A Moment I Felt Most Satisfied With My Life

I have decided to stop trying to keep track of the prompts and challenges I'm participating in and just write about them. I hope this is not confusing to anyone, and I hope you still enjoy the posts. I do like having a prompt. I get a lot more ideas this way than I would have otherwise.

The day I got my teaching certificate was a moment in time I wish I could freeze. On the morning of November 18, 2010 I took my first day away from school since the school year had begun. Up until then I had either been student teaching or volunteering in a classroom as a teacher's aide essentially. That morning, however, I was going to get the paperwork I needed from Ottawa University and then to the Arizona Department of Education.

By 9:00 AM I had my teaching certificate in my hand. I was slightly saddened at how anti-climatic it was to get that piece of paper. I gave the man at the counter money, he looked over my paperwork from Ottawa and checked some test scores in the computer, then printed a really plain looking certificate and passed it through the bullet-proof glass to my waiting hands. There wasn't even a "congratulations" or a smile. I don't know why I had been expecting balloons and confetti to fall from the ceiling, but I really had been hoping for more.

By 10:00 I was standing back at the school where I had done my student teaching, filling out paperwork to become an official employee. I was scheduled for my first substitute teaching job the next day. Between then and Christmas I was once again either in a classroom as a sub or volunteering full time. I didn't miss another day.

That night my husband and daughters insisted we go out to eat. The waiter (who also happened to be the manager) had a wife who had also recently gotten her teaching certificate. He gave us free desserts to celebrate the occasion. The girls behaved excellently at the restaurant, and we all had a pleasant conversation. We talked about what our future looked like and how excited we all were that I was done with school and ready to take on the world.

I don't think there was a time in my life that could have been more perfect. On that day the world was truly mine to do whatever I wanted. I had confidence that I would be teaching in my dream job the next school year, and I was so proud of my family. We all worked out together on a regular basis, and we worked as a team to get the household chores done because for the first time ever both Daniel and I worked outside of the home. Life was more than just satisfying at that moment- it was a dream come true.