Let me tell you a story about some of my people, it's a good one. I mean, sort of.
Ok. So here's the thing you need to know about me. I'm a perfectionist in almost everything but proof reading.
I swear I never proof read a paper in college. Mostly because I was always writing 12 page papers the night before they were due. I hate it. I'm not sure why, though, because I love editing other people's writings. I guess, I just don't read my own.
And, as I can imagine you've noticed. I suck at typing. It's because my fingers don't move as fast as my brain. It's just the way it is.
Well, when you go to school to be a teacher, they kind of expect you do write some units for whatever subject tickles you're fancy. Mine is English. I'm not even going to note the irony of that. Just know, I'm making the same joke about myself in my head as you are, dear reader.
I mean, units, duh? Well, at Eau Claire, they really pushed cross curriculum units. We all like to be well rounded and drive the same themes home in EVERY subject. Super great idea in theory. Much harder in practice.
but I digress, what else is new?
Cross Curriculum Units. Right. So, me and 4 of my pals from other subjects got together and wrote a 250 page unit for 5 different subjects complete with assessments, assignments and handouts for every subject....it was on Identity. We worked super hard for about a month on it, though it was assigned 2 months previous, and while we tend to procrastinate our stuff was good. I picked a good group and we all stayed up late together, met early and email, texted and called each other checking on progress to the point of obsession.
We're all procrastinating over achievers. There is such a thing. I am walking proof.
Everything was given to me 3 days before it was due. As the resident grammar and language Nazi, it was my job to proof read everyone's stuff and make sure it was formatted correctly and sounded like we'd spent months working on it. Instead of month. singular, then i was supposed to print and bind it. Making it look pretty and professional.
All was going to plan, i read and re-read every page of that stupid unit until I had it memorized. I printed it and had it bound.
*enter Jabs (whose real name is John) and Brent (my gay)* These two are extensions of myself. We are the three amigos, i practically lived with them all through college. They are my people. my family. the people i would freak out to and at when i was super stressed and they'd get me drunk to make me feel better. They are my bests.
Well, I brought my newly bound unit to them to show them what a work of art it was. I had just returned from a celebratory happy hour with my group, So i was tipsy. Though it should be noted that i am just hyper emotional always. I don't need booze to make me like that. I need no help with the crazy.
I hand them the unit, smugly, daring them to find one thing wrong with it. They half-heartedly flipped through it, impressed not so much by the content, but by the amount of time and energy expelled into something that would never actually get taught.
yep. it was a fake unit. sitting in my professor's filing cabinet somewhere.
Then handed it back to me, and john mixed me a drink. I stared at it one more time, and then i saw it.
ON THE COVER PAGE. THE WORD IDENTITY WAS SPELLED WRONG.
i dropped the unit, quickly picking it up, pointing, and screaming "WHAT DOES THIS SAY, WHAT DOES THIS SAY BECAUSE IT DOESN'T SAY IDENTITY LIKE ITS SUPPOSED TO" not actually listening for an answer.
mass panic ensued. i started swearing and crying because not only had i just come from happy hour where my entire group looked it over and ok-ed it, but it was now 10pm in EAU CLAIRE so the only thing open at this time of night ARE THE BARS, which at this point, did me no good.
so i do what any normal, mature, adult would do and i begin to full on weep. Big old crocodile tears, cuss words flyin'. I mean i lost my shit. all of it.
Brent and John just stare at me. (they're used to my slightly dramatic reactions) then they immediately begin to form a game plan. Brent takes my lap top and emails john all the pages of the unit, while I try to pull my shit together. Then I fix the typo on the cover page. Jabs then drives down to lower campus, breaks into the academic building where he works (Well, he had a key, but he's not supposed to be in there at night) and he re-printed the entire 250 page unit in color for me, and then Brent and I put it all back together the right way. We bound it. I cried more. Hugged them both. (I love those boys and would take a bullet for them, but as a general rule, we don't ever hug each other. I'm not sure why. i'm a hugger by nature) and thanked them until the words sounded funny, like they weren't real words. you know how that happens when you say a word too many times? It starts to sound made-up. Then we went back to my apartment, safely tucked away the unit, and then went out to the only thing that was actually open at 11 pm on a thursday. The Bars. We had yet another celebratory drink...or 4.
I wore out the words "thank you" that night, and they didn't seem to mind one bit. They think it's hilarious, mostly because of my Oscar worth freak out. We still joke about it, today. Jabs just wrote it on my faceboook wall which is why I'm telling you now. I laugh about it now, but that night was one of the most sincere forms of friendship I've ever experienced. It makes my heart overflow.
Those boys. I love em. more than most things. They've just always been there. Right now, though, I feel far from them, but I know that this is a season, and we're all going to be just fine. They're my lifers. When i get married they will be the first people to approve my potential husband and the first people to tell horribly embarrassing but side achingly funny stories about me and us.
Because when you let people into your heart and life the way those boys are in mine, you give them permission to expose the real you to everyone, and they'll do it without having to be asked. They know me better than I know myself most days. They understand what makes me scared and how I act when i'm nervous, and how i always try to surpise them with something but they've always seen it coming. They know all the facets of me and when they raz me about the weird parts of me, they are doing it out of a tender place, because some of the things i hate most about myself are their favorite things about me.
And sometimes you have to try and see yourself the way your best friends and family see you in order to love yourself the way they do. Completely and without hesitiation.
So sometimes I get a little sad when I don't see them as often as I would like, or I get frustrated when our seasons of life don't match up and we're all trying to do our own things. I have to remind myself that they aren't going anywhere, and that i'm not necessarily supposed to understand why things are the way they are right now, i'm simply supposed to love them. and us through it because our roads always come back together.
So, if you're wondering, No, this little situation did NOT teach me to proof read better. I still rarely proof anything that's mine.....thats why I have other people do it for me.
I don't even know how to end this, except to say that I hope everyone has their own version of Jabs and Brent because it really doesn't get much better than those two boys.
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