the niche finagle

31Aug11

Now that I’m more or less recovered from the huge wave that MASCOT is, and the partial shock that I’ll be back in America by the time MASCOT 2012 happens, I can now sufficiently work towards the now reality:

• Teaching. This is huge and awesome. The teachers I’m working with are amazing and wondering. PLUS! For the first time in two years, I’m going to have a teaching schedule! Can you see the amazing possibilities!? Consistency! Collaboration! The ability to have a flow of curriculum/ideas/discussion! I’m so stoked about this!
• The topics: critical and creative writing!
• Projects: There’s a few things going in every direction
• Writing Beyond Reality Seminar Series(actually this is just what we’re calling it currently): The idea is to take participants from the entire process of brainstorming to producing their writing in some form. Basically, we want participants to have the skills, support and empowerment to act on their ideas, so that at no moment are they hindered in the creative process.
• Developing an online resource library/equipping students with media skills: As you can probably tell by this description, this project is in the very vague form, and is actually what I should be working on instead of writing this blog.
• Wrapping up the four open grant projects (2 ‘MASCOT’ grants, 2 at my previous site, which is a great excuse to go there and see everyone, seal the mosaic, purchase the last materials for the dormitory wheelchair remodel, and go swimming at my favorite place).
• Developing an online IST for how to work with people with special needs: We’ve been working in spurts towards this goal, but from where things are, the pilot IST should be up by November.
• Considering ideas and possibilities for moving back to the states:
• Job (trying to figure out how to continue to work with youth in an interesting and investing way that builds on what I’ve been doing here in Ukraine)***
• Grad Schools (am thinking the Northeast, and planning not to start grad school until at least a year after I return – since it’s more than likely that 3 years in Ukraine equals an intense adjustment period to all that is strange about the US culture)
• Place of Living (the two above nodes and many other factors will impact this)

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***While walking around Kharkov basically the entire weekend, I fell overly in love with the Opera House – mostly because it’s this huge geographic, multi-leveled concrete building, and everywhere you look, there’s youth doing something (hanging out/hip-hop dancing on the second floor/sitting in the amphitheater waiting for an art film to start/etc). Then, in the parks, there were all these adorable toddlers chasing birds, racing friends, studying the world around them. And it hit me.

When I started thinking in high school about what I wanted to do, I came up with the idea about providing a space for transformation, because of the adults who provided that for me – whether it was a shoulder to cry on, someone who gave me a book to read about multiculturism, picking me up from school after an AP test to have cake and plan a retreat, or someone just listening, and joking about the inane. I wanted to do that for others, because it saved me, shaped me, and challenged me to do the work to understand who I am and what is possible in the world. I understood that if they hadn’t provided that space, then I wouldn’t have become real.

What hit me in Kharkov is that in some ways, nothing changes, but everything shifts.

I still want my life to be about living to provide the space for transformation, but I no longer want that because I think it’s important. I want it because it’s me – it’s what I’m incredibly passionate about – what holds meaning and a challenge to life. And for me, working with youth, getting to bear presence to  the messy stages of growing up and learning from that, is beyond cool.

For now, I think the answer to how is in exploring/implementing how to cultivate critical and creative thinking skills into society; therefore, in the 3 focii, this is the under-over-current. So here’s to challenging, shifting, changing, and exploring the niche.

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