day. Despite doing hour upon hour of pre-reading for the Institute, we spent much of today going over things at a very cursory level, essentially reviewing things we already read. We leapt from one two-minute activity to the next, each instructor modeling a thousand different ways of doing things. It was just too much; and, we never examined anything in any kind of meaningful depth. It's just day one and there is a staggering amount of information we have to cover, so I'm trying to be patient.

After dinner, we went to the Welcoming Ceremonies. There were several speakers, most of whom were fairly engaging and inspiring. Wendy Kopp, the founder and president of Teach For America, spoke for about 30 minutes. She's not the most exciting public speaker, but her message is clear and no on can argue with the quality of the organization she created. It's really quite amazing.

I'm hoping to get a good night's rest tonight and correct a few of today's mistakes: I'll sleep in a little longer than 5 am; I bought snacks to get me through the thin parts of the day (especially considering the small size of our boxed lunches). I've tried, without much luck, to get into the rec facility. They supposedly have a "martial arts room," which could be just about anything. I walked in what appeared to be the front doors tonight only for the security guy to inform me I was using the wrong door. But I can't seem to find any other entrance to the facility. I'm boggled. But I need to get some exercise soon or I'm going to go start raving mad. Well, madder.

Part of me wants to go right to bed and get some rest; the other part wants to hang out with new friends, explore the area, be social. The whole weat side of me says it would be wise to catch up on sleep and get off to a healthy start. The frosted side says, "hey, you only live once."

Home Sweet (temporary) Home

After five days of "Induction," I've moved from the Embassy Suites hotel to my new, though temporary, home here at Temple University. The suite-style dorm I'm in is pretty swank. We have a full kitchen and the rooms are generous by dorm room standards. I have one immediate roomate and two other suitemates. The four of us share two bathrooms.

Teach For America is *big* on reflection and feedback and my goal with this blog has been to do just that, though the last several months have been focused primarily on random life events as I prepared to move out here. I have to say, I'm feeling pretty good right now. Everything I brought with me is now in this room, except my two bikes which are still at Victor's place (Scott's friend). They have a bike storage room on my hall but apparently they're not allowing anyone to use them during the summer.

I have just about everything I need. I'm connected to the net. Have bedding and toiletries. My clothes are hanging up in a clsoet rather than folded into a garment bag in the trunk of my car. In the parlance of our times: it's all good.

I've been a little worried about the age difference between me and most of the people around me. I'm used to being a supervisor to "kids" (am I allowed to use that term now?) their age, so being their peer is awkward. I'm trying not to be the crotchety old man, but I'd feel better if the whole college party scene leftovers would dissipate. You've graduated folks, move on.

Luckily , everyone I've met is really cool. Those of us from the interview weekend bonded a lot and I'm looking forward to building more/deeper friendships with them all.

It's been a two month oddysey getting here. I moved out of San Diego June 1 and stayed with my parents a couple of days before spending four days in the Bay Area, then a day in Yosemite before flying to Philly for a week, Minnesota for ten days, then back to mom & dad's for a day before starting an eight-day cross-country road trip. Oh, then I moved into a friend of a friend's house for four days, the Hampton Inn for a day, the Embassy Suites for four days and, finally, Temple University. Home for five weeks.

And what a five weeks it will be. My days will begin at 5 am when I will wake up, eat breakfast and get ready to ride a bus to the school where I'll be teaching summer classes. I'll be team teaching with three other corps members and we'll all be working with various supervisors/mentors. At the end of the day, we'll head back to Temple where we'll have roughly one hour to eat dinner and relax, work out or whatever we choose before evening workshops begin. Our days officially end around 10 pm, though we'll have some group and individual work to finish to prepare for the following day. Needless to say, maintaining balance will be difficult.

I'm excited about diving into the process. At each step, I'm more and more impressed by Teach For America's approach, professionalism and forethought. I'm as interested in the company as I am about teaching. It's pretty awesome. At the same time, I'm concerned about the lack of free time. It's not like I need to sit on my butt and watch TV or something, but I'm used to training four hours a day and as it is, I don't think I'll get much more than a couple hours a week, and that will be on the weekends. It will be a good test of my organizational skills to carve out that time whenever I can.

A few of us were developing a training regimen for our hour off. It begins with changing into workout clothes in 32 seconds then running to the cafeteria and jogging in place while in line getting food. You can't sit down while you eat; rather, you should be doing lunges or stretching as you munch on carrots and such. Maybe a few jumping jacks. Loading up your tray will be like using free weights. Then, you run back to your room and shower in 46 seconds, get dressed again in professional attire, and get back to the program.

This summer is going to be a challenge, but there is tremendous energy and excitement and talent here and I'm looking forward to seeing us all apply everything that we are to this endeavor.

Maintaining this blog will be a challenge, too. I think taking 15 minutes each night or so to reflect on the day will be helpful in many ways, and will help keep the blog up to date. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to be up in six and a half hours!

Flowers for Zoe

I've learned that many of my pop culture references are lost on a majority of '06 corps members. To them, Ozzy is just some dude on another reality show on MTV. Luckily, The Simpsons transcends generations, much like Zeppelin and umm Barry Manilow.

Nevertheless, one of my favorite Lenny Kravitz songs is "Flowers for Zoe." That Zoe was Lenny's daughter; the Zoe in this picture is an '06 Philly corps member. She and Matt and about 15 or 20 others were with me in May at the Philly hiring weekend and we all bonded pretty closely, especially since we got back to Philly and started Induction.

She has a sharp wit and a dry sense of humor, so even if she doesn't get my outdated pop culture references, she appreciates the spirit in which they were made. Phew.

Ms. Crooke

Matt's cover letter from UPenn was addressed to "Ms. Crooke." He lasted about three minutes until he just couldn't stand to leave it uncorrected any longer and changed the "s" into an "r." Matt is from just outside of Philadelphia, from a place called New Hope (wasn't that the name of Episode 4 of Star Wars?). This picture was taken on the way to see the house that he and a couple others are renting. I've been invited to take the fourth room and I'm really interested (in the house and the people) but I'm not too keen on the neighborhood. It doesn't grab my soul, so to speak, and it's fairly far away from where I'll be teaching. But, we'll see.

Yeah, that's a good one

La La La Luuuuuuke....

Another brief stop was Sandusky, Ohio. I looked for the plant where Tommy Boy works but all I found was a giant amusement park. Oh well. I pretty much included this entry so I could make that joke so uhhhhhh I'm gonna go now.

Sandusky was my final stop before getting in to Philadelphia. I can't believe the trip is already over!

WiFiOwa

Let's admit it. When you're talking about boring places to drive through, Iowa comes quickly to mind. But it really wasn't so bad. It was mostly green and certainly was more rolling than Nebraska (good grief). And check this out: their rest stops have free access WiFi. How crazy is that?!

Unfortunately, since I got such a late start leaving Omaha, I got in to Cedar Rapids at 10:30 pm. Kevin's wife, Bedora, had already gone to bed, but he and I chatted for a while catching up on all the random and inane jokes from our college days (am I officially lame referring to my "college days"?).

I got up early to see the two of them before they headed off to work (they're both lawyers) and then I relaxed a while before hitting the road again. I also managed to not take any pictures while I was there. I guess I was getting lazy.

Somewhere in middle America

Yes, I played Counting Crowes as I drove into Omaha. Somehow, I neglected to take any pictures. Everyone says Iowa is difficult to drive through, but I found Nebraska to be the most boring. Omaha isn't bad, though. I stopped off at a bookstore and met up with a friend of mine. We had lunch and hung out at the park for a while catching up. It was a great part of the trip even if it was short. I left that evening to race to Cedar Rapids to stay with Kevin for a night before heading into Ohio.

There are those who call me....Tim? *kablam!*

This was the second time I had been to Ft. Collins, CO. The first was during one of my summer road trips back when I had a ten month contract at USD. I wasn't planning on going quite so far but it seemed like the thing to do. Since then, Tim has gotten married, bought a house, been to Boston to do his post-doc work and has started teaching and doing research at Colorado State (go Rams, I think?).

Tim is one of the pair of friends I hung out with most in college (the other being Kevin, whom I visited next). He's something of a genius (at least compared to me!) who did his PhD work in atmospheric physics. He and his wife, Ashley, have two very rambunctious dogs (Bacon and Letty, seen above) and three cats (whose names escape me...Sunshine and Giggles or something or other...ok, not Giggles).

I spent Saturday in Boulder training at Boulder Aikikai with Hiroshi Ikeda Sensei, a very well-respected 7th dan. They have three-hour seminars every Saturday and, lucky for me, it was all weapons take-aways this week. I don't think I could have handled three hours of full-on Aikido at 5,500 feet. They have a beautiful dojo – very impressive. Ikeda Sensei did a calligraphy drawing for me of the Japanese word, "Ganbatte," which means, "Go Fot It!" I'm going to post it inside my classroom and use it as a rally cry for my students.

I was tempted to stay. Tim and Ashley have a great house and she cooks a mean chocolate chip cookie. World Cup was on. Great Aikido not far away. Why did I leave again?

Szchooooommmm!

That, of course, is the sound of seiza (the kneeling/seated position one might associate with martial arts) a la Vince Salvatore Sensei. On day two of my trip, I stoped in Truckee, CA to visit with Gabe and then the next day, the two of us drove down the hill to Reno where Gabe trains and Salvatore Sensei teaches. Their dojo is Iwama style, too, and so things were pretty familiar. Salvatore Sensei has a unique energy and makes some pretty cool sound effects. Iwama is a very vocal style of Aikido -- lots of kiais and everyone interprets them differently. While I was training with Gabe, I swear I heard him utter "su!" Su is the kotodama – the primordial sounds of the universe that express energy and power and such – that can destroy your opponent. Geez. Thanks, Gabe.

When I got in that night, Gabe and I jumped in the hot tub on his parents' backyard deck. Now, that is style! The next morning, his mom ran to the store and made us breakfast. It was the first of two times I considered not leaving (read about the second below).

I nearly had to abandon my road trip on only the second day as a result of the two Russian girls who were training at Aikido of Reno. They're in some sort of Cirque du Soleil show in town (holy flexibility Batman!). But, I managed to escape their siren-like calls and, after lunch at a pretty cool sandwhich type place, jumped in the car and drove to Salt Lake City.

Exfoliation!

Jon and I used to have this gag that whenever you said, "exfoliation!" Pete would come bounding over the ridge, as he did on at least one or two occasions (most notably while we were climbing at the Santee bouldering field in San Diego). I'm lucky to call Pete my former supervisor, my mentor and my friend. I owe most of my outdoor experiences and early career opportunities to him.

So, I was excited to make his house in Arnold the first stop on my cross country road trip. I stayed with him and his wife, Teglene, and their two young boys, Cleary and Shannon (and their dog and cats). We hung out and caught up on each other's goings on, walked around "the lake" and just generally took it easy. Oh, and of course, we visited the local pool (I wish those "noodle" gizmos existed when I was a kid!).

Minnnesohhhta: My 30th State

After spending about a week in Philadelphia, I flew into Duluth, MN and then got a ride up to Ely where I co-instructed one last WFR course for WMA. The students were a blast: most of them were camp staff and the course was part of their required training to lead kids on canoeing and backpacking trips during the summer for Camp Widjiwagen (which is where the course was being held).

Erik and I canoed into town with a bunch of students on our day off. How often do you get to canoe into town? How cool is that? It was a great day; the weather was spectacular and the bugs weren't terrible, either. Better yet, there was a BBQ picnic waiting for us when we got to the beach in Ely!

Oh, and Minnesota makes 30 states that I've visited. The rules of what counts as a state are always evolving. For instance, I only cut a small corner off New Mexico, but I stayed overnight. So, I counted it. I don't count airports. Anyway, the list will grown by two after I drive across country.

Gaglione Bros. 1, Pat's 0

The first thing everyone associates with Philadelphia, so I'm discovering, is the cheeststeak. And, so the locals tell me, the Hatfield-McCoy of cheesteak rivalries is between Geno's and Pat's. So, one of the things I made sure to do while I was visiting Philly in late-May was to sample a 'steak from at least one of those establishments.

Technically, I failed in that quest. But, I did eat from a place at an indoor Farmer's Market that claims to be descended from Pat's (which itself claims to be the originator of the Philly cheesteak sandwich). Now, I've only been eating cheesesteaks for a year or so because I used to not eat red meat. But when a place opened up near me in Ocean Beach called Gaglione Brother's, I decided to leave my steak-less diet in the past and enjoy some variety.

Having enjoyed the Gaglione sandwhich quite a lot, I really was looking foward to an official "Philly" 'steak. Results: Gaglione Brothers 1, Pat's Knock-Off 0. The bread was a little tough, the meat was in big strips (which I know is more traditional) and dripping with greese. And the french fries didn't come close to comparing to Gaglione's (which may be the best french fry around, especially when they get overcooked just slightly and are all crunchy and ).

Aside from that, the trip was great. I lounged a little, but also saw a fair bit of the city. I've heard Philadelphia described as having a relatively small feeling given the fact it's one of the largest cities in the US. I trained at Donovan Waite Sensei's dojo in Center City, visited UPenn and met several of my fellow TFAers, too. I came out here ostensibly for a "hiring faire" which was neither a faire nor a hiring event. But, I did interview with a couple schools which may lead to something down the road. The placement process requires an advanced degree in theoretical mathematics and a minor in theology to understand, so I'll just wait until they tell me where to go.

I stayed with my friends Scott and Kristin (and their ginormous dog) who live very close to UPenn. They're renovating their house, following the script from "The Money Pit" as closely as possible. I'll spare them both and won't post the pics of them painting!