slowly becoming a Mass-hole.

I fear I have been off the map more than normal. There's always an element of sitting under the radar for me, given I guess my personality, but having moved a few hours away and also having a job where I literally am 'on' for hours and hours (almost 60+ hour weeks) a day is well. time consuming to say the least?
So if you're reading this and you still want to be my friend, then I am pleased about that. I really feel like I've struggled trying to make people happy here and leave kind of my NJ/Baltimore friends on the backburner a bit. I love you guys. if that means anything.
My week has been crazy here - from classes to dorm duty, where should I begin. well dorm duty isn't anything special really - I just am required to be present once a week in my respective dorm (Thursday) for 7-11pm and routinely check in. Usually I bake brownies or whatever and then hand them out to the kids as a semi-excuse to come into their room and see what they're working on. Once a term, the dorm faculty have to cover a weekend, and since I have Thursdays anyway, I was on T-Sat. so. I was doing that. and although nothing exciting happened, it was still insanely draining. no wonder it only happens once a term.

My classes are doing really well. I may have mentioned that I teach a freshmen foundations class, and that makes me nervous most days. I think it's because the very first week of school many of them didn't talk, and the ones that DID talk didn't feel like listening. I am pleased to say they are coming around. We did have a great end to the week, this project I gave them was an adaptation of Ukiyo-e's Great Wave blockprint.

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I printed out a copy, made a grid, and each student got a little 1"x1.5" block that they had to transfer by charcoal onto a bigger piece of paper. They didn't consult each other while doing this, so the first time they were able to put it together was when all the pieces were done. Here's the final piece (now hanging in the hallway of the RAC.)

These students made me proud this week.

in other news. We had an NMH annual event this week, "Mountain Day", where essentially each class hikes a mountain during what would otherwise be considered a school day. My role as a faculty was to sit at a check in point and make sure the kids didn't die. I know. I'm so ridiculously important. so then there is a 'sweep' person who collects everyone after the last kid comes through and we head up the hill ourselves to get a lunch.

Meg, Teryl, Julia and Martha (and I) taking a break before heading up the mountain.

my roommate, Teryl, and good friend Sarah.

The kids liked it because there was essentially no classes that day, and the weather was absolutely stunning. The seniors were able to hike Mt. Monadnock, which is a pretty rigorous climb - a lot of scaling the mountain and vertical rocks. The top is high enough that you could see Boston.

still wanted to give a shout-out to my girl Pam who made it out here and visited a few weeks back. we also made pizza fondue. (my life is jburg.) Thinking of everyone down in the garden state - esPECially on Thursdays during Jersey Shore. the people on that show are absolutely ridiculous, and the boys in my dorm absolutely worship them. well just the situation. they are all about the GTL. maybe next time I post I'll have some lines.

so. new england in the autumn. definitely more pictures to come. and to be insanely into the harvest season (yay for pumpkin and my girlfriend Colleen.) our NMH farm has started to sell pumpkins. and the leaves are turning (though it's still 90 degrees some days.) more to come on the turn of the season. I'll be back in NJ to celebrate the matrimony of Cheryl and Gurzo the weekend of the 8th, and then the following week.

If you still love me, at this point, let's make plans.

Massachusetts Bound. part 2.

Hey again,    So. it’s going to be my one month anniversary of living in Massachusetts, happening this Saturday. And as cliché as it sounds, I can’t believe it really – because part of me has felt at home here from the first week. So. I guess it feels longer than a month. I’ve made some pretty incredible friends on the faculty and am still meeting people daily. My academic life takes place in this beautiful new arts building they call the RAC(K). (An acronym for Rhodes Arts Center.) Kind of amusing, because it is well. A nice rack.      I am one of 3 people in the visual arts department – the other two faculty members with me are two old men, one of which has been teaching here for 30+ years, and the other for 10. I mean, I am not only completely new, but I am about 20+ years their junior as well as the only woman in the visual arts. Our department meetings are completely random – both are ridiculously crotchety. Maybe I’m getting on a tangent here. Either way. It’s kind of an interesting dynamic. So I teach about 5 classes total, and we have block scheduling so I have about a 2 hour duration with each of them over the course of the week. These classes are essentially Drawing 1, Digital Photography (probably my all time favorite class), Freshman Foundations (they are small and ridiculous), Landscape Drawing, and Design Theory. The classes here are pretty small – I think my smallest being Landscape drawing with 8 kids, and the biggest is Freshman Foundations with 15 (though it feels like 85.) When I’m not teaching, I am currently the JV coach for the Outdoor Team here. This is basically a PE class for the kids who want to do awesome stuff outside, like rock climb, mountain bike, canoe and sail. (and I don’t pretend that I know how to do all of them – I primarily do the canoe and biking portion of it and let other people run the rest.) I think what I really like about this job is that it is extremely similar to Johnsonburg. One of which being the SNAG events they have here for the students that live on site (primarily the international ones.) they have activities that range from Bingo, to blood drives, to Habitat trips, to bus rides to Boston,  I mean it’s really an endless array of options. We also sing after every school meeting. And they’re usually hymns and the kids kind of pile in a chapel (not much different than the new chapel) and sort of sing their part in the community. In other news, I am still going strong with my vegetarianism (and for those of you that didn’t know I became a veggie, I did this past May as a sort of recognition of a bunch of things. Ask me if you want.) – and not unlike camp, the vegetarian food is freaking amazing. We are currently underway with international week so each dish is being ‘sponsored’ by a different country. Despite this, no matter what day, it’s actually really hard to turn the food down… So, I can ramble on and one about all of this stuff I’m doing, but overall you should know the following. I am extremely happy here. I love every minute of my job. And I am extremely thankful for Johnsonburg these days, as this whole camping lifestyle has made my transition into rural America extremely painless. (I’m teaching my dorm how to make s’mores on a George Forman grill this Friday, in fact, which has been a Lakeside tradition.) I do try and make it out of the NMH bubble once in awhile, and hit up some of the neighboring towns. I made a Flickr account which has been allowing me to show students our residence life shots (I can’t friend them on Facebook), and you can find the link here: My Flickr page. I sort of organized it in a way I hope you can follow – and I’ll warn you that I’m not in any of these photos really (because I’m behind the camera.) but it will give you an insight to what our campus life is about. Hog Olympics is a sub-category. So to explain a bit. The NMH mascot is a ‘hog’. And the school has this annual event where students are represented on teams as the dorm and partakes in certain events, like slowest bike race and water carrying. We also made a flag that represented us, as seen in a bunch of different pictures. Whatever these pictures mean to you, I hope you enjoy.  Now I should be getting back to New Jersey for a few weekends in October. It will be nice to be temporarily back in the mid Atlantic. And as always, visitors HERE are always welcome... already had some camp representation stop in for a brief visit and check out my 'Hogwarts-esque' lifestyle. YAY PAM! That may be it for now. Thinking of you all fondly and loving the various updates I've been getting. Thanks again for being wonderful additions to my outside life, and totally thankful I can share these experiences with you.

Massachusetts Bound.

Hey there everyone,
So just like the beginning of every big move, the insanity sort of comes 2nd nature which has been... well... overwhelming... exciting... and a lot of craziness. just to name a few. I mean, where to begin really.
So I know a few of you knew that I left Johnsonburg up until basically last minute, on a Friday August 13, post dinner, and moved out here on that Saturday. (which wasn't a genius move but whatever.)

to give you the low-down, I work at a coed boarding school called Northfield Mount Hermon School out in Northfield, MA. which is basically the last town in Massachusetts before hitting the VT and New Hampshire border (depending on what side of the connecticut river you go on). The school is about 664 (accurate count for the 2010-11 school year) students, about 100 of them are day students and the rest reside here until the end of the school year.

so. I guess I could go on a bunch of tangents. I moved into a ranch house on campus, basically right next to the Headmaster's house with 2 other girls also newly hired - I included them in one of the pictures enclosed. One is Teryl Scott who teaches French (we share a last name. and because the houses normally go to families, people have asked us if we are partners.) and the other is Rosey, who is in mathematics. and my cats. we're a pretty awesome little family. :) So getting back to it - we moved in (see pictures of the place enclosed) and new faculty orientation started not long after - which resulted in extremely long days and nights.
so the upside being that generally, everyone really gets along well and its starting to feel like an amazing community. the downside is that I barely had any free time last week. so. still learning the balance that a bit.

the start of this new week has been amazing. Overall, although I don't live in a dorm, my responsibilities include still being on dorm duty - my particular one is an all boys upper class dorm of about 47. I share this dorm with 3 other staff members and a few Student Leaders, who are essentially seniors who have been hired to be so. They basically do all the menial tasks each night, check in after curfew, room checks, similar to an RA except without the punishing authorities. aside from that, I have about 7 students from this dorm who are my personal advisees, and act like a 'mom' to, check in with, am essentially the go-to person when they skip class, etc. and a liaison between the school and their parents. my group this year (I will meet them on Thursday) are all 11th grade boys, one's a day student and one's an international from Asia (not sure exactly where yet). rest are all from america. in various corners.

I teach about 5 classes, which meet twice a week based on block scheduling (so for 2 hours each interval), which include the subjects: drawing I, design theory, digital photography and the new 9th grade visual arts foundation class (one of the other guys Craig in my orientation class is doing the performing arts section of this). and then a co-curricular (takes the place of when fall sports have practice) of Landscape drawing (this class is pretty sweet. and should I mention completely goes against Johnsonburg's supervision rules. I can take all these kids in my car and drive anywhere. I can take them to my house. I can be in their bedrooms for whatever reason. just saying. its kind of feeling wrong.) I am also going to be the JV Head coach for swimming this winter, and my wife... er.... roommate Teryl is my assistant coach. which makes me laugh because the last time I was even remotely swimming a real stroke was when I was in high school, though I also know that I am the most qualified out of everyone here. kind of sad, really.

so after a bunch of dorm staff meetings and whatever else, I am feeling. oriented. and my student leaders are great. the kids themselves move in later this week and we, as a school faculty, take them hiking up Mt. Monadnock for the day. and we have HogOlympics that evening - sort of rotating around community and allowing kids to get familiar with the school. (oh yeah, our school mascot is a pig.)

and I am still learning things - found myself out in Keene, NH to check out the closest Target, but mostly relying on the favorite grocery chain Price Chopper. and Market Basket. really great little places to eat in interesting, artsy hippie towns like Northampton, MA and Brattleboro, VT. I am really loving small town New England. I can see myself making a home here. it's really beyond exciting.

thanks again for the ongoing support and love from you all - I promise to keep the updates coming and the lines of communication open. and with that being said, you are absolutely always welcome to visit if you're around or want to flee your side of the country a bit.