Ms. Brunault, are you writing a book?

Last week. In the middle of reviewing research requirements with the sophomores of period 5A religion, a student raised her hand and innocently asked, "Ms. Brunault are you writing a book?" Immediately my answer was no. No I am not writing a book. "But Ms. W said you were," the reply came, instantly rumored by voices throughout the room. Am I? I was forced to ask myself? Am I writing a book? The simple answer is no. No I am not a novelist. No I am not in the midst of some massive writing project with the goal of publication. But the bigger question remains, am I a writer? I still bounce between yes and no. Part of me, the part that would like to be a writer, says yes. Another part of me, the part of me that knows writing takes more time, talent and effort than I have, says no. No you are not a writer. What is a writer we ask? Is a writer simply someone who writes? A kindergartener learning to print her name, and string simple sight words into sentences. Or is a writer the Jodi Piccoults, Ann Rinaldis and William Shakespeares of the world? Our answer I believe lies somewhere in the middle, and it is thanks to a fellow blogger (if I can really use the term to describe myself) that I have reached this conclusion. "Someone I know is a blogger." I told a few friends and family members, "But she is not a blogger like me," I continued. "She is a real blogger. She doesn't just write about what she does. She really writes. She is prophetic." It is in this reading of words from someone I actually know that I realize we all have the potential to be writers. We write stories of our own lives. We have been given the paper and the ink, but it is our responsibility, our opportunity, to write a story everyday. Each day I visit As Simple As That I am given the chance to read someone elses story, and to be inspired to write my own. It is in reading Hannah's words that I am reminded that real people can be writers.... I am reminded that next time maybe I should answer my students a little differently when they ask, "Ms.Brunault are you writing a book?"

Yes. I am writing a book. Everyday is a new chapter. Every word I write is a lesson learned. I have a good teacher.

A New Englander in the Midwest

Growing up and throughout college, I had friends who were 100% of a particular ethnicity, or had their ethnic background neatly divided into two categories. People who spoke Spanish at home, visited relatives in Portugal, took pride in Notre Dame football because they too were "fighting Irish," enjoyed pierogi at Polish picnics, or ate a traditional fish dinner on Christmas Eve. This neat background, and grounding in a particular heritage were not true for myself however. My best attempt at an accurate count, shows at least 6-7 cultural backgrounds in my blood, though I suspect the number may be higher. I am not 100% anything. My parents are not 100% anything. Neither are my grandparents. At times I considered this the best of both worlds. I could join the DAR if I really felt the desire, can eat Linzer tarts at holidays, oplatek on Christmas Eve. I can enjoy Yorkshire Pudding, or homemade pitscelles, or lasagna. (Yes, I know - all memories seem related to food.) At other times I was jealous, felt that I was missing out on some mystical family bond which develops over shared culture and ethnic foods. It seems silly in some ways, to think that a close-knit and loving family could be enhanced over something so trivial. I know what I am. What we are. I am French like my name. Italian like my love for pasta. I am Polish, English, and German. I am things I don't even know about. I am American. I am a New Englander. A New Englander in the Midwest. I knew that our country was different. That throughout this great nation there was variety. From Redwood forests to the New York Island. From the mountains, to the prairies, to the oceans white with foam. For the past few months, these differences have smacked me straight in the face on a daily basis. I cannot even perform a simple activity such as pumping gas, without being reminded - "Lauren you are in South Dakota." Pulling off Hwy. 16 or a similar road outside of town into a gas station, means feeling the crunch beneath your tires as asphalt becomes gravel. There is no requirement to pay before you pump, and in fact, many gas stations do not have a pre-pay option. My initial avoidance of pumping gas on the bitter cold -10 days was somewhat alleviated when I remembered that outside Massachusetts gas clips are allowed, and I could wait in the comfort of my car while filling up. I am not in Italy or Africa or Mexico, and yet simple everyday tasks, also remind me that I am no longer in Massachusetts, no longer in New England. They remind me that even when I can not connect to any particular ethnicity, I am a New Englander. The title of this blog was started as a bit of a joke. Rapid City is not even on the prairies (it's part of the Black Hills, and the largest mountain between the Rockies and the Alps is visible from town.) The culture of the area however is far more different than I expected. Shockingly different. Soccer is not a sponsored interscholastic sport. Football is intense. High school games can lead to the type of heckling I'd previously seen amongst Sox-Yankees fans. The western, prairie lifestyle I'd imagined from Laura Ingalls Wilder books still exists. I have students who live "in town," during the week to attend school, and go home on the weekends. School districts have separate categories for "rural schools," many of which service K-8 with only one teacher. In Massachusetts there is no such thing as living "out of town," we consider Palmer and it's population of 12,000+ to be a "small town," and deem anyplace more than 45 minutes from the nearest mall "rural." Moving here has made me realize, that being a New Englander really can be an identity. I am a Sox loving, Yankees hating, Dunks drinking, Friendly's eating New Englander. I love seafood. I don't consider the Atlantic too cold or too rocky. I know the difference between whole belly clams and strips, between New England Chowder and Rhode Island. I love summer days at the beach and the smell of fall air. I like visiting small cities, college towns, and used bookstores. I ski on hills. I love local, homemade, hard-serve ice cream. I can navigate highway traffic and left hand exits just as well as rural roads and snowstorms.

I am a New Englander. A New Englander in the Midwest.

Finding God in Nothing:

“find God in all things.”

While I find all of the charisms both interesting and beautiful, and the general theology of the Jesuits to be sound, it is this principle of “find God in all things” that I am most attracted to. This principle could easily serve as a five word summary of my own understanding of God and faith. I see God in my family and in my friends. I see God in smiling faces. In crying eyes. I see God in children, and hear him in laughter. I see God at the top of the chairlift at Butternut, or at the end of the jetty at Dune’s Beach. I see God in my students and in my roommates. I see God in strangers.

I can – at least most of the time – see God in all things. There is one place however, where I have trouble seeing God. I am able to see God in something, but I can’t seem to find God in the nothing. Most often I see God in people or in nature, but finding God in the spaces between is my challenge. I can hear Him in the birds chirping, or the children laughing, even the people fighting. I have trouble however, hearing him in the silence. I can see Him in the shiny new snow, or the bright fall leaves, or the faces of my students as they return to their pews after communion. I have trouble however, seeing Him in the stillness, in the emptiness.

My goal now? My goal as we enter a new month, a new season of Lent, a new semester? My goal is to see God in both the something and the nothing, to hear Him in both the noise and the silence. To find Him both somewhere and nowhere.

Prayers Please....

Today we found out that one of the Magis applicants for next year's cohort was killed in the earthquake in Haiti while volunteering at an orphanage. Also, one of my students is beginning chemo this week. While I am keeping their intentions anonymous here on the WWW, I ask you to please keep these young people and their families in your hearts and prayers this week. "To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing." - Martin Luther King Jr.

Refreshment....

Friday was a long day. Half a day at school. 7 hours in the car. 400 miles of driving. And then, finally, the ground grew flatter, the sky grew wider, and we were in Nebraska. Cozad, NE. Camp Comeca. Magis Retreat. Long, exhausting, and ultimately refreshing. As Katie's car crunched across the gravel parking lot, and the lodge came into view, memories of summer retreat came flooding into my mind. My shoes filled with mud and melted snow crossing the lawn, and I remembered a warm summer game of capture the flag.

Entering retreat my emotions were mixed, I was enthused to see people I hadn't seen in months, and to catch up with my C8 comrades after months apart. I was also frustrated, knowing I wasn't at the place, with my teaching or with myself, that I had hoped to be at this point in the year. I was ready to be refreshed, and I found myself gaining more refreshment than I knew I needed. The retreat was an opportunity to just be. To catch up with friends. To be in community. To be in solidarity with other first year teachers. To laugh. To cry. To smile. To reflect. To realize it's okay not to love teaching every single day. To talk. To share. To recieve help. To offer help. To realize that even if three is a small number, my community is larger than just Magis Rapid. This was a weekend to realize, that all of Magis is my community, and that in order to survive I need all of them. My goal is not to survive. My goal is to thrive. To feel alive.

Refreshing. Rejuvenating. And then, at the end of the day, after hours in and out of consciousness along I-80, I came to reality. The Sandhills of Nebraska, weren't the sand dunes they vaguely resembled. Turning on to 90-West, it didn't suddenly become the Pike. Exit 8 was still a 24 hour drive in the other direction. The sky grew darker, Hills gave way to Plains, the names on the signs grew familiar again - Wall, New Underwood, Ellsworth. And there in the distance, were the lights. "We can see it now, we're almost there." "Distances can be deceiving out here," my roommate reminded me. But it didn't matter. The distance in time didn't matter anymore. In my mind, I had looked at those lights, and thought, "there they are, that's our city." In that moment, I realized maybe the lady at Bradley wasn't so far off, when she handed me my baggage claim sticker and said "Have a safe flight home." Rapid will never be my hometown, but, at least for the moment, it's my home.

Around the World in 50 Foods...

A few years ago I decided I wanted to start putting some new foods into my diet, spice things up a bit. No, I didn't want to try mashed turnip or squash for the 50th time (still not a fan of either, though I did discover a liking for summer squash). I was able to find some new foods pretty easily. They weren't necessarily radical foods, just ones I'd never gotten around to trying, or had bad past experiences with. I discovered that I liked chickpeas, hummus, black olives, black beans, guacumole and feta cheese. I tried vegetarianiasm for a grand total of about one month, but along the way discovered eggplant parm and veggie burgers! I came up with some wierdly delicious combinations such as stir fried pineapple and soy sauce, and I tried and disliked things such as sushi, tofu, and salmon. After a while things hit a standstill. Not because I didn't want to try new foods, but because I was running out of foods to try! The Charlie's snack bar only had so many options! Then came a move far away from my "homeland," and all things familiar, cuisine included. This new area has allowed me to try "Regional cuisine," such as fried catfish, okra, buffalo,and pheasant. In recent months I have found myself sampling baba ghanouj, fried pickles, shawarma, tofu that actually tasted good, and many other things. What has been the result? An overwhelming desire to try more new foods! This is where you, my readers and fellow bloggers can help. My goal for 2010 is to try (or re-try) at least two new foods each month. First up - spaghetti squash! What else do you think should make it to my table?

pioneering the frontier of humanity

8 months of blogging, and only 10 posts to my name. yet i still wonder if this blog is interesting, or if people bother to read it? my purpose in writing was simply to keep in touch with my east coast friends as i began my midwest life. but am i following the cardinal rule of writing? am i "knowing my audience?" what is it an audience wants? more importantly, i must ask, what does this audience want? there are many places this blog could go... reflections of a first year teacher, humorous stories from high school halls, tales of the hearty prairie which exist for my east coast friends only in the words of laura ingalls wilder? it is from wilder that this blog gets its name. as a child i loved her books. devoured them along with any other historical fiction tale i could get my hands on. i see now what attracted me to her. it was more than simply laura's pension for writing the historical novels which interested me, it was her pioneering spirit which drew me in. it is this same pioneering spirit which brought me here. i am a new type of pioneer now, but i am hardly alone. our world is one which encourages thought. in place of rote memorization we encourage critical thinking. as modern pioneers, we do not seek to tame the land on a new frontier. our frontier is humanity. as a pioneer in 21st century south dakota, i do not wish to harvest the prairie grasses, or tame the wild buffalo. my frontier is humanity. my goal is solidarity. It is the sweet, simple things of life which are the real ones after all. - Laura Ingalls Wilder