Retirement

No, we're not talking 401Ks or Roth IRAs, but rather my official retirement from teaching.  I know, I realize I may be disappointing a few of you, namely the teachers/pastors/educators among my friends and family, but I gave it some serious thought and I simply cannot continue.  It's not really a matter of being capable of teaching or having fun with a language class -- THAT I can do.  And I believe I did it rather well, actually.  It's quite simply the fact that I spent sooo much time creating the lessons.  I made these spiffy powerpoints with pictures and fancy slide transitions, I even had fun activities for them, all of this only to realize I was neglecting my school projects in order to impress my middle-aged students.  Priorities, siiiigh.

some serious reflections happening here

I feel a bit like a quitter not continuing with the job, I know my students enjoyed me and appreciated my humor, but I had to admit I didn't have adequate time to dedicate to the job.  I really wish I could be as involved in things here as I was in Austin -- I had time for everything!  Kickball, Book Club, endless outings with friends, heck I even had time to keep up with my favorite shows and maintain constantly manicured nails.  Then if you tack on my interest in discovering European cities while being here, that just doesn't leave time for a weekly English lesson.

classic brooding gaze across the sea photo

To confuse matters a bit, a few days after I quit the teaching job the Student Services Coordinator, Gian Lorenzo, told me about a 1.5 month-long internship at the Museo di Antropologia e Etnografia at the University of Turin.  Apparently the director was looking for 2 students to help out a few hours a week in cataloguing artifacts for an upcoming exhibition.  Gian Lorenzo informed her he knew of an American (me) and an Italian student who would be perfect for the job and next thing I know I'm cramming into his FIAT with an Italian art history student to go meet the director of the Anthropology Museum of Turin.  She immediately adored me and delighted in the thought that an American (how exotic!) would be able to provide some cultural insights into their American collections.  She doesn't speak English and our encounter was entirely in Italian, which was a welcome challenge since I speak English 85% of the time here.  In the end, what I thought was going to be an informative meeting actually turned out to be my first day on the job.  Not really sure how that happened, but I'm looking forward to seeing if this can actually work for me.

bridge over troubled waters

I figure a job at a museum will be more beneficial to me while I'm here, and heck I didn't even have to find it myself.  Plus, working in an environment where only Italian is spoken should be good practice.  She also told us we'd have the opportunity to not only catalog the artifacts but also help in the exhibition process - exciting!  On Friday I'm going to get a tour of the museum and I'll get more details about the internship.  I will be up front with her about my availability and amount of time I can afford to commit to the project.  Who knows if this will work out, but I can't imagine it could be more demanding than lesson plans (how do teachers do that every day?!), otherwise you'll be hearing from me in a matter of weeks about my latest retirement plan.  Ha!