Beginning a Countdown With Reading

It is the day after boxing day and I sit here in Wolverhampton, my stomach light with the nauseous tension of a mixed diet of both digital and olfactory indulgence.

I have read a fair bit about NVC (Non-Violent Communication). While there is much easy criticism to make about its tenants, its invitation to step away from value judgements is empowering. Read some of this stuff: see what you think to it. Conflict resolution seems it most likely application. Being kinder to yourself is another. It is something that I hope to take more of as I grow through time.

This holiday I recently read Yes Man by Danny Wallace. I remember it impacting me when I lived in Hull. Alas, so many of the opportunities I saw available to me required heavy drinking. Whether that was true or not, I will be dead in 40 years or so, and it is how I remember things. Maybe it is the heavy drinking, or maybe it is the dislocation of me from the immediacy of my surroundings, but I realise the need to say no to myself and yes to opportunity more often.

It is without any doubt that I need to leave Dubai. I will look back to that time, which is currently this time, and realise that this time where I am overweight and overstimulated has ended.

I am tired but I am not broken.

Reading the writing of others is perhaps the best way to approach these final days of 2018. That and moving more, sweating more. I have survived this barrenness.

A new future to be realised

I sit here in the late hours of the penultimate day of the Xmas holidays. Another evening spent smoking shisha, reading furiously and eating kebabs. The rest of the evening saw two beers imbibed and this blog written. This same time last year I was sick with tiredness. Now? I am floating in time. Definitely a little weary. But not destroyed.

I have been enjoying interviews with several schools, one of which has really taken care of me. The British School of Manila. Now such a place will be mixed, a potential British School of Beijing. But I am in a good place mentally – somewhat more pragmatic yet without too much of the excitement dimmed. I expect a new future that will be far from perfect yet very human. With rest I will rise up again with the potency that I expect of a man of my mind. 

Yet now I more measured. One of my bosses, a person whom I harbour mixed feelings about, spoke about how I was not expressing hyperbolic excitement about my potential new job. How can I express my relief and determination to make a life away the from the insidious mindlessness and casual cruelty of this place? Especially to those who revel in it? It is to you, my silent reader, that I speak to of such things. You will come to share eventually in how I have resisted the calm battering and banal neoliberalism of this wretched place.

Part of my winding down in the next 200 days will be to ‘forgive’ a range of people at work. Some have been terrible colleagues, amongst the worst in my career. They have been cruel and foolish, procedural and dull. But even to mention these weaknesses melts my ire. To forgive them is really a reverse: I want to praise the people whose I values I really love. Yet in some ways I do want to call people out. And I might do this with praise.

Being a source of good energy is my true ambition here. And that is something that I have achieved. And it is something that I want to achieve in my next place.

Tomorrow I will Skype with the outgoing principal/Head about a possible Teaching and Learning role. I have somewhat fallen out of love with Teaching and Learning over the past year or so. I suffered a weak interview with two dire characters: one a nepotistic science teacher who brought her best mate into the fold, and the other a farcically ignorant PE teacher who has only two A-Levels at D and E to his name. They have taught me how such roles can exist as pragmatic projects that operate to create numbers. Aside from a marking project, and doing observations, it is tricky to see what these characters are doing.

In their place, what will I do? I think the Screencasting Project is a worthwhile teaching and learning thing to do when I first arrive: a champion from each department, focusing on thinking and providing these links. A link library. Critique the issues behind it, and the need to create BSM-flavoured ones. Another one is creating a canon of intercultural literature that everyone is aware of, and considering the cross-curricular links there, holding public celebrations of learning, galleries of experience etc. Looking at marking projects and policies are also useful. Interleaving questions and learning is also a useful aspect. Looking at metacognition is also an idea, as perhaps is the prioritisation of cultural capital. The key thing is that I want to see what the school wants and from that I will deliver a worthy project. Tomorrow I speak about this, from this.

And the good work I do day-in, day-out will continue. I have found rhythms of practice that allow for both excellence and a life. I speak to hearts and minds. It was only my speech that gained a round of applause at the options evening. To speak about the specification as being your curriculum is not only mindless, it is dangerous. I have enough about me now at 36 to make a curriculum. I will not suffer the dangerously limited curriculum of this place for any more than 200 days. 

Living with integrity: challenging wrong doing where you see it

One of the things that I remember from my youth was a freedom to challenge wrong-doing where I saw it. At primary school I challenge some boys who I saw as ineffectual and nefarious: I couldn't understand why so many weak-willed boys followed the charismatic but deeply stupid boys in my primary school class. It wasn't that they were evil - they were boys who didn't fit my idea of the kind of person I wanted to follow. While I did suffer some altercations, I held my own and more.

I carried such behaviour into secondary school, challenging others where I saw fit. Socially I was reasonable, but always suffered a kind of awkwardness - the machinations of Wolverhampton school-society passed me by as rather unworthy. I felt most connected when I discovered a rock music community. My first partner was experienced and I loved music and some sense of belonging to a people that spoke to me.

At university, I remember distinctly the moment in which I spoke to two girls who seemed lovely and were alone. It was funny, and I really enjoyed their company. The story stays with me now: I ventured on the second night the bar without my block. I approached one group of people, introducing myself and asking if they wanted to chat. One guy suggested that they were going to leave soon. Thirty minutes later, they hadn't.

I then approached two girls who seemed friendly. We chatted and laughed with delicious wit and vivacious nonsense. I remember seeing one of them later going out, and I was wearing a deerstalker hat. We passed each other by without words. That was a bit too much. In fact, at university I was largely a bit too much for many people: I was kind though.

My next move is seminal. If I do not meet someone that I want to meet, then I will loosen myself from social bonds and do something else quite different.

I do feel, however, a great desire to tell certain folk what I think of them in my current place. To right those wrongs. In terms of my career, though, I should realise where I feel strongly, and to concentrate my perspective there. I do not really care for these people. To challenge them is to risk a future reference. If I was ever invited to give an opinion or kick some ass, I would give both gladly.

To speak about the inner-life is the place where I would not shrink. Even with the characters who surround with undue power now. And even then I would present such ideas in a way that would shirk their worst aggressions. But deny others their inner-life? No, thank you.

Why do I lack vision? The options in November 2018.

Despite this blog being almost entirely anonymous I struggle to write authentically. I don't really know why this is the case, but I wonder if it is because I lack strong connections with my family. With my mother busy and a father monstrously selfish, there is little influence on what I want to do and how I want to do it. Those who read and write now are not really those I want to be like, either.

Instead I wrote for a few hours this week about what I want to do and why I might want to do it. This might exist as a record of this time of freedom. It is a terrifying time.

For many years I have lacked vision. Beyond perhaps writing a book, I don’t really have great ambitions to do much more. I work hard and I have some good measures of success. But these seem arbitrary and not necessary ones that speak to my spirit. I have some freedom now which I do not seem to own. When I think about Facebook, a spike of anxiety rises in me. I post so little on there and yet feel that political neutrality does not sit well with me.

I believe that the average citizen of a country should be able to live with some dignity. Is that true? Will poverty crush any dignity? Where will I find myself?

I need to fall in love with myself again. My mind needs to excite me again.

As part of that, my present self will talk to the future me below about some of my options.

I. Stay in Dubai

Normally I stay in a place until I have to leave. I find it hard to make a choice to change unless I am forced into that position. Fortunately, I have to leave this place. There is no way I can stay: my age and my social connections demand it. I will be ill otherwise. Senior leaders say the right words that they care. But the way that others have been treated echoes within me. I have made the best(ish) of my time here…

A. Pros of staying

The pros of staying in Dubai further are largely financial. I would save an enormous amount of money again, possibly another 20-30k+. I have paid off my student loan and have enough money to happily invest into a mortgage. I have some freedom now: yet more savings at the expense of health do not seem sensible.

If I stayed, I also feel that I could get a little better at KS5 teaching, although I feel that such training has gone as far as it can go given the time etc of things. There is some good conversation with some friends, but at the expense of my mind elsewhere. Better now for IB I feel.

Technically there is a better dating scene here. If I worked harder I could find women and even new groups of people. But I feel it is time for me leave, and to leave the mess that is the French woman and her Pakistani husband behind.

B. Cons of staying

Firstly, I need to consider my mental health. My lifestyle here is weak with my momentum, social and spiritual, almost entirely lost. I live a risky life with my frugality, playing hard and fast with my mind.

This current school is good in many ways: well-organised and with far less time needed to plan stuff. BUT I am also tired. It is relentless and purposefully so. It has no real rhythm. I feel a breakdown could be experienced.

I am also not meeting my kind of people, eccentric types. That would make for a better life. Instead I meet aggressively normative people. It feels like a terrible school playground where the years of being my own person are unwinding. Or, perhaps, maybe those years of being my own person are keeping me alive now.

I also feel that many of my friends, although loved, are unduly negative. I try to negotiate other forms of conversation. I know that I encourage negative conversations myself with my mum: 24 hours is all it takes in the UK to become like that. I need to be better.

II. Leave Dubai

In 226 days I will be on a flight leaving this place and I will reflect on what I have learnt in this half-life here. I will not be shattered but instead I hope the arrogance and misapplied rhythms of my work will be changed forever. In 168 days I will be on Ramadan hours and ready to take easier days. And shortly after that I will be receiving a thousand pounds a week for a relatively easy job.

The temptations to stay in Dubai are easily outweighed by the need for change.

The narrative I have given others RE: my social circle satisfies. I leave with good references and integrity.

And so what are my options?

A. 1 Take another teaching job

My first option, the default, is to take another teaching job. If I work for a good 10-20+ years more, I could have a good lump sum upon which to retire. The teacher's pension in the UK is actually extraordinarily good and needs to be appreciate by those in the system. Other choices can be made from that.

I am in a position whereby I feel mixed in what I want from my next job. I also wonder how good I actually am. My  

1. What to prioritise?

And so this is the difficult thing: what will guide my future decisions about moving? How flexible can I be? Without discipline and a vision now, will any decision I make be ideal? TWE will I simply choose a job based upon whether it is advertised or not? TWE will I feel happy revelling in these winds of fate? Of how different things could be? There is a sense, is there not, that things will always be like this.

a. To work in a Recognised school (place 4)

Earlier this month, on 9th November 2018, I experienced a vivid dream about working in a new school in Asia. The accommodation was remarkably poor. I was compelled with other interviewees to lie in a sleeping bag under grey plastic sheets. This disturbed me. One girl, who was Lynsey from Lee Mar, strode past carrying a sleeping bag. There weren't enough apparently. Shortly after I left this school, located next to a hotel (BST?) and made my way back to the airport. There is too much possibility of dangerous disorganisation in brand new schools... and yet I am seeking to interview for one? It is an interview that I am struggling to organise. Says it all…

b. Finding a partner? (place 1)

The surprising first priority I found here is the desire to find a partner. If I am being true, this is what I thought of when I went to Bejing: this is why I dated three women in the first month of being there, and why I fell in love so deep with someone I should have not done. I was starved of love in Scarborough. I am wiser now.  

Of course, perhaps the best option to do this is to move back to the UK. I could take up residence in an independent school or similar. I think being willing to work anywhere in the UK would be ideal.

Equally so, travelling might mean that I meet someone.

c. To make savings? (place 5)

I don't want to lead a poor life. I have spent a lot of money over the past year without happy memories for it. A frugal life that is stoic is ideal: a frugal life that splurges without care is less so.

Saving money is part of a wider life: a life that I should understand in its entirety. Family and support and kids and partner make a difference: savings exist to give choices.

d. A supposedly easier place? (place 6)

Is Dubai an easy place to work? Is my school an easy place to work? The curriculum is... strained. It is based on exams and in doing so is fairly mindless. The lesson are there, however. I am aware, also, of the flaws of my approach. Too much teacher-led at the moment.

I do think that a place that is a little kinder would make me happier. That would also be more conducive to finding an apt partner. My school is actually alright, if you take away some of the difficult personalities. Working hard is not a huge problem if you have perspective.

e. Less isolated place (place 1)

Is Dubai isolated? Do I isolate myself? I think it is more likely that I isolate myself. Like in Wolverhampton, I feel too shy to venture out easily. I am aware of that - from next week I need to change my social approach, without any doubt. But moving will help with this in many ways. Anywhere I go will be a positive move.

f. An example of what my career could be (place 7)

This is an interesting point. TWE do I want to strive for a hard/difficult school as a way of proving to myself that I am able? A challenging school... and a school where high standards can be attained without outrageously consuming work is ideal, too. The OneNote and booklet/textbook/pre-reading culture is one to implement. Find some rhythm in work. There are gaps that I need to address with the need to implement self-directed learning etc.

But I am happy to accept a school that achieves the previous points above this. I am not seeking merely Tanglin and Patana. It surprises me to write that.

g. A job that is actually available (place 2)

Of course, the thing that determines getting a teaching job, or not, is what actually arrives in my email. ESF seems a good post: whether those jobs are available, though, is something else. Interestingly, the wage for Malvern seems higher than elsewhere. We will see if that is the case.

Applying for jobs proactively seems smart. Last week, on the day before our inspection started, was a job fair in Dubai. My weary illness and inspection responsibilities demanded my attention elsewhere and I did not go.

Talking to a great friend of mine whom I respect hugely told me of his phases of applying. There is not really a job that has arisen that I admire. But at least these jobs have come up.  

2. Future teaching career/job possibilities

And so I should have one eye on the future. I cannot be a classroom teacher forever, can I? Certainly not in the state school, unless it is a place that allows me rhythms of living elsewhere. The neoliberalist system seems one that threatens to hound people out, or even just require far too much of them. There are other jobs and other careers and paths I could consider, something I do now:  

a. 2 Continue as a classroom teacher

So, a balanced life would see me continue as a classroom teacher in the right roles. In a difficult school this will be arduous. That difficulty could be in a school that is ineffective, or in a social casualty area. Otherwise, a classroom teacher job is doable. It is an interesting job of craft. It feels worthy to influence people. It is often interesting. It is not terribly arduous when done right. But… it is something that I did in some quiet earnestness after leaving university. There have been a handful of people I have respected in that time. Not too many elsewhere.

b. 1 Classroom leadership

Firstly, it seems most likely that I will continue to take on some leadership roles. Still I will be teaching, but leading a key stage, or even a department. That would be interesting. This is a big step forward, and one at my age that I expect to take on as well. It would be easier in some ways and more difficult in others. I am in a peculiar position with this: which of my bosses would I rather be like? Such leadership also requires me to be invited into such roles – I seem not inclined to strive for them myself for some reason.   

c. 3 Consultant/different kind of job

B trainer; technology consultant; curriculum consultant; school inspector... there are many roles that I can choose to take on if I prove myself in other roles. I am resolved in this; I realise I want to take on other roles now that I am older.

d. 4 Change career?

A career change is not impossible. Researching this will be interesting at some point as well. Again, living with family? Will that be available? Should I want it to be available? What will I retrain as? Is this not the case that I apply for jobs elsewhere? Again, my lifestyle might need to change and I would need to enjoy the influence of others

B. 2 Take year out travelling

My second dominant alternative option is to take advantage of my freedom and drop out of polite society for a time and travel. This will be a double-whammy of my money -I will not earn at the same time as I spend - but could lead to changes in perspective and personality that might make life easier and more enriching when I am older. It is something that I have not seriously considered, but it is something that after my next job might be more realistic. Maybe even in my next job I will be travelling with others; I will be less wilful.

1. How? Car? Van? Camp?

To travel for a time seems expensive. I also want to travel in such a way that gives me some freedom. Living from a backpack is the dominant idea. Equally so, the idea of owning a van that I live from appeals. Again, it would impact my life and the kind of people I would meet. This really is an option, especially when I venture back to society or the UK at some point. I think living from a Van in the UK seems an interesting idea, especially if I am registered elsewhere, and/or teaching or studying… this is worthy of a whole new post.  

2. Extended holidays? Travelling?

Whilst travelling sounds good, I find myself doing the same things: a little tour, eating burgers and beer, and wandering the streets. I... find it hard to get out of the touristy areas. I think I need a travel companion more than I did before. I want to make memories; currently the memories with myself are mixed. I… think I want to discover myself a little bit more as well.

3. Move back home to the UK and read/write

As I say, I want to probably read and write, and need the space to do so. This would not be an easy option. It would probably be the hardest. If I was able to read and write more now as I am teaching, then I would be more comfortable with this choice. I definitely want to read and write more, but (like today) I have not read as much as I desire. I have found many excuses not to.

C. 3 Take secondment/study leave

The final option is to take a kind of study leave. I think that this is a realistic option, staying at home in Wolverhampton and doing a distance MA. I can travel somewhat, read and try to improve myself. The issue, of course, is that I will almost certainly lose momentum. I have never managed to keep it with the discipline of study. Never.

And so here are my options as they stand. I will revise these as the year moves on. The space between them is tangible.

A bit of illness and a hazy future

Three weeks into my search for a new post sees me quite ill yet in an interesting position. There are three distinct places to which I have applied already. Each has its own attractions whilst also threatening particular issues. Recognising where those issues might stem from my prejudice rather than potential fact is ideal.

I spoke yesterday to a HoD from Japan. I felt somewhat uneasy with that position: the school itself had banned its youth from a local store on the behest of its patrons. The school isn’t very international and the supposed package didn’t seem to offer great savings potential. I have wanted to visit Japan for a time, but my heart did not feel in this one. Perhaps most disturbingly, in the initial exchange I was told to not expect Sixth Form teaching. To be another year out of IB and another year outside Sixth Form is difficult at best. To potentially work there many years with Sixth Form protected would be unduly awkward and a position I would not want to suffer. Fortunately, the decision was made for me, and I am glad for that.

I have put applications into HK and Jakarta. I am avoiding chain schools. At some point in the future that might change. But for now the recruiting season has barely started. And my future, and who I might meet and how I might be, remains in a difficult haze.

I say this haze is difficult because I am distracted and tired, and I am not reading as much as I wanted to. I am not really helping myself. I need to be able to be bored. My health is really quite poor at the moment and I need to take better care of myself. 

Asking for a reference and realising the influences on me

Asking for a reference and realising the influences on me are my ambitions this weekend. I woke up a little better this morning after some heavy drinking with a friend. I refused to drink too many beers, leaving two that were poured. I remember Pat and Tom.  

This week was one of change. I gave in my intentions. Whilst the newbies are leaving vociferiously en-mass, I desire a quieter approach. My body reacted to the stress and I responded well. Firstly I spoke with the PA, sharing desires for her family and their ambitions. When I did sit with my Headteacher, I spoke honestly and with integrity. It meant much that he responded positively. He shook my hand and called me a diamond geezer. My HoD spoke herself in similarly supportive terms. Again, this meant much to me. Later, a great man and a supportive friend was generally angry that evening, and not unsurprisingly so. Various family things had combined to vex him. A tough life is experienced in Dubai, or rather tougher than expected. It was in the acidic awareness of the evening that I felt something akin to love for those who supported me today, despite our distance over four years. My friend has supported me with time and love and expertise over years and deserves understanding on his terms. He racialises issues so much yet is racialised in return. To understand him is important: he is someone who could be a best-man to me. He is moral. It is interesting yet challenging to experience his culturally different background. It made me consider mine.

I am not so… certain as him. I am earnest. I am passionate. And right now I am a little lost, and grinding my way into the next days.  

And so it is with this that I am in a position now to write my application and reapply to Search Associates. My references go back a decade or so. The process fascinates me: the lives of myself and others ready to change on the serendipitous of choices. I want to find an interesting place; I want a life a little more colourful than I have now. I will record my thoughts on here to be read by those who stumble across them.

My impression of Search Associates was very different some six years ago. When I first wanted to venture abroad, I was distinctly uncertain of teaching EAL students. I thought British students would be superior. Perhaps they will be. Now? I want to find myself in a truly international school that is far more organic. I want to be in a place that inspires. I want to be in a place that will lead to a different lifestyle than the one I have now.

With that in mind I am to look at The British School of Tokyo. A job arose there last week. This is a school to which I would really like to apply. There are some distinct pros and cons.

Pros

Japan is interesting: it is alien enough to me and allows me to enjoy an outsider status.

Tokyo has great things to do: it is a cosmopolitan city with many people and many things to do. There is a small city of expats: perhaps 6k British.

School has good results: it is in a good place already academically, although it remains to be seen how the curriculum is spaced

School has opportunities to grow etc: it seems on the up, but this is made on incidental information.

Leadership is educated: they are Oxbridge. This will be good for my subject.

Cons

No maid service: I have got used to having a maid who cleans once a week. China or other places would allow me that experience. Japan would see me having to change the habits of a lifetime, frankly. I would have to make my lunch every day. I need to look at how I can do this.

Small school size with poor facilities: unlike Beijing and Dubai, Japanese schools are really quite small and unimpressive with what they can offer.

Small accommodation: again, there are issues of growth and classrooms. But… this is fine enough too. I don’t necessarily need my own classroom anymore.

Poor savings potential, perhaps: although I have good savings and now it is time for something else.

Students have been banned from two local shops for presumably being boisterous, but we can suspect what other cultural influences are at play here. 

Ultimately, though, the opportunity to work in Japan is alluring. These cons are obstacles.

Before I can finish this weekend, I need to mark like an English teacher can... There is a kind of machismo in marking books on a constant basis in some British schools. I remember in China having a nine-hour stint to catch up on 3-4 weeks of work with marking. I fell asleep marking. In the future, I intend to use whole-class and marking-code methods for non-assessment work, not least as it involves using students' work to inform the next lesson. But for now, I will brute out the marking.

And so as I set out on the weekend, I realise I want to manage my workload a little better. 37 tasks sit on my Wunderlist today! Last week I suffered through pressing tasks that felt unduly stressful. I deprioritised some planning as a result and had a trickier week. But I did many important things. Now? I want to ensure things are more cohesive. And I want to plan tasks over several days, not just one.

1)      Therefore, I will first tick off tasks that I have done.

2)      Then I will reallocate tasks over the coming days.

3)      Then I will allocate tasks to today or otherwise, spending a few minutes where necessary on some.

A war for our concentration

Eight months until my last year in Dubai ends, I desire to remember that finite urgency that once drove me away from British shores.

It was six years ago that I watched on Scarborough beach the finite rolling of water. The autumn air was crisp and clean and the walk interesting. Yet my mind was forlorn. The sadness of lost connections and atrophied ambition made thin insulation against the cold threat of my Western freedoms. I sought connection and love. These were not to be found in a small seaside town in the North. With courage I applied for jobs abroad, I won a position in Beijing. I made an exciting life. I met people. I made connections. With some naivety, I took risks to move with someone to a shiny place of their choosing. It was their desire which I supported, and the acceptance of that was survival. I knew it would be tough and sadly that risk did not pay off. The toughness of this place will pass soon though: I have 277 days until I leave. And I have been here for over 1100 days. This is time to appreciate what I am being taught here.

I am being taught the importance of friends and company, even amongst people whom I might not always seek. I am being the taught the importance of organisation and time, knowing that I need to be wilful over both my time and my actions. I am also being taught the importance of stating my reasons to others. Often I do not have that forum. Giving the world my reasons is a balm to hate and uncertainty. In my current school, I cannot express enough the importance of keep good with the institution. Keeping good with them is often keeping reasons internal. Fortunately, I have done well in my time here; I have been a good man. But there are reasons and perspectives I want to express.

Right now I see a glimpse of me sat in a cottage in the Yorkshire Moors writing next to the warmth of a fire. I have the space and time and courage to write bad fantasy. 

My imagination needs to be nourished. I have neglected my imagination without realisation.

The immediate future needs me to make applications to other places. Teaching abroad offers me a niche that may not last forever. I am 36 and with appreciable savings. Savings that can forge a life in different places. I have no consumer debts. I can make connections again. It is time soon, remarkably soon, to make distinctive choices about how this life might be led. I think I have one more international school left in me before I could really seek something dramatically different. Perhaps that next school might give me that space. Indeed, it might allow me to make that space.

I should write more cohesively about applying.

Essentially, I have my CV and application statements ready. I will tailor them to the school. When the time is right – either a job comes up or maybe in three weeks - I will request a reference to put out feelers via Search Associates. Invariably, my immediate colleagues and the teaching and learning types can always change anyone’s timetable to detriment. That cannot define what we might do. Watching that happen now to two colleagues, I can only be thankful that I currently escape the worst of that brunt.

Attention is the currency of 2018. There is a battle for our concentration and a war for our hearts. For a long time, I have struggled to concentrate. The rhythm of my mind bounds only in the shallowness of digital valleys, distracted by social media and buffeted by reddit. My reading habits have kindled some imagination, but not entirely. And the people I meet are barely writers. 

For the time being, reading more of the books I need is my fitness.

Ultimately, writing more and writing better is what I desire. I am a writer that does not write. I want to meet other writers and to connect with them as well.

And so now I want to write responses to assessment questions and more. To write answers to assessment questions is to improve my reading. It is something that costs little. And it helps the young minds under my charge. 

Two weeks in and seeking to sustain

My ambitions at the start of this year were to read richly and to better balance. I have done this more books read than ever. A Game of Thrones is almost finished. more important still, I have seen good friends, with Sarah being particularly lovely. She is a great boon in my life at the moment, taking me on walks and organising theatre visits. Being with friends and reading more are my ambitions to sustain.

Yet to reduce my loneliness and anxiety, I still work on weekends. I can still work well on Sundays (well, Saturdays here..), ensuring that I have the week ahead planned. Unlike in Beijing, I do not find myself trying to decide tasks for the week ahead. That wasn't good. Instead, I am genuinely planning for an hour or so on Sunday and achieving well. I am pleased with my efforts here and feel them sustainable. Such time, when retrospectively recorded on my calendar, suggests I am working efficiently. The effect of weekend working, of course, is that I feel I have worked too much still.

So working too much is something I want to avoid. I am expert. It is more than time to begin reprioritising my efforts. Admittedly, I am more decisive than before, especially about logistics. This is perhaps the best thing about my current school. It is managed in a way that would be transferable to any institution, a supermarket for example. I am looking forward to being focused on my subject in my new place. And yet... I realise that I can take time to consider my best options. That is a strength and flaw. I consider too much and act too little. 

To be entirely strong I am to see a doctor soon to ensure I am fully healthy. My stomach isn't entirely well. Being better in this will calm my mind.

The difficult spirt of my department continues to irk, and yet I am able to remain removed, for now at least. While last year I said words to someone that suggested it was a difficult year for me, it was more something barren. It was no Hull, it was not degrading and violent. Hull was crushing, and a place that I still need to process. This, at the least, is a place where the people in key roles of leadership disappoint me continually. It is a place in which I have learned how to survive, and one in which I must continually negotiate how to do so. The hostile behaviour of a few has invited the focus of leadership onto them. That is fine. 

The future is brighter than this. I look ahead very soon to working somewhere else. Each day my countdown clocks another day - 297 days. There are only 239 days until Ramadan. I am in a decent position financially and professionally and willing to look at death. My life is finite, and I have made due sacrifices and followed the desires of others. I am better than I was when I arrived; my age gives me a position in my mind and my grey hair thrones most discernably my head. 

And yet most of all I read of love and realise how I want this with wisdom and openness. I seek love and realism. Love for, and against, the cynicism of these people and the mercy of my mind. 

Dreaming of Conversation

Back in Dubai now I am finding it hard to sleep. My excellent reading habit has continued from Canada and my mind is engaged each day. It is becoming the most important thing I do, and the fountain from which my day becomes meaningful. 

Part of my sleep issue is the continued jetlag, especially if I don't speak others. That conversation tires me out. Last night I slept at 1am. I woke up from my alarm at 7am. There was no way I was moving at that time, my sleep sickness was profound. Instead, I enjoyed bonus sleep until 11:30am. In that time, I dream deeply and evocatively, remembering my dreams as I once did.

I dream of old friends and enemies. Enemies is a strong word for people with whom I have no contact: of old enmity instead. Over the past two nights of sleep, I experienced travels to places new and old. Faces I once knew came to me, most notably an old alcoholic housemate who once trashed my house and exploited my kindness. He was remarkably selfish yet enjoyed an interesting mind. I do not miss his company but I do miss that kind of conversation. 

In one dream two nights ago I strode a pavilion like Scarborough's, golden light strolling over the marbled ground. I didn't perceive the beauty at the time as I was rushing to find somewhere to do something. When do I build in time to perceive? My phone finds far less time in my hand these past two months. 

Another dream last night saw me sleeping in bed with shoes on, resting until work started again the next day. I was with two people who were warm in body and mind. It was friendly. Outside, however, earthquakes had wrecked the world or at least mildly displaced some cars in the Western streets. 

My feeling was ultimately of waiting for something to happen. I was not sentient. I was not composed. 

Yet the final dream that provoked me into finally waking saw me speaking to a young man about being smart and being Northern. He had a calm manner about him, a readiness to wait and to let others speak. The environments in which I am in, now and before, rely upon me battling to be heard. He had an assurance I admired. 

When he did speak, he was clearly smart and quietly engaging. He spoke about his experience of being an educated Northerner. In return, I was aware of how desperate I was to speak, a bubbling urge of communication threatening to burst my throat. The quickness of my mind, of needing to express myself, was overwhelming.  I spoke about how being Northern was to be perceived as a cultural outsider. It wasn't a bad thing. It meant an extra layer of reflection, of removal from self-appointed cultural arbiters. It meant being aware that I was not positioned with the privilege of direct connection to power and importance. However, he embraced that position, or at least accepted it for what it is.

My intensity of expression overrode the others who sat with us. It felt like the first day at university. I was aware of a girl that wanted to speak too, and how she was opening her mouth to interject. She waited a few moments and then wondered off. Good for her, I feel in retrospect. I am thirsty for such conversation now; in lieu of those friends being here, I guess I have to have it with myself and with my books. They are a poor substitue, but are a balm for now.  

Aiming for a Lifestyle back at work in Dubai

As I sit here in Wolverhampton, having enjoyed friendly company while watching Wolves play Everton, I consider the kind of lifestyle I expect over the next ten months or so. I consider my mother's endeavours, her retirement and travelling and living with ongoing health and social challenges that she continues to carry heartily.

Any consideration of lifestyle choices should not be simply about making a better life for me. I detest the Hollywood spin of how 'breaking the rules' leads to a better lifestyle for that person alone. The implication is, of course, that others are foolish and naive for keeping to the rules, and that the best lifestyles require the subversion of a community's norms for personal betterment. That probably isn't incorrect: it just doesn't really sit well with me. I detest a lifestyle that might benefit me without benefitting a community. What communities are these? My colleagues? Those I live near? My immediate family? My current communities are necessarily transitory (based on travel and reading for example), but that also means I don't seem to need a huge community that grants profound worth. I am quite self-sufficient in that regard. My job gives me a feeling of purpose and well-being that works both ways. Without that nurturing of others, I would find my bachelor lifestyle right now to be remarkably barren. 

Of course any lifestyle that is socially nourishing requires a rudeness of health. Any kind of well-being that exists without health is, in contrast, short-lived, literally. Walking, eating well, taking time to talk to others: these are essential to any kind of a good life. These are things I want to do more of next year... small steps and ambitions.

Of most worthy exclamation this holiday is how I am reading well, the best I have ever done. Literally every time I read, I feel enriched afterwards. I worry sometimes that it will take too much energy: a true introvert! Yet I feel enriched after. Conditioning myself to read when tired is another ambition next year. To be raised through reading is an experience of thought and being that I have lacked for too long: too much of my reading is of the work of novices etc. I do worry if I have will have the emotional and social space to read whilst teaching... that is key.

In terms of communities, I do I wonder what kind of community I want to find or to create. Yesterday I spent time in the pub just being with people. At one point I fell silent for ten minutes. Yet I didn't feel a sense of displacement: I was just there. It was a great experience that rewrote the narrative of my teenage life in Wolverhampton and one that makes me realise more how being older makes life better, especially for someone of my background. The urgency of talk and thought to which I feel compelled when with others can make some social events ardous. 

And so tomorrow I return. 

Whilst I am sad that I haven't seen friends as much as I desired, I am happy to be going back to Dubai. I intend to begin calendaring life again, and to tackling some of the structure of my To-Do list... to tick off the thousands of ''someday tasks'' is a very good idea as well. The pragmatic obsession of some of my colleagues will be a judiciusly useful influence, in that, at least, presumably.  

Writing the 3-4 reviews, and beginning to write and plan essays for the books I am teaching next year, is a worthy ambition too. Let's see what we do, and let's hope that I benefit others more openly with that, too. 

Leaving Canada after a fantastic recuperation and family connection

Leaving Canada

Here in my brother's kitchen, I sit and see a soft cake of chocolate cooling from last night. I am due to leave this house in seven hours and to enjoy the wait and sleep on the plane. I have given some of my good time to my family, and I am the better for it.

My health has improved through simply walking well and enjoying warm breezes. Beijing was a Mordor; Dubai is Dante’s pit. Canada and the UK are softer, greener places to breath my air until death. Those million breaths are ready to stop too soon. 

This breathing has also being enjoyed indoors, with the rhythm of my chest rising to the flow of words from the page of my mind. This rising flow has danced in my mind, a tremendous experience of sitting and reading. I experienced a different rhythm two years ago. Two years ago I spent an entire summer meeting people on MeetUps and cafe dates, enjoying the vast possibilities a place like Toronto could offer. People and bars and metro stops seemed endless. In a desire to experience this place further, I willfully undercut my position with the stay-at-homes at work by declaring my intent to leave Dubai to come here. That didn’t go down well, as expected, and I suffered for that tremendously with inglorious blockings of promotion, and strange underminings when that did happen. Still, like toothache, when that is removed I will feel happy. I cannot define myself on them, however. 

What I can define myself on is my reading and my writing. Such reading as I am enjoying now is the best in my career. I can read hundreds of pages a day and have enjoyed almost all the NEA texts. I am now focused on the texts I am due to read, and I am reviewing every text I have read. This is in contrast to the times I struggled to read foolishly one book in weeks before. My attention has been in pieces before, poisoned by phones and naivety. 

More than any of this, I fantasise about doing nothing else but reading for a year. Could I manage this? Would it be helpful? To read and place such reading at the heart of what I do… that would be a refocusing worth prizing.

Another sharp enjoyment this holiday has been the mocking of life coaches. This is somewhat close to home as I:

a) Have a coaching qualification and believe in its usefulness.

b) Enjoy the personalities of life coaches and appreciate what they try to do.

My two main gripes with life coaches are they're pious self- aggrandizement, and their lack of situated commentary. Firstly, the life coaches I meet seem to work only within their own field. They train other lifecoaches, or offer unqualified counselling. Their very manner reeks of presenting themselves as fledged human beings who have reached a self-defined point of actualisation. Very often, this freedom and power is economic: like all great philanthropists and colonialists, such position has been gained at the expense of others. The act of coaching is a kind of assuaging for economic guilt, yet filled with economic power.

Secondly, the lack of situated commentary sits uncomfortably with me. Giving metaphors about lights on a car being like life says nothing of action to anyone: it sounds good though. And without situation, it cannot be contested. It sounds grand, like Shakespeare. But its meaning falls between thought and action. As long as you buy the book, all is well...

Still, being able to laugh at what they do makes me realise better how it is to guide a good life. And in contrast to my university musings on what could be, situating my life in the pragmatic realities of teaching is the strongest, highest path I can take right now.

On a distinct aside, I remember in the Dubai art gallery thinking that all of life is a reduction from the infinite to the specific. This occured whilst watching the Japanese digital fixtures changing in size and space. As we live and as we act, our options are reduced. We are on this world corporal for a finite time. The finite urgency I experienced when first writing this blog wanes more than it waxes. Choices, if not made, are made for us. I choose to wait, I choose to stay in Dubai. To survive, at least with some of my immediate colleagues, I have been making little choices. Still, as Kant and Foucault say, be good with the institution, for it brings civilization to that which would gladly be chaos.

The pragmatics of my situation are clear. if I am able to live internationally for ten to fifteen more years, then I will enjoy a fairly substantial pot of money. Meeting a companion along the way is ideal: one whose situation and values can dance with mine. Better to be single in a campbed, though, than next to someone whose crushing will demands daily defiance. I also give myself a great choice of what I might be able to do, as well. But specifically, I am seeking to lead well the KS5 curriculum, to keep my universe open with reading and reviewing, and to seek wisely an interesting new post. The nature of how I choose that post is important to me

Most pertinently, I have enjoyed sharing the new life of my beautiful niece. I am somewhat harsher without a child that is not mine: my patience and sympathies to childhood are surprisingly finite. I am also glad that I didn't donate to make that child, for I would not be able to leave Canada if so. She is a delight and my in-laws are great parents. I look forward to influencing her life for the better and to being a good uncle. As ever, reading and language make for a better person.

The tiredness of her parents is, however, a terrible price for modern parenthood. What does it mean to be alive when you are exhausted? Is this something that I can do? I guess no-one chooses to be tired. It happens, and you deal with it.

And so before I want to leave today I wish to walk the rocky path by the lake and to strafe the sandy beach once more. I want to appreciate how this holiday has been a fantastical recuperation, and how I am in a momentum of reading that I do not wish to lose... I want to write regularly and to avoid the poisonous addiction of quick information.  

Feeling a little better lying in Canada

I write this sat on a warm sofa in Canada, my wonderful brother and his delightful wife and child having set off for a family holiday in a cottage.

I have finished a good few books the past few days. I speak so often of how much cultural capital is needed if you wish to engage with history and culture as a form of study. Given a man of my background, perhaps a more mathematical or scientific field would have had more utility. It wouldn't have fallen on the rocks of my Wolverhampton and Hull heritage and floundered in the wake of my social quirks and eccentric disposition. Instead I have found myself returning more intensely to the field I have chosen: literature.

Each day I wish to walk, to read and to write somewhat.

I wish I had a wider range of reading friends; they are there (and have been there). It is up to me to nurture those relationships.

This holiday I have managed to read almost a book every 2-3 days. This time last holiday I felt the time would last forever. That feeling has moulded into finite urgency, and I am happier for it.

And now?

I have five distinct projects:

1) Look at developing a passive income through selling resources on the TES: I need to investigate tax to see how this works.

2) Write and publish a book on computer games, inspiration and humanities education.

3) Creating the Modern Text booklet and more.

4) Train for my CV with the Microsoft Educator etc.

A diet of reading and writing each day will do well here, particularly one in which I am able to look at a small, focused list. Let's try this...

Maintaining the Momentum of Attention in The Holidays

Momentum in the teaching holidays is hard to maintain, nor particularly desirable. I have passed the midway point of my holiday now, and we have three weeks until I begin again in Dubai in earnest.

Having suffered debilitating sickness in the first three weeks of my holiday, I am happy now to be a little healthier, and certainly with the kind of space and expansive flourishing of the mind needed to approach this time and to be with people in a nourishing fashion.

I have stopped using a calendar at the moment and rely only upon my To-Do list and a countdown app. I have consolidated my summer tasks into one task: will I get some of these things done? Write a book? Train for Microsoft and Apple qualifications? If I want to exert my will over anyone it should be myself. I remember writing about this in a previous blogpost: such organization should gain spirit, not lose it. Reading of such work and reading by others on Twitter is, though, surprisingly annoying. I was bathing today when I thought of an old boss, a desperate woman whose child committed suicide whilst she was nursing a scraped face from too much drinking. She derided my enthusiasm privately, calling it puppyish. Whatever it might be, that school and this one have shaped how I might express my practice to others, and to be a better judge as to whom I should express.

Teaching, like some of my travelling, aims for improvement. To appreciate the mundane; to be monastic in the mind – these are worthy ambitions. If my work is to save time for others, then that is worth sharing. All will appreciate that.

The most important aspect of my time here now is being able to love my family. With their flaws and quirks they are wonderful, powerful and full of integrity. The mean and utilitarian cynicism I suffer in my current place is no more than to be expected in such a barren environment. To square that with the love and warmth I see now is to imbibe delight after a desperate thirst. My wonderful niece, in particular, is loving and is growing every day, testing boundaries and becoming more part of the world. Her parents want her to become resilient, and to process what has happened before.

Such resilience and processing is desirable for all thinking people. I wonder here, in this cold kitchen and a cleared wooden table, of how I would like to deal with my exes? Should I want to meet them? Converse with them? Should I want to speak to all people from my past with whom I might have a broken connection? Without a fruitful intention in my conversation, I am perhaps best letting such things simply lay. That is a later conversation – for now, I am focused on creation.

This holiday I have read more than I have ever done in my life. That I suffer from an atrophied concentration is almost without doubt. The lack of attention and care I experienced at home (not through any machination, just through the busy nature of survival), and the lack of support and nourishment in school, both as a pupil, a student and as a teacher, is not to blame for this lack of concentration. Now, I can read and can read for hours. Whether this remains the case when I start teaching again will remain to be seen. I hope so.

My reading ambitions have meant I have almost moved through my list of NEA books. Reviewing them afterwards is taking a long time, but again is worth it to consolidate understanding. My education in such literature now is superior to my time at university, with better, if equally distant, online peers on Goodreads.com.

Such reading makes me realise how much knowing the texts myself is empowering: if I am continually able to write essays and paragraphs etc, then I will be happier. That will be my focus, along with vocabulary aspects etc. There are interesting ambitions I have.

So, overall, my prime purpose next year is to strengthen attention.

With 335 days left, I intend to read a few more books in Dubai. I want to find Arab books, maybe attend more bookclubs. I need to monitor my mind and my body and to see what happens. What cultural experiences do I want to have? Will I stay in the other Emirates?

All such ambitions lead me to the most important thing next year – to plan my CV to take an interesting step elsewhere. I did not really choose this place inasmuch as I chose love and accepted the consequences. Such different lives can lay out ahead after this year. I should see these varied places and see how and where I might go. The ease and Westernisation of my current place is, not, however, what I want.

I want to make my universe a little bigger.

Weeding out my imagination

I am a little lonely here in Canada with my brother and his family having left for a trip elsewhere. I have read well, finishing another book today. I will begin another, aiming to finish that by tomorrow. My writing is trickling along: I need to write and publish a little wider I think.

I am ready to take on this last year of Dubai. I have changed, and not always in terms of progress. I listen to this now and flash many images of working, boredom, tears, love and ultimately discipline.

These days are very much about future actualisation.



I am weeding out my imagination.

A hand from the future planning the present: this hoiday

Morning all. It is about midday in Wolverhampton and I am sitting here in my mother’s garden making plans for the holiday. Last year I enjoyed the languorous stretch of ten weeks of holiday. In that time I read and  I gained. I created a historical framework and I flourished in literature. There is still some reflection I want to enjoy from that time; that will come soon.

I have just returned from a fairly extensive walk around the roads of home. Many buildings sit distinctly larger than almost all others I have seen. On that walk, I considered the prejudices that have held me up as much as pulled me down. And during that journey I experience a hand, mine, reaching from the future to hold me. At the same time, I ushered the younger version of me to journey alongside, telling him of the many cultural successes of music and sport and women that he will come to enjoy. I urged him to nourish the mind, for that is the source of all joy to be had, or at least its filter.

That future hand said to me that I might be travelling and reading at some point in the future if I do not find a partner; I might do so if I do find a partner with whom that spirit resounds. Reading and being – these are the things that matter. Each day for the past year I have played chess. I have won games and I have lost games. In both conditions, I have experienced competitiveness and the joy of battle. My blood flows and my mind works – the emotional state of success is somewhat incidental if failure also leads to action. Feeling righteous anger at a loss and the desire to counteract that failure is potent motivation indeed.

And as I guided the younger self, 10 years old, I saw an older self congratulating me on making it through the hardest part of my time in Dubai. This next year is a countdown, and this blog will be a good companion to see me through. I look forward to reading this blog again when I’m in other conditions and to realise that it is wisdom to foster condition for efficacy and nourishment. I am not sure those are the right terms, but they are very Western.

For these next five weeks or so I intend to walk every day. I am getting fitter than I was, although I am by no means fit enough; not at all. Rhythm and purpose need movement and energy, and I need that energy to be experienced daily. I have finally managed to walk though: it has taken me decades! The blood flowing through my muscles enhances my brain; my thought is easier, at least, to come by.

The ultimate long-term goal I am realizing is to be well-read. For a man leading literature, my reading is average at best. Currently, I am reading for 3-5 hours every day, which considering where I come from is decent indeed. Reading is also inexpensive, yet the gain is rich. For a man from a background such as I, it is something that will not likely raise me. It will, however, buoy me. And that is enough.

Key to being well-read is to write: I am publishing reviews frequently now. Goodreads is a decent enough community, although I don’t really have a community on there. I can make one though. Finishing my MA essay is key as well: I think an hour or so today should tidy up what I have done. I am proud of how I have improved in my writing and my thinking.  

Of course, the dream is to write fiction. The reality is that I need to make more sacrifices than I am doing now and to read more than I am doing now.

Underlying the rhythm of this reading and writing and walking is my desire to read and prepare for work. The work is essentially DONE. I will take my surface pro and make that my work laptop, or vice versa. I will write on my other blog my plans for a pre-reading curriculum with non-selective students. I will write, maybe, about the realities of a responsive curriculum. I know that I am not a huge fan of monolithic planning. Calendaring and planning how to do this work without risking burnout is the pragmatic lesson this place will have taught me.

Most essential to all of this is to keep socially healthy. I am to see friends old and new, speaking to many on the phone whom I don’t see.

An epic project in which I am engaged is my desire to prepare and sell my miniature collection. I love this plastic crack, a testament to a childhood of imagination. The decision of whether to sell quickly or to administrate for money is pressing on my mind. The time and difficulty to do more than box them is perhaps more than I possess. I will do my best.

And so I find myself ready to prepare for my next job and leaving Dubai. My CV is pretty great, and I am flexible in where I desire to go. I want to:

a)              Complete MA essay.

b)             Complete miniature project (or at least structure it enough).

c)              Plan for leaving Dubai.

That philosophy will be key. I want to serve and I want to stop this signposting of everything through the narrow eyes of this Midland skull.