Indulge me for a minute while I blather.
Things I want:
long hair
this ring
a home library
to be friends with John and Hank Green
a publishing contract
to meet the man of my dreams in a library or bookstore
to touch lives
… is that too much to ask?
How about you? What do you want? Be as wild or silly as you want.
I have been a college admission counselor for about 9 1/2 years now, recruiting for Northwestern College (undergoing a name-change Summer 2013!), the most wonderful Christian college and my alma mater. Recruitment at a small Christian college is definitely different than recruiting for a large state school. These are the pros and cons.
The Bad/Ugly:
* I like being a selective school, but it does make college fairs difficult. We are not the best school for a lot of students I meet, and it’s an interesting balance to remain enthusiastic and love each student I meet, all while trying to point them in the right direction.
* LifeLight 2006, trying to recruit at a music festival in the middle of a South Dakota field when it has rained all weekend and the mud is higher than your ankles and threatens to suck your shoes off as you take three times as long just to move 100 feet away.
* Rude parents. You would not believe how awful parents can be to college recruiters.
* When a student LOVES your school but the financial aid just doesn’t come through. It about breaks your heart.
* Loving the students you work with and then having them choose another school in the end.
The Good:
* When those students you love go to another school but still keep in touch (and even visit you when you are recruiting in their college’s town!). Caitlin, you made my visits to South Dakota so sweet, and I cherish your friendship.
* Meeting kiddos when they are in high school and then watching them come to your school, get involved, make great friends, and succeed academically. I met Brieanne when she was in 9th or 10th grade … and now she is in her first year of grad school and living in the building next to mine. I can’t tell you how proud I am of her now– and how many times she has made me proud over the years!
* That moment when your relationship with a student switches over from recruiter/recruit to just plain and simple friendship.
* When those kids you recruit become some of your very best friends. When I was 21, I didn’t know that the high school senior named Desiree I was recruiting from South Dakota would eventually be my roommate and dear friend. Likewise, even though Elyse and I emailed almost every day of her senior year, I still had no idea how close we would become over the years– now she is in graduate school and one of my favorite people on earth!
* When you just click with certain kids. I was friends with Jamie since he was a high schooler and also through his first year or so of college. He would always talk to me online and say, “Sorry for interrupting your work, but I have a question,” and I would say, “Jamie, you are my work.” When he finally started at Northwestern, he came to my office and said, “Sorry to interrupt,” and I went to say my usual phrase, and he and I both stopped and stared in amazement at each other. “I’m not your work anymore!” he said, wide-eyed, and we both laughed. After that I jokingly nicknamed him “Dr. Interruption.” Jamie would “smuggle” me Harry Potter books in those years when Christians were still so anti-Hogwarts. 🙂
* Enjoying certain towns because of the people you’ll see there, regardless of whether they are interested in your school or not. McGregor girls, I’m talking about you.
* All the public speaking opportunities (Note: this could also be filed under the Bad/Ugly column!)
To all the wonderful students and families I have met with and bonded with over the years, thank you. Students are often surprised when I can tell them my memories of first meeting them, even when it’s 6-10 years later, but the point is that you guys matter to me. My life is built up of words and people and my God (who is both the Word and a Person), and you have made it special. Thank you so much. I love you.
I didn’t even mention one of the best parts of recruiting: I have THE BEST CO-WORKERS EVER.
I had the privilege of visiting with Faith over lunch last week. Faith is a nine-year-old third-grader, and she is the cutest nine-year-old in the world, all eyes and sweet, sweet smile. Not kidding, you look at this little girl and think, Oh my gosh, a hug from this child could change the world.
Faith is the strongest, bravest nine-year-old I know. She has obsessive-compulsive disorder, and she is dealing AT NINE with obsessions that buckled me in my 20s. My heart just breaks when I think about the daily battles she fights, and it makes me hate OCD even more than I already do (with the passion of a thousand and one suns) for the way it could dare to target such innocence and loveliness.
How do you talk about OCD with a third-grader?
That was the question that I grappled with in the week leading up to this lunch. My OCD first appeared when I was seven, but I didn’t have the vocabulary to really discuss it until after my diagnosis, which didn’t come until after college. I am such a huge advocate for cognitive-behavioral therapy, but I’m so ignorant as to whether this is even possible or appropriate for a child to tackle. When it nearly snapped me in half at age 26, is it even reasonable to expect someone one-third of that age to try something like it?
What we ended up talking about was the narrative therapy that I practiced on myself and my OCD. Narrative therapy reminds us that the person is not the problem; the problem is the problem. I chose to separate myself from my OCD by imagining it as a black dot that followed me around … and I got the upper-hand by belittling it. Most often, I would “dress” it in a pink tutu and make it twirl around. My OCD hated this.
Perhaps this sounds crazy to you, but it was a good strategy for me … and hopefully for children too. Faith was intrigued by the idea of the black dot, and I told her, “It’s okay to bully the black dot because it’s so mean and it’s a liar. So you get to bully it back.” (Please, Jesus, don’t let me be teaching her bad life lessons … can’t you just picture her telling a teacher, “I bullied the kindergartener because he was mean to me first, and this girl I met told me that was okay!” Oh gosh. Ha!) But I think she understood that we were talking specifically about the disorder, the black dot.
And we sort of talked about CBT elements too. I told her, “When the black dot tells you that you have to have your locker clean before you go to your next class, you can ignore it because it’s a liar. And when you feel like you need to wash your hands again, just to be safe, you can ignore the black dot because it’s a liar and a bully. Instead …”
“… I tell it to put on its tutu!” she said, giggling.
“Exactly!”
So … there is the element of response prevention. Hopefully introduced in a way she can understand.
I hope it helps her. I know it helped me, but I was also going through intense CBT at the time. What I do know is that I hate OCD, which could dare to steal joy from this sweetest little girl, who should be enjoying third grade, best friends, recess, pencil collections (or was that just me in third grade? ha!), and Jesus, her Savior, whom she loves, and about whom her OCD whispers lies to her.
I remember being that young, remembering overthinking every thing, remember the obsessions and the intrusive thoughts and wondering why no one else my age thought about these same kinds of things. I am so glad that Faith has a name for OCD at such a young age, but I am deeply saddened that she has to struggle. My heart hurts for all obsessive-compulsives but today especially for the young ones, who are so confused, who feel so guilty, who are so scared.
I wish I could tear through the lies and fear for them, show them truth. I am trying.
Does anyone know of tools for obsessive-compulsive children? Is CBT an option?
Christmas vacation is definitely over– I haven’t had nearly as much time to read! And now that I have only a few weeks to prepare my manuscript before I attend the Big Sur Writing Workshop, all my free time is dedicated to working on my novel (along with blogging and time with friends). I have lots of new books on my shelf that are calling out to me, but I have to ignore them till after the workshop is over.
Just finished:
Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore | This is the sequel to Graceling, and while I enjoyed it, I did think it was weaker than Graceling and Fire, the prequel to Graceling. Set 8 years after Graceling, Bitterblue is now 18 and a queen, dealing with a country that is still really broken. I liked the characters in this: Katsa, Po, and Giddon make reappearances, and readers meet a cast of other fun new people as well. I don’t want to spill too much so that I don’t spoil the first two books. Cashore again leaves readers with an unexpected ending, which is refreshing in some ways and disappointing in others. Still definitely worth the read, although Fire remains my favorite of the three books.
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern | I have reviewed this book before, but let me just say that the second time through it was just as breathtaking as the first. Morgenstern is a sensory genius. I grovel at her feet. And she is so humble and likable too. I cannot wait for the Night Circus movie to come out and for Morgenstern to write another book!
Saving Francesca by Melina Marchetta | Another re-read for me, but this time around, I think I liked this book even better! (Which is saying a lot, since I loved it the first read through!) I think because I am working on a young adult novel about a girl with her own family issues, Saving Francesca rang a bell in me that just didn’t exist the first time I read it. This is the story of Francesca, a young Australian-Italian girl who is learning to navigate a new co-ed school (new to her and also new to being co-ed … and the boys are not excited that there are girls there now) all while her normally active and energetic, lifeblood-of-the-family mother has sunk into a deep depression. This book is marvelous. I can’t recommend it highly enough. I still think Jellicoe Road is my favorite of Marchetta’s books, but Saving Francesca is right up there, competing with it! (This book is one of the reasons I started thinking about going to grad school. I want to be as good a writer as Marchetta. Ironically, she doesn’t even have a bachelor’s degree in writing, let alone an MFA! BRILLIANT, I TELL YOU!)
The Piper’s Son by Melina Marchetta | This is the sequel to Saving Francesca, and it is so good to be with those characters again. This story follows Tom, one of Francesca’s friends, years after high school, after he has made a mess of his life. It isn’t as friendly as SF. Tom is a jerk through a lot of it, but you still find yourself loving him and rooting for him and his family. Marchetta is a genius. If I could go study under her, I think I’d do it in an instant.
Up next (after Big Sur) …
Son by Lois Lowry | The fourth book in the Giver series!
Janie Face to Face by Caroline B. Cooney | The final book in The Face on the Milk Carton series, which I first started reading back in 1990. (In other words, this book is a long time comin’!)
Unwholly by Neal Shusterman | The sequel to Unwind, which I read last October and loved.
The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater | Desiree’s fiance bought me this for my birthday! So excited.
Help Thanks Wow by Anne Lamott | Her new book on prayer (thank you, Des, for buying me a bunch of these books as birthday presents!)
A Thousand Mornings by Mary Oliver | Her latest poems
The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness | I read Ness’s A Monster Calls recently and loved it. So excited for this book.
Hokey Pokey by Jerry Spinelli | His new book about a land without adults and how growing up someone still creeps in!!!
Vex Hex Smash Smooch by Constance Hale | The book on verbs my daddy bought me for Christmas
Across the Universe by Beth Revis | From what I gather, this is a story of survival in space after being cryogenically frozen. Eeep!
The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker | A novel about one girl’s life when the earth’s rotation begins to slow.
Ordered …
Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi
Under the Wolf, Under the Dog by Adam Rapp
Stupid Fast by Geoff Herbach
Pre-ordered (because I am just so excited about them) …
The Holders by Julianna Scott | Includes a boarding house for kids with special powers. Makes me think of Hogwarts and of Ender’s Game. Can’t wait. Love boarding school books– get rid of those adults!!!
The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay | Advanced reader copies are getting rave reviews, and I’m so jealous and want to read it now instead of waiting until this summer! The story is about a girl who refuses to speak and a boy who has everyone he’s close to die, and about their friendship.
So … yeah. A lot on my radar, as well as a potential grad school application and application materials. But I’ve got tunnel vision until after Big Sur! I love my literary life. Sigh.
For my 31st birthday, my delightful friend Elyse made a list of 31 things she liked about me. I had done this for Elyse’s birthday because my roommate Desiree did it for me when I turned 30. It’s such a fun idea!
One of the things Elyse wrote about me was this:
26. Your integrity—everyone I talk to only has the BEST things to say about you because you are so consistent wherever you are and whomever you are with
I am deeply humbled and honored that she would say this, but I do have to say that I am really glad she did because my integrity is something I think about a lot. I make a concerted effort to always be only and exactly who I am. I keep only one Facebook account (instead of keeping a second one just for work, as many of my students add me) precisely for this reason. If it’s not something I should post on my wall or on my blog, then I have to stop and consider if I should be posting it at all. I want my online presence to match my real life presence, my work presence to match my home presence to match my church presence. I have this strong, strong desire to be only one person and for people to love me for exactly who I am.
It’s not that hard to have integrity when you like who you are. Thankfully, God (and the VlogBrothers) has given me confidence to be the silly, nerdy, passionate English geek that I am. To not take myself too seriously, to give grace, to care deeply about whatever I really do care deeply about. To take risks in walking around without the normal masks people like to wear. To trust that I have intrinsic value. To be unashamed of my OCD. To vocalize my shortcomings. To be real with people in the hopes that they will be drawn to the honest me.
I’m not perfect by any means. (Of course not! Don’t be ridiculous.) I have secrets and faults and things I am ashamed of. But as I grow with Christ, I am more and more confident that my identity is found in him and that I am free to be exactly who he made me to be– and only that person.
Love this!
JACKIE LEA SOMMERS 