Anything better

In a more recent episode of "Mad Men," Betty Draper pauses before carving into her Weight Watchers Thanksgiving dinner. Her son reminds her to say what she is thankful for. She says, "I'm thankful that I have everything I want...and that no one else has anything better."

It's a reflection of her character, a grown-up princess, and perhaps of America at the time. It is not enough to be grateful just for what we have, but the benchmark of gratitude is drawn in comparison to what others have. At least what we know that they have.

True, in the mid-1960s there aren't Facebook albums humblebragging about homeplate seats or wide acreage for us to be sure that our possessions are superior to that of others. But based on the propaganda of prosperity, perhaps Betty Draper had reason to believe she had not only what she wanted, but what everyone else wanted, too.

***

The last two nights I've fallen asleep tired. We'd had visitors for a week and I was exhausted. But last night was different. I fell asleep tired from such a wonderful day, just hanging with my family and enjoying what felt like the first true day of summer. Summer, what a great idea. As all the best fruits ripen in the garden, the fruits of our labors during the rest of the year become ready for harvest, and we are given a season to be a little more leisurely, to flip-flop a little more freely through the stacks of books and projects that lay dormant under the frost of winter.

I found myself smiling just as I fell asleep. For the first time in a long time, I didn't have to check myself. I didn't have to remind myself to just be grateful, or to stop coveting the time with children or time without children, or the yoga classes or the cute yoga figure that the gal to my right has.

Unqualified gratitude is sincere gratitude. Thankfulness just because I know I *should* be thankful does not make a beautiful character. Thankfulness in light of what others do or don't have is not even touching the real issues in my heart. Cultivating thankfulness is daily work for me. Even though I know I am living far better than a huge swell of the world's population is living. My heart wants to know who's got it better. Easier. Safer. Prettier. Thinner. Smarter. Richer. Better.

Even though my greed heart and my thankful heart beat with one rhythm, I can tell you they are both trying to beat louder than the other. Type Greed blood must be thinner than Type Thanks blood because when it's easier for my heart to pump it. I get so irritated when the kids complain about the wrong flavor popsicle--but I am no better, just letting my greed heart pump its toxins all through my system.

I am thankful in my life right now for a million blessings. Each one little in light of my thanks for Jesus, each one big in its job of building up my thankful heart.

Running my guts out

Every six months or so, I take up running again, which in this curvy petite body looks like this: For a month, I reappreciate running and all of its benefits, and for at least a couple of those weeks of running, I do not totally feel as though both my lungs are going to collapse and I am not going to have some kind of reverse-intestinal upchuck fiesta on the track. Running is a great outlet for stress but I do not live in a body that can endure running on the regular. My long history of pounding out Irish step dances has netted me ankles that are predictably unpredictable. Also, my lust for change does not a good endurance runner make.

Right now, I am back at track practice. Running my ever-loving guts out. I need running to work for me right now because the stress I am feeling is not the stuff of checklists and bills to pay. I am back on the identity carousel, trying to figure out which pony I want to be riding for this go-round before they start the ride and before the siss-boom-bah of the merry-go-round musicmaker starts playing. Is it this one? This one with the ruby reigns or this one with the long and flowing mane? Or is it that one over there that bobs higher and lower than all the rest? Or this one that just stays put for the entire ride.

I have an enviable career. I get to teach bright people in a resource-rich, spiritually-gifted community, close to where I live and where my children school. And I? Only have a master's degree.

I am oh so lucky and yet I question the stability of this when I feel so unstable. I know God's hand was in every detail of our move here. I just want to feel a touch of the divinity in what I am doing here now.

We all want to do work that matters, right? It's a universal cliche. Teaching has its rewards, but on a day-to-day basis, I see some long faces in the classroom. Teaching is a give, give, give business and the return on investment might not be known for many years henceforth. We prepare and prepare and we teach and jump around the classroom; we run our guts out. Unlike a chef or a hairstylist, our "product" is often not immediately recognizable. The reaction to learning or developing a nascent skill? Is not the same as reacting to a California sushi roll or a new body wave perm. So we teachers wait in hopeful expectation of a reaction, a response to this gift of active learning and oftentimes we get blank stares, a deep and abiding disinterest in favor of a cellphone screen, or an evaluation that says, Errrmmm, yeah, maybe you should get out of this business altogether.

I will not worship at the crumbling altar of the evaluation, but I will look inward and upward and continue to run my guts out and hope that as I make another lap around the track, this now my fourth full year of teaching college writing, that I can know that I am in the right lane, running in a fair heat, that with more training, I'll only improve my time and my stride.

Rather than grow weary, I want to grow more fit for this race and I want to know and see and experience the outcomes of this work that I believe matters.

At the end of track practice, though, I know I'm still okay. If my career dries up tomorrow, I'll still have the love of this little family. Their hugs and affirmations and little teeth to brush and deliveries of coffee when I left my mug at home are pretty amazing. I feel equal parts unworthy and totally whole as their mama/wife person. They are the ones for whom I am running this race. They keep me running strong.

Great Gatsby

Dear High School Sophomores, The Great Gatsby dam is about to break and the waters of excess are going to flood every aspect of our culture. This means nothing to you now while you are Snapchatting away on the phone that you pulled out of your Coach wristlet. But a few drafts of that five paragraph essay later and you'll know what I mean.

Or will you?

Because, in addition to having the powers of the internet machine, you get to consult Leonardo di Caprio "for research purposes." Versus Kendra Stanton circa 1996 who had Mrs. L. Bluhm as a secondary source (a la MHS' English department) and some borrowed Cliff's Notes she read over someone's shoulder while riding home on the RTA.

It's funny that this book is taught to teenagers, as pointed out by R. Clifton Spargo in a recent HuffPost piece that I thought was very telling. Who can possibly comprehend, at the age when many are just grateful to drive around a pile of rust on wheels, the hazards of pretension and extravagance in society? Of seeking after the ever-elusive fortune?

But maybe you can better than any of us. The truth is that high school now is so radically different than it was even ten years ago. It is not some Dr. Seuss "Oh the Places You'll Go" cliche played out in four years. A 2011 survey by Schwab found that teens expected their starting salary in their first job would be $70,000. Reality check: this was three times my starting salary ten years ago. But the expectations of spending and earning potential are so tremendous for young people. Because God forbid girlfriend is wearing the ::GASPS:: same dress in the selfie she Instagrammed last week as this week. Teenagehood today is emotional battery that doesn't cease when the bell rings. It is media inundation, it is visual exhaustion, it is everything that F. Scott Fitzgerald decried about the Gatsby estate and the people who mingled therein.

I will return to this novel once more before Leo and Carey can teach me its merits again on the silver screen. I will be transported to a time of innocence when the green light and Gatsby's car were mere symbols in a five paragraph essay rather than real life.

Concurrent with my movie ticket, I look forward--and I mean this sincerely--to learning what our young people can teach us about the book that we pompous academics think we are teaching them.

Yours, A pompous academic