Musings on Life and Living

I posted this on my substituting blog today, but I wanted to share it with my family and friends who do not regularly visit Adventures in Substituting : Today is Memorial Day here in the United States of America, and so it is that all government buildings are shut down, including the schools. It is a day to reflect upon the great sacrifices made by men and women throughout history in the defense of our nation. I tend to avoid any overt religious commentary on this blog, for the simple fact that I wish to focus on my work as an educator, more specifically so as a substitute teacher, but I thought I'd make an exception today. I figure that if we truly believe that we are "one nation under God" then it is totally okay for me to bring up my own faith every now and then. I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints--a church commonly known to many as "the Mormon Church" because of our belief in the truthfulness of The Book of Mormon as an addi...

Yesterday was Easter Sunday, and our ward had a Sacrament meeting devoted to music and messages about the events leading up to and following the Saviour's death and resurrection. Gretch and I are in the ward choir, so we were a part of the music. And last week I was asked to be one of the speakers. I know that we use the word "talk" in the LDS church to describe sermons, but I like to think of my talk as my Easter sermon. The topic I was given was... actually, no; I'm not going to say what my topic was. It annoys me when people do it in their talks, so it would be silly to do it now. For those who continue reading, I'll let you decide what my message was. I gave no formal title to my sermon. When I am given the opportunity to speak in Sacrament meeting, I spend all of the time between the invitation and the day of the meeting contemplating the topic. I read what the Scriptures have to say about the topic, I read relevant passages from books I have acquired, and ...

As I am pretty certain everyone reading this blog knows, I am an active participant on several different blogs, many of them related to religion, politics, education, and social issues. In a recent blog post at By Common Consent, a Mormon blog, about immigration, a nugget was posted by a (to the best of my knowledge) drive-by commenter, ranting and raving about "illegals" ruining our nation. Here is the verbatim post: Do illegals pay social security? Millions of dollars are sent back to Mexico to their families. And their are jobs besides farm jobs that that citizens haven’t done because wages have been depressed by importing them at a cheaper rate. A condition of higher unemployment means that any race, Irish etal takes opportunities from those who first deserve them. Eventually, the citizen would take any job to survive if they hadn’t already been taken by then. If no citizen needed that job, then I wouldn’t care about that aspect of it. But their is a coverup of statistic...

It is a few days past the middle of April. We had some wonderfully warm and sunny days, then the weather turned north and it got cold, rainy, and grey. Last night we had severe thunderstorms that knocked out power in some communities (although, fortunately, not ours). We are among the many of North America who really wish spring would just get here and stay for a couple of months and then turn into summer before it cools off again and we prepare for another winter that will, inevitably, be cold and miserable. Back when I was in high school (over ten years ago--that's right: this May is the 10th anniversary of my high school graduation), I was actively involved in the school plays and musicals as the Chief Spotlight Operator. I had tried out for a play my freshman year and, upon not making it, was encouraged to sign up to do lights with my friend Jacob. The current spot light operators were both Seniors, so the drama/art/woodworking/who-knows-what-else teacher, Mr. Hershberger, af...

A thought has been running through my mind this morning and it doesn't seem to be planning on leaving any time soon. I have things I need to get done (such as applying for more jobs for the coming school year), so I am hoping that this may help me at least share the thought well enough that I can worry about other things. The thought is really more of a question. Who am I? Who are you? How do I define myself? How do you define yourself? So often in our lives, we have opportunities to introduce ourselves to new people. I've mentioned before how I have this habit of introducing myself as Alex Valencic but, if I am writing my name, it is always Alex T. Valencic. After sharing my name, it is inevitable that someone will want to know more about me, and the first thing they ask is what I do. How we respond to this question says a lot about what we think of ourselves, I think. When someone asks me what I do, I respond by either saying I am a teacher or I am a professional educat...

It has been nearly two months since a real update on the blog here. If all of your knowledge about our comings and goings comes from our blog, I'm sorry I've been so lax in keeping things updated. Gretch and I have both been really busy in the most wonderful of ways. Gretch has continued to love her work with AmPride Communications, using her skills at graphic design in awesome ways. AmPride recently published two of their magazines, American Concierge and Community Concierge , which has marked the first time her name has appeared in a professional piece as a designer. One of the coolest parts of her job has been being able to use her skills as a typographer. Someone else in the company wrote all of the copy for the magazines, but Gretch was the one who placed all of the copy (referred to as typesetting, even if she isn't actually setting type the way folks did way-back-when). She also designed several of the ads in the magazines. With both magazines printed, she's now...

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