I still have records that I have not completed - as teaching ESOL becomes more and more like teaching SPED (special ed.). I have NOT finished packing up my room. I found out I would have to move (two doors down for no apparent rational reason) just two weeks ago. I am not finished with my large project for the final class of my Reading Endorsement. I have until Monday to do this and will get it done, I know.

On top of all of this, I just found out that I am not, after all, HIGHLY QUALIFIED to teach my subject area which is English as a Second Language. I will swear on a pack of bibles that several people in my system told me that taking this 150 hour Reading Endorsement was all that was necessary to bring me up to snuff. So when I got the e-mail asking what I was doing about my Language Arts certification, I was floored.

So, I have to take the Praxis, which is a certification test - in Middle Grades Language Arts. There's no getting around it. We won't even go into the fact that, no matter what anyone else said to me, I am ultimately responsible. I won't even go there with my hatred of fine print, which extends to manuals, health insurance info, and tax preparation. Apparently, it's time for me to become a grown up and get over that.

I am not particularly afraid of the Praxis test, despite all of the drama over the past year with my Brazilian friends trying to pass. I went to academic competition in English when I was in high school, and I am a language major. I have two chances to take it: I am going to try a stand by position on June 10th, and I will register for the August 5th test as a standby. The way things are going this year, I cannot take any chances...

I am just tired of jumping through hoops, thinking that I am finished, and finding that there are more things to do. I swear to you that last Monday, when I found out about the Language Arts requirement, I was ready to quit. Seriously. I was looking for real estate in Mountainair, New Mexico (a house can be had for one third of what we are paying for our house here).

Oh, Mountainair is south of Albuquerque, and a couple of hours north of Ruidoso , where I spend a couple of summers with my grandparents. Not to mention its proximity to Santa Fe - one of the holy sites of Southwestern art - and Taos. Also, my friend lives there with my former pony... There are artists there...

So, as you can see, I did a bit of thinking about that.

But, no, I am going to stay here for a little while. It's not so easy to pick the geographical cure as it once was, what with a house and husband. The dog is no problem - I am used to hightailing it out of a place with a dog. And maybe even a horse.