Laurie Johns Weblog

Caleb

Hey, that’s my kitchen and my son and they’re  looking pretty good to me right now! I found this image on Cynthia’s facebook page. I haven’t cooked yet in my San Anselmo kitchen, er, unless you count tea.

Week one of Montessori “teaching” was, well, let’s just say I’m deferring judgement and it got better today. I’ll be in San Francisco all weekend for Montessori training.

Images of new place coming soon, sorry, it really has not been an easy transition back to work.

Rick, Caleb and Ailee

Rick’s parents just marked 50 years together and everybody celebrated in southern Iowa. Despite the fact that we’ve been divorced for over 10 years now, I continue to think of Rick and his parents and siblings, as family.

Everyone looks better as time goes by. I had so much fun watching Meryl Streep in Mama Mia–she was having a ball. I recall her once listing among her regrets a general fixation on weight in her youth. Growing older gives us perspective.

So, I’m about to begin a new phase in my life–teaching organic gardening and movement (including yoga) to pre-schoolers at Montessori school. Fortuitously, my new house mates are: a gardening teacher (Ellen), a dance teacher (Lily), and a masseuse (Samantha)! Montessori training begins next weekend in San Fransisco, my bed will be delivered on Saturday, and my job starts as soon as my fingerprinting results come back from the Marin County Sheriff’s Office.

One of the keys to good wine is ensuring the grape vines ‘struggle’. The more a vine struggles or feels threatened, the more effort it will put into reproducing – meaning more and better grapes. This is why most good wine is produced in climates that are hot and dry during the day, and cool at night.

The climate of northern California is in my Italian bones. I never expected to love it here so much, but alas, it feels like home. I like the “micro” ness of it. The microclimates, the microtowns, the little windy roads, the countryside, the dryness, the vineyards, the ranches, the mountains, the sea. I like the smells: redwoods, eucalyptus, the kelp on seashore, the flowers, the grapes and how these smells change as the day goes on.

Since I was feeling nostalgic about the beginning of school, I applied for a job teaching movement and gardening at a Montessori school in San Rafael. I will know in a few days whether the job is mine. In the meantime, I’ve read 2 books on Montessori philosophy and recounted the year that Caleb attended Montessori in Madison Wisconsin. I am ready to expand my research to early childhood movement. It feels like I have quite a bit to do, but like the grape, I get sweeter in my struggle. Salute!