Thankful

After my fourth year of teaching I had the chance to move on to a new building as a teacher leader. Instantly I was able to shed my image as "a kid" (which I really was in my first building . . . most of my colleagues were the same age as my parents) and become a "gray hair." It was a fluke. Usually 26-year-olds don't get such positions. But someone had confidence in me, and I had the courage to jump.

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I'm thankful that my year of teaching is over in two weeks. This has been a challenging year for finding balance between work and home. I look forward to better handling that next year. I think I'll look back at 2012-13 as a year of growing up: for my wife and I professionally and for my son first-graderly. My daughter had the easiest year, and I'm thankful for her disposition as the rest of the family underwent growing pains.

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I'm thankful for my cat. I don't quite know why he is so insistent that I sit in the position that I sit, but it seems to make me happy.