Tucker and Jamie Maxfield & Fam: My Other World

I often think about writing down my thoughts on my schooling because I know someday I’ll forget. But then it sounds so jumbled when I try to make sense of all of it. The experiences and joys and difficulties of it are so vast that it’s hard to be concise about it!

There are so many things I love about it. I think that is WHY I’m staying sane through it (or mostly sane). Though it’s very difficult, there are so many sweet experiences that have been a result of this choice to get my Master’s…IN San Francisco to boot.

1. I love being exposed to such a different world than my own. To learn just a portion of what challenges come with being blind gives me even more compassion, and passion to be an advocate for those whom I will help in the future. I love seeing how passionate all my professors are and how much they live & breathe O&M.

2. I love the group I’m going through the program with. There are only 9 of us, so we have a chance to get to know each other well…and we are all so drastically different. Different ages, stages and walks of life, coming together with one common goal. It’s eye opening and invigorating.

3. I love that I get to step outside my world each week, because it gives me a chance to miss my home and children…which is a good thing. Driving alone, time to think, time to experience a city SO different than where I live.

4. I love that I get to see Shana and her family every weekend. Often it’s very brief…enough to have breakfast with them and then run out the door! But I feel like a member of their family and not only am I thankful for the room & board & breakfast…but I love seeing and chatting with Shana so often. Friends for almost 25 years is much more like family. I even get to bond with their dog, Griffin…since he likes to sleep with me on the couch each Friday, ha ha!

5. I love that my girls get picked up from school by Grandma and Grandpa every Friday when I’m gone…and they get to have the type of love and nurturing that only Grandparents can offer. They are safe, loved and making special memories. Which is wonderful for them AND wonderful for me because I feel less guilty about leaving each weekend.

But then it’s also really hard. For a year and a half, I’ve driven to SF once a week. That’s amazing! But this semester feels much more intense. I have an online class from 4-7 every Monday night. Then I leave Friday morning for SF, have Friday night class for 3.5 hours. Get to Shana’s by 9:00 ish, sleep and then leave by 8:00 ish the next morning to head over the Bay Bridge again to get to class from 9-5. Then drive home and get back late Sat. night. The other days of the week I have to somehow fit in my research papers, assessment reports, lesson plans, observations, etc. Plus the normal duties of a mother like make sure my kids eat three meals a day, school activities, dance (all), softball (Jo and Pey), piano (Jo), glee (Lex), subbing, running Watch Me Draw classes, Trinkets/Signs, cleaning? shopping? laundry? HELLLLP! It’s really too much. I’ve been trying to find a balance and not feeling successful. I know I need to cut myself some slack and know that after May, I will not be spending two days a week in San Fran, which will give me back 48 hours of my life each week!

I’ve pulled back on my signs, I’ve tried to cut back on my subbing and only sub for Mrs. Stone, my house is never really clean and laundry is rarely caught up. I think Trinkets is the next thing to go, but it is much harder to eliminate GOOD things from your life…even when you know it’s time!

I truly don’t feel like my kids are suffering from this and someday we’ll all look back and it all seem like just a moment in time. I think my struggle lies more internally. I really like to be mentally present when I’m doing anything or with anyone. I don’t like to be distracted and flippantly doing things. I like to be intentional and focused. When I’m at school, even when I’m exhausted, I try to stay so focused on that as if it is the only thing in my life. When I’m at home, I try to balance when I do homework, and attempt to stay focused on the kids. I just feel like I’ve lost touch with close friends and family because I have less time to spare, which is opposite of my personality. I hope I can feel more balanced when I graduate. I don’t mind being busy…in fact I like it…but I think you can be busy and organized versus busy and chaotic (even if it is just in my head).

I’ll be done with my coursework in May and then I will have a 440 hour internship to do. But that will be local and I can do it part time. It will probably take me 6 months to complete, but that’s okay.

I’ve been trying to take more pictures during class. It’s hard because our main teacher, Wendy Scheffers, has every single SECOND filled up and accounted for. So I pop my cell phone out here and there to get some action shots of us. We are now full-on traveling around the streets of San Fran with our partners taking turns being blindfolded and using our cane. In fact, this weekend we have to let our “student” make a purchase in a store without us helping, we have to just quietly watch and shadow (or “lurk”) and watch then use customer assistance to buy a small item. I’m nervous about BEING the student and doing this! I also can’t believe we are crossing busier streets now. We are learning “near parallel timing”, instead of using the “all clear” timing. Which means we cross the street WITH the parallel traffic. But the details that go into that would be like a mini-novel to write down.

We do get a kick out of ourselves though. Here is Joe posing so cool with his medium opacity simulators. And Wendy, our teacher, pretending to be a overhanging hazard. She’s been an O&M instructor since 1977 when she graduated from SFSU!