People in this journal: I live with my three-years-younger sister tenrith, a music major who's about to have her second science fiction short story published next month, and my fiancé ccommack, a professional poker player whose real passion is transit and urban advocacy. My six-years-younger sister ivonova, a recent college grad who teaches guitar and piano, and drives up to Brooklyn every weekend to practice and perform with her indie band, no longer lives with us but also makes the occasional appearance.
About my job: I teach high-school physics, plus the occasional freshman elective, at a coed Catholic independent school in the mid-Atlantic. I do write about this sometimes, because I care a lot about my students, but always under lock, and always protecting their anonymity. I have been teaching at this school for four years, and I continue to feel privileged that they gave the calculus-based Advanced Placement class to someone so young and relatively inexperienced.
Some random facts: I lived in New York City for four years and emerged a hardcore transit user; I hate being cooped up in cars stuck in traffic.
I spent a bunch of my adolescence below the poverty line, but I went to private school for nine years, followed by four years at the kind of college a lot of my current students can't afford, so this sometimes leads to weird contradictions in my identity and anxieties.
I'm vegetarian with a standing exception to invertebrates and an occasional exception to fish in Japanese food, because I went to Japan once to meet/visit ccommack's relatives there, and it's really hard to avoid fish in Japan.
I studied Russian in addition to physics in college, but I've lost a lot of vocabulary since then.
My hometown is the kind of place where 10" of snow has to be exactly timed in order for it to become a snow day. Adjusting to the mid-Atlantic's climate has been interesting.
I spent two years as the president of my college's science fiction club, which turned out to be relatively good social preparation for working with high-schoolers who plan to become engineers.
Things I like to do: I really enjoy participatory music-making, but I don't really play an instrument, so I've mostly been involved in vocal stuff. There are a couple of local groups that get together to sing rounds together, and I've been pretty committed to a few of those. Rounds singing is awesome because you only have to teach everyone one part, and then you have instant harmony.
I like to run, although I am very obviously a Fat Girl Running when I do so. I love the freedom of being able to get places under solely my own power, and I enjoy exploring and keeping tabs on my city neighborhood on foot. I spent a bunch of time in the last year trying to regain strength and control of my body, although deep in winter, in the middle o9f the school year, it's become more difficult.
I care deeply about spirituality, but dislike a lot of specific labels. I tend to identify as a Unitarian Universalist, but I've been a member of a mainline Protestant church for the last several years, because that's the community that's been working for me here. I enjoy going on Catholic spiritual retreats with my students, but disagree with a lot of that Church's specific positions. I went to a Quaker college, which was another useful experience in my religious education.
Most recently, I have been spending mountains of time on wedding-planning stuff, although that will probably be thoroughly over by mid-summer.
Fandom: I pretty systematically don't watch television, but big chunks of free time find me reading a lot of books, and sometimes fanfic about those books. I really enjoy Douglas Adams, Lois McMaster Bujold, Jacqueline Carey, Octavia Butler, and Ursula Le Guin. I don't really think of myself as involved in fandom, other than occasionally reading things which are awesome. I've been following Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality pretty diligently over the past few years, though.
Social media usage: I've been on LJ since 2003, my freshman year of college; I was part of that generation that could still have dial-up at home and didn't truly discover the internet in the form of web sites and forums and blogging until I got to college. I've been on Facebook since it opened up to elite liberal arts colleges, and thought it was a much better site back when it was just pictures and contact info. I treat Facebook as very public, and have remote family and former students friended there, so anything personal or sensitive goes here under lock.
I migrated to DW in early 2010, mostly in search of better software and more compassionate leadership. Everything gets cross-posted, but comments are all on DW. I have but do not use accounts on G+ and Twitter; the pacing of those media doesn't really work well with my brain.
Subscriptions, access and commenting: Unless I'm insanely busy, I read everything on my friendslist, although I don't always comment unless I feel like I might have something substantial to add. It's fine with me if you do the same; it's also fine if you comment more than that, or less. Short comments are kind of nice — sometimes these days it feels like maybe no one's listening.
I have a couple of deep filters for e.g. emotional crises and people who actually know real names and addresses, and I try to keep oversharing about work to a pretty tight filter, but in general most everyday stuff gets just the surface-level friends-only lock.
I’d like to get from my participation here: Mostly, it would be neat to get to know more nifty people!
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2014-03-19 10:56 am (UTC)I live with my three-years-younger sister
About my job:
I teach high-school physics, plus the occasional freshman elective, at a coed Catholic independent school in the mid-Atlantic. I do write about this sometimes, because I care a lot about my students, but always under lock, and always protecting their anonymity. I have been teaching at this school for four years, and I continue to feel privileged that they gave the calculus-based Advanced Placement class to someone so young and relatively inexperienced.
Some random facts:
I lived in New York City for four years and emerged a hardcore transit user; I hate being cooped up in cars stuck in traffic.
I spent a bunch of my adolescence below the poverty line, but I went to private school for nine years, followed by four years at the kind of college a lot of my current students can't afford, so this sometimes leads to weird contradictions in my identity and anxieties.
I'm vegetarian with a standing exception to invertebrates and an occasional exception to fish in Japanese food, because I went to Japan once to meet/visit
I studied Russian in addition to physics in college, but I've lost a lot of vocabulary since then.
My hometown is the kind of place where 10" of snow has to be exactly timed in order for it to become a snow day. Adjusting to the mid-Atlantic's climate has been interesting.
I spent two years as the president of my college's science fiction club, which turned out to be relatively good social preparation for working with high-schoolers who plan to become engineers.
Things I like to do:
I really enjoy participatory music-making, but I don't really play an instrument, so I've mostly been involved in vocal stuff. There are a couple of local groups that get together to sing rounds together, and I've been pretty committed to a few of those. Rounds singing is awesome because you only have to teach everyone one part, and then you have instant harmony.
I like to run, although I am very obviously a Fat Girl Running when I do so. I love the freedom of being able to get places under solely my own power, and I enjoy exploring and keeping tabs on my city neighborhood on foot. I spent a bunch of time in the last year trying to regain strength and control of my body, although deep in winter, in the middle o9f the school year, it's become more difficult.
I care deeply about spirituality, but dislike a lot of specific labels. I tend to identify as a Unitarian Universalist, but I've been a member of a mainline Protestant church for the last several years, because that's the community that's been working for me here. I enjoy going on Catholic spiritual retreats with my students, but disagree with a lot of that Church's specific positions. I went to a Quaker college, which was another useful experience in my religious education.
Most recently, I have been spending mountains of time on wedding-planning stuff, although that will probably be thoroughly over by mid-summer.
Fandom:
I pretty systematically don't watch television, but big chunks of free time find me reading a lot of books, and sometimes fanfic about those books. I really enjoy Douglas Adams, Lois McMaster Bujold, Jacqueline Carey, Octavia Butler, and Ursula Le Guin. I don't really think of myself as involved in fandom, other than occasionally reading things which are awesome. I've been following Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality pretty diligently over the past few years, though.
Social media usage:
I've been on LJ since 2003, my freshman year of college; I was part of that generation that could still have dial-up at home and didn't truly discover the internet in the form of web sites and forums and blogging until I got to college. I've been on Facebook since it opened up to elite liberal arts colleges, and thought it was a much better site back when it was just pictures and contact info. I treat Facebook as very public, and have remote family and former students friended there, so anything personal or sensitive goes here under lock.
I migrated to DW in early 2010, mostly in search of better software and more compassionate leadership. Everything gets cross-posted, but comments are all on DW. I have but do not use accounts on G+ and Twitter; the pacing of those media doesn't really work well with my brain.
Subscriptions, access and commenting:
Unless I'm insanely busy, I read everything on my friendslist, although I don't always comment unless I feel like I might have something substantial to add. It's fine with me if you do the same; it's also fine if you comment more than that, or less. Short comments are kind of nice — sometimes these days it feels like maybe no one's listening.
I have a couple of deep filters for e.g. emotional crises and people who actually know real names and addresses, and I try to keep oversharing about work to a pretty tight filter, but in general most everyday stuff gets just the surface-level friends-only lock.
I’d like to get from my participation here:
Mostly, it would be neat to get to know more nifty people!