I’ve been busy since getting the news that my contract would not be renewed next year.

Obviously the left photo is before, even though I had long since retired wearing my hair down in favor of my classic, time-for-a-haircut, Det. Odafin Tutuola braid. I decided to chop my hair off, and it is shorter than it’s been in almost 20 years.

Last year after Hannah was born I went to a local salon for a basic haircut to get me through new motherhood. I didn’t even take a single picture of it, because I’m not sure it ever had a chance to breathe before going up into an endless stream of ponytails. So my last real cut with real photos was two years ago (yes, I am still sadly on a one-haircut-per-year rotation…childhood anxieties die hard!). And I thought this was pretty short and bold for me:

But I don’t know…there was something about the experience of being non-tenured and losing my job, combined with the continuing angst of finishing out the school year knowing I won’t be back, that was weirdly liberating. I worked hard and loved my job, loved the students, had great ideas and plans for the future of my library. I’m a damn good librarian, and I was happy building my community there. And in the end that didn’t matter so much.

And I had this epiphany that I’ve always felt like a bit of a square peg at work. In most jobs I’ve had, really. Like I was holding back pieces of myself to try and fit the persona of the place. I was quieter than I am in “real life”, I held back the things I really wanted to share or say or do. I was always bursting at the edges to get free from that (because man, is that stifling). I always wore bright clothes and said nerdy things and advertised my geeky tendencies. But it was…edited. Which everyone does at work, right? Especially (let’s be honest here) women.

The first teacher I met at my current school walked into the library over the summer while I was getting acclimated and playing the score from The Phantom Menace at full volume. You know, the music from the duel between Darth Maul, Obi-Wan, and Qui-Gon? It took him a minute, but he placed it. And was impressed. But you know I was only playing that music at full volume pretending to be a library Jedi because I thought no one would come in and see me. Why did I care? Because I was at work, and I’m a grownup. That’s why.

I sort of drew these connections between that feeling of “fitting in” as a grownup and my hair. My hair is so very curly. So very much a piece of my heritage and ethnicity and personality and entire identity. If I had a dime for everyone who has asked me if I’ve ever considered changing it in some way, I’d be set for life. After years of that you internalize the message there, that your hair needs to be changed. So when I left college behind, and the days of being known around the art building for the hair (and, yes, a Green Hornet lunch box that I carried with me everywhere), I sort of felt like I needed to tame that side of myself. Like my hair in its wild state could not be part of my adulthood.

It happened gradually, as I took on jobs with more responsibility and went to graduate school. More ponytails and braids. The haircuts got more expensive, but the requirement that “I need to be able to pull it back” stayed. And somehow felt more urgent. I became terrified by the idea of not being able to pull my hair back. After a childhood spent fighting and destroying it, and my college years spent embracing it, somewhere in my mid-20s it became something I tolerated publicly but adored in secret. Something I allowed to show through a little, but not all the way…that wouldn’t be fitting of a grownup with a real job. Except maybe on the weekends.

So when I was told in mid-March that my contract would not be renewed next year, despite all my observations and performance reviews and supervisors that told me I was really good at my job, I kind of called bullshit on the whole situation. The holding back to seem like a professional and an adult. The not being my entire, complete self, even down to the way I wear the hair that grows out of my head as nature intended it. And I think I just decided to use my remaining time at this job as a kind of experiment. What would it be like if I was just me? If I couldn’t even pull my hair back? Would the sky fall?

Turns out, no. (And the hair really works with the new glasses..in the end I went with pairs #2 and #5). The teachers seem to think the haircut has made me sassier (in truth, I was holding back the sassy…at least until I got tenure). I got some uncomfortable looks from administrators, who didn’t know what to make of the sudden and sharp change (childishly satisfying). And I felt lighter and more comfortable in my skin at work than I had since getting the news about my contract…and maybe even since long before that.

Maybe sometimes you just have to chop something down and start again.

This has been a helluva month. I posted about the awesomeness surrounding Hannah’s first birthday, but then I basically needed a break. I found out a couple days before her birthday that my district isn’t renewing my contract next year. I’m up for tenure at the end of the year, and…that’s the end of that. They don’t have to give a reason, but they did, and it was frankly more insulting than if they just hadn’t told me why. So that was a blow to the juggling act that has been returning to work after having this glorious little lady, and it all happened very fast, and I still had to try and pull off her birthday party despite being terribly distracted and frustrated. Then I spent the week between Hannah’s birthday and spring break trying to finish Battle of the Books with my 4th graders and deal with my job posting going out and telling folks I will not be back.

I was exhausted.

Then last Friday night, fresh off the Battle of the Books final assembly at school, I packed up the baby and drove to Boston to meet Adam. He was already there for PAX East, and I rolled into town at 2am. From there we had a much-needed, much-deserved, very wonderful road trip week around New England. We lost MLK Day and Presidents Day at work because of Hurricane Sandy, so this was the first break since Christmas. And I know I was burned out and in desperate need of it.

We got home around midnight last night, so we have the weekend to hang out before going back to work and this very bizarre new reality. And then when June comes, it’s time to figure out what’s next.

But in the meantime, I’ll be posting LOTS of great trip photos.

I’ve always liked Ben Affleck, but I really liked the speech he gave for Argo’s Best Picture win at the Oscars on Sunday. And yes, I know this is tilted. But it’s the best version of the entire speech that I could find.

I get everything about this. Doing things for your kids because they are the mirror that you see yourself in. And why showing them your best self is such a big deal. I even get his awkward statement about marriage being work. It is work, the best kind of work, even when it feels effortless and amazing. You work to show up and be present and support each other every single day. I get that you won’t both be happy in your careers at the same time every day, or even every year, but you always celebrate the other’s highs and pull them through the lows.

I get it, and I really love his story.

My first New Year’s Resolution this year was to get organized. I needed to try and find some routine, some system, that would help me juggle the everyday tasks that take up so much of my time in my working life and home life. I feel like I’m horribly inefficient when it comes to the day-to-day stuff, devoting far too little or too much time to them and throwing the rest of my life out of balance a little as a result. I’m also a terrible delegator and kind of a control freak; I can never point Adam at the tasks that would be the most helpful, and some of my systems are so obtuse that it’s impossible for him to figure them out. I’m getting better about that, though. I’m learning to care less about how things are done and just be excited that someone else is doing them.

But, everyone has chores. And let’s face it, when you get home 3 or sometimes 4 hours before your significant other you’re just going to have more of the chores to do. And there are certain tasks I dislike but do a better job of (like ironing and sorting mail, I hate dealing with the mail), so I let them snowball until they become so giant they cannot be avoided for one more minute. And then I dedicate hours or even days to getting them back on track, which puts me behind with everything else I need to do that week, and it just keeps repeating the cycle.  Once I’ve gotten to the bottom of The Dreaded Task, I cannot bear to look at it again for a while. Which, of course, leads to another marathon session of Dealing With It.

So anyway, I started looking around on Pinterest in January for ideas and strategies to help get me focused and juggle the small stuff so I could free up time to focus on the things I actually get excited about: more playtime with the baby, my hobbies, fun work projects. I stumbled across this whole subculture of (largely) Christian, homeschooling, stay-at-homes who run their households with military precision. A system for everything, a clean and tidy home, and an arsenal of creative activities with their kids. I even found a Salon article about this after I started my research. It’s a thing. Now, I happen to be the exact opposite of a Christian, homeschooling, stay-at-home mom, so obviously not everything was going to work for me. But I just needed some direction, and that’s how I found Clean Mama.

I can’t say I’ve become a regular reader; the level of devotion to cleaning and organizing is more than I can handle every day. But, her post “How To Make a Homekeeping Binder” spoke to the list lover in me. She has some great printables and kits on Etsy to use, and I did buy a couple for organizing holidays and my blog. For the rest, I took some inspiration and created my own templates personalized to suit my family’s needs. There is nothing more motivating and focusing for me than being able to cross an item off a list, so she kind of had me at “hello.” I also made one for work and another one for my blogging and crafty life, but the latter hasn’t had much action yet. One thing at a time. It’s been a full month of using this new system, and while I’m still getting used to the routine and still have setbacks and things I avoid, I have to say it’s making the day-to-day of life much more manageable.

I made a monthly calendar of To Dos for my home and work binders, just like in Clean Mama’s binder. But I didn’t use her template because a lot of it was irrelevant to me. I designed a similar looking calendar with my own household needs.

For each day of the week I’ve designated One Main Task in red. The blue tasks repeat more frequently, some every day or every other day. This helps me just have a set schedule for doing laundry, sorting the mail, and etc. I’ve also noted the once-a-month visit from our cleaning service and the prep day for that.

My work binder has the exact same principal, but a little more detailed. Big weekly tasks are in orange, everyday tasks in dark blue. But for work I’ve added light blue tasks that include meetings, self-imposed deadlines for things like changing bulletin boards and submitting orders. All of this is to try and give me a routine for running the library so I can easily keep up with the daily management of it all in addition to my class load. This work calendar has been kind of a lifesaver. I also included sections for work projects and a running list of book requests so I can easily log books I need to order.

For my home system, I didn’t want to assign days to complete certain monthly tasks, so I also made this checklist. Most of these repeat every other month or so, but this is to try and help me stay on top of the less frequent chores that I can forget about indefinitely. I still haven’t cleaned the oven, though. I’m still growing into this.

This is where I got extra nerdy. I made customized shopping lists for regular groceries and for Costco. The latter is so Adam and I can stop looking at each other on weekends and asking, “Do we need anything from Costco?” The former is just to have a list of things we actually buy. I’ve been using these great shopping list pads for years, but they’re missing some of the everyday things we buy and are full of stuff we never use. So I thought customized would be better. I even made customized menu pages so I can keep it all in one place.

So far I like this system, and I am using it. And it’s nice to be able to point Adam to a list of things to be done that day so he can help. I am not yet at the magical point where I’ve gotten time back for the rest of my life, but it’s been a tiring winter. I wasn’t expecting to achieve this goal in a month, but I am moving along with it.

Hannah and I braved the cold and went into Manhattan for the day today. I kind of hemmed and hawed about it this morning because a) Hannah woke up at 1am in hysterical tears, no idea why and b) I had planned on meeting up with Kathy but didn’t have her Christmas and birthday presents ready yet. Somehow these things, combined with the cold, just felt too insurmountable. But, I dragged myself out of bed at 8:30 this morning and got us out of the house.

I’m so glad we went! I had such a wonderful day with Baby Girl!

We were going to the February meeting of the NYCMMQG, and even though we were half an hour late I had a great time. I’m always so shy at these guild meetings, and I don’t know. Everyone is so friendly and welcoming, but I just feel tongue-tied and self conscious. Maybe it’s because I look at work like this

and this

and I just feel a little awestruck by the skills and creativity. Let’s not forget our president, Victoria Findlay Wolfe of Bumble Beans Quilts, who was invited to create this pair of shoes for an upcoming auction:

Insanely cool. And then there’s our guest speaker Linda Lum DeBono, who brought projects from her book Sew Merry and Bright (which I ordered on my phone from the meeting).

Obviously I love this Advent calendar:

And this little Russian dolls ornament is so clever, I love it!

So yes, I feel like I have a long way to go with my craftiness to catch up to these folks. But I always get so much inspiration from them, and I love going when I can. I’m also the Charity Chair for the guild, and I have done absolutely zero in that role…this also makes me feel awkward when I go. But Victoria runs her own very successful charity organization, Bumble Beans Basics, and so the charity work seems to run itself through her.

After talking to a couple of other ladies there who’ve had babies recently, Hannah and I headed from Midtown to Chelsea, where we spent a couple of hours walking all over having a great time. We went to City Quilter and then walked passed a Marimekko store I didn’t even know was over there (I’ve only been to the tiny Uptown store). It was amazing.

Gorgeous fabric everywhere I looked, but so pricey; it was $53/yd. I came very close to buying some but decided until I have something specific in mind to use it for it would just sit in my stash being way too precious to cut. Sometimes that depresses me a little, so I’ve put it in the back of my mind for when the perfect project comes up.

And then there was this raincoat in Hannah’s size. The absolute quintessential print in a baby raincoat, I was so tempted. But again, it was pricey ($68). I may still go back for this, though. I really loved it. I tried to make a smooth getaway from the store after drooling over stuff for half an hour, but Hannah and I got stuck in the glass doors on our way out and had to be rescued. I move like a gazelle, I’m telling you.

We walked the Union Square Market.

We bought baked goods for Adam.

We bought baked goods for me at Baked by Melissa. Our last stop was Books of Wonder, where I read some of this year’s Caldecott books to Hannah. I have one left to track down, and then I can post about them all. She was particularly excited about Creepy Carrots; Peter Brown’s illustrations made her giggle and smile.

We headed home from there sufficiently pooped and exhilarated. I needed a day like this to recharge, I’ve been sleep deprived and a little stressed out since…well, since I went back to work, really. I realized today that we’ve just passed the halfway point of the school year, so from here to summer it’s a downhill slope! I can’t wait to hang out with Hannah every day and have more adventures, but today was wonderful for reminding me how many adventures we can have even when I’m working. She’s such a great little lady, so sweet and happy to go with the flow.