I'm moving back across the world in less than a month, a fact I conveniently forget much of the time, as I enjoy the last few weeks of the school year, walks with K on the Corniche, the ritual weekend cappucino and my favorite supermarket chicken biryani for lunch. Soon, though, it will be impossible to ignore the looming deadlines, the packing to be done and the hard goodbyes. Transitions have never been easy for me. Unlike the broken-in fuzzy slippers of the present, the Great Unknown of the future seems to glower in the shadows, and my hamster brain spins all sorts of what-ifs. I also get sad, regardless of how right the change seems to be. A chapter of my life will end when I board my flight to Austin in the early morning hours of June 8, and nothing in this lifetime will bring it back. I have friends, admirable, brilliant, well-adjusted people, who cannonball into the pool of life's changes with a c'est la vie and a rebel yell. I'm the one easing into the shallow end, squealing and clutching the ladder.And surely the same one, 10 metaphorical minutes later, paddling around, hardly remembering what the fuss was about.
I'm old enough now to know this. For the past few months, I've been slowly peeling away the layers of my life in Abu Dhabi and living with the blank slate of the next step. Without losing too much sleep. I have sorted stuff, researched shipping methods, packed a few boxes and given away my furniture. Soon, the boxes will go, the bank account will be closed. My residence visa will be canceled; my cell phone deactivated. I'll leave a forwarding address for the school and pick up my last check. I'm not looking forward to saying goodbye, but I'm at peace.
I have learned so much these past two years. So much that I can hardly remember the person I was when I arrived, though I've recovered a few artifacts while packing that serve as reminders. I found an untouched bottle of 200 Wellbutrin tablets tucked in my bedside drawer, a vivid symbol of the year I spent on anti-depressants before easing off of them just two weeks before leaving for Abu Dhabi. I brought them with me just in case, but I am no longer dealing daily with unrelenting feelings of failure and shame. I came across the copy of The Giving Tree, a good-bye gift by a former colleague given with love and the very best of intentions as I was leaving San Francisco. To her, it was a tribute to the sacrifices I made for her and for the school where I worked. She even got our team to sign it, like a yearbook. What she didn't know was that I have always hated the story of The Giving Tree, with its co-dependent tree and sociopathically grabby boy. I will keep it always as a reminder never again to drain myself of life until I become nothing but a stump.
Today, I feel the opposite of stump-like. I feel balanced in a way that leads me to believe that I will not get sucked down the workaholic rabbit hole when I start my new job in Austin, even though I will be working for the same type of school as before. And it's not just because I've had an easy schedule at a well-funded private school for two years. It has helped to rest, but I was rested after the first semester. It didn't make me feel at home in Abu Dhabi. What's made me feel balanced as a person and a professional has been the discipline of setting boundaries and sticking to them--and discovering that I can still be an effective, respected teacher and a full member of the community. It feels weird to call what amounts to saying no repeatedly a "discipline," but that's what it is. Not becoming department head. Not leading my grade level team when asked. Telling my principal and the curriculum coordinator that I didn't want to return to administration until they stopped asking. Saying no to subbing for my whole first year. I came to Abu Dhabi with the goal of being a classroom teacher and learning about how to live without burning out. Period. Turning off all the "should" voices and sticking to that has given me a huge boost of confidence. It's almost as though I now believe I can take of myself. Whether I do or not remains to be seen, but I know I can. Whereas I wasn't so sure before, given my years of Giving-Tree-like self abuse.
Not that Austin is a later
al move. Abu Dhabi was the bunny slope of boundary setting. That's where the well-funded private school thing does come in. Austin will be different. The needs of the community and the realities of public school teaching in a state that is currently writing bald-face lies into the social studies standards will be a true test of this new resolve. I have learned that I am healthier and happier when I put boundaries in place and stick to them. I'm confident I can do that. What I haven't had practice doing yet (as much) is sticking to those boundaries in a situation where I feel other people may be adversely affected (in the short term) by my decision. Is it all or nothing? Could the Giving Tree have stopped at her leaves and smaller branches or is it one big slippery slope? Should you only give what you can renew easily or is a life of "sustainable tree management" acceptable (ie: sacrificing a little more now and then, but intentionally and sustainably)? OK, I might be overdoing it with the Giving Tree metaphor here, but you know what I mean. I suppose finding out is the next step in this journey toward a balanced life in a helping profession. I'm sure I'll get plenty of practice in Austin...
