On the way to school today, I listened to “Keep Ya Head Up” by Tupac and it’s been in my head all day. Regular readers of this craziness will know that having songs stuck in my head is typical, but today it was the same song all day, I think. Which is different. But it was good.

I’m settling into the idea of being a traveling teacher and of teaching middle school. Today was a good day, and it was the last day of the week at school. I stayed after really late and got close to caught up with grading and got plans made for next Monday and the rest of the week. I met Dak and Annika, who came in for Multicultural Night at the high school. I have a lot of students who performed with all the different cultural groups, and it was great to see them all confident and proud. After the show, they had food, games, and things to look at from all over – American Indian, Karen, Nepali, Hmong, African American, Latino (tamales!), and many variations. What a beautiful night.

I hope that being a traveling teacher doesn’t mean I end up without a home base community. I like going to the basketball games and the multicultural nights and supporting students as part of the community. Being so far away from Forest Lake meant I wasn’t able to take part in as many events as I wanted to. I made it to some of the plays, a couple of the homecoming games, a few sports games, and that was about it. I wasn’t connected to the community nearly as much as I might have been if I lived nearby.

I like being so close to the school now, where I can hop on the road and be there or be home quickly, which means I can go to Black History Month shows and basketball games and not be on the road for an hour or get home well after my bedtime. Dak can bring Annika up to the school for events easily, which means that I can just stay and work until the event. I feel like I fit in so much more where I am. I hope that doesn’t change when I am traveling. I hope I still get to be a member of the community in full standing, rather than half.

Maybe I’ll get to be a member of two!