New Learnings and Musings

A Children's Book Publisher

New Things I Have Learned Today
- A hot steamy shower that lasts too long can result in shorting out all of the electrical in a bathroom.
- Having a cheerful personality, as opposed to a blah one, makes working a whole lot easier and waiting on people a lot more enjoyable.
- A man who does not live with a woman in her mid-twenties will never understand how a boot can be just as comfortable as a sneaker, if not more so.
- Technology can connect me to anyone in the world, but still can't create a decent cataloging system.
- Charles Manon has a cell phone (who could he possibly be talking to???)
- I passed subtest II of the mathematics CSET. =D YAY!!!* 


I want to make sure that I am using the title of my blog correctly. My understanding is that a serendipitous disaster is an accidental disaster that is fortuitous. I had previously thought that I had never encountered a serendipitous disaster. However I believe that the way I met my hubby (Marty) may have been the result of a serendipitous disaster.

It was my senior year of high school and I was on top of the world. I had a boyfriend, a real boyfriend that took me out on dates and had me over to dinner at his house and spent time in my room.  I met him at prom my junior year. I'd gone stag, to shame my ex-boyfriend who was a senior and without a date to prom because I had dumped him. It really wasn't very nice of me. While there, I met a stranger, also a junior, in the karaoke room where we talked, spontaneously kissed, and at the stroke of midnight I ran off in shock that I had just kissed someone I absolutely did not know. Quite by accident, we "fell in love" and became an item in less than a week. He told me he loved me and I thought we were going to be together forever. Blah, blah, blah.; you get the picture.
          Eventually, I became disillusioned with my boyfriend. All year my friends had been telling me what a scum bag he was. Instead of listening to them and thinking about what they had to say, I lashed out a them and pushed them away. What did they know? I was in LOVE, something they couldn't possibly know anything about. But as the summer approached and I became more aware of the fact that my childhood was slipping away, I began to see what they were talking about.
It was little things, really. When he rolled his car and totaled it, I understood it was an accident. When he insisted on driving my car, even though his parents refused to let him drive one of theirs and had given me instructions not to let him drive, I began to think he was a little irresponsible. He would also compare me to his friends' girlfriends (who I could not stand to be around).
          "Why can't you be more open and adventurous like Mia?**" he would say, and be adventurous, he didn't mean going on hikes. 
          The further into senior year we got, the more I began to resent him. Especially when it came to our English class. By a twist of fate, he ended up in my English class. By nagging my counselor for two years I ended up with my favorite English teacher. He was quirky and fun and had bent over backwards my freshman year to prevent me from failing and bring me up to my potential. I owed him a lot and I wasn't about to start slacking in his class a second time around. My boyfriend, however, could have cared less. He openly called assignments from our teacher lame and pointless and never cared much about his work (he thought that I should be changing the grades for him anyway since I was also our English teacher's TA). The worst was when we teamed up for our end of the year video project. We went into Hollywood to film historic literary sights and explain their significance. When my boyfriend waited until we were at the Chateau Marmont to tell me that he hadn't charged the video camera's battery, I blew up at him. On the street. In front of several shocked on-lookers. A bellman quietly asked us to leave. That was the start of many similar incidents and shoutings.
           The morning of graduation was the last of these encounters. I woke up early that morning and spent forever and a day making myself up, doing my hair, and picking just the right outfit. I was thrilled to be graduating and my boyfriend would be escorting me to the Senior Breakfast at a downtown hotel. He showed up on time. In his jeans, t-shirt, greasy hair, and leather jacket. If you looked only at him you would have thought this was any other day and there was nothing special about it. I was annoyed that he looked like he had just rolled out of bed, but steam began trickling from my ears when he explained that we would need to be stopping by the school first so he could complete his physics presentation because he had not done it on the day it was due: last week. I drove him to his class silently. I could have been mistaken for a pot that had been boiling over too long as I stood in the back of the room waiting for him to finish not only his project but having a social conversation with his teacher. We were late for the breakfast. Very late and he was being cordial as if there were nothing more important that chit chatting about the weather. I was too angry to speak.
           My friends had saved us a couple of seats at their table when we got to breakfast. I loosened up as I joked with my friends about the answers we wrote for our ten year anniversary cards. My boyfriend was uninterested, but did manage to get into a nasty argument with my best friend. They had never gotten along, but thought that they didn't need to. He thought I was nuts for being upset at the offensive things he had said to my best friend and we left early...because he had a doctor's appointment...which he forgot to tell me about. On the way to his doctor, we continued our 'discussion' about his opinion of my friends. Discussion became screaming and crying and slamming on the brakes at every red light. I was coming undone and couldn't take it anymore. We broke up in the car. On the morning of graduation. Oh, and I still needed to drive him home from the doctor. I'm sure you can guess how pleasant that car ride was. 
         So, my high school graduation was ruined. I was miserable all day and night. To add insult to injury, I learned a few weeks later that a girl I considered my close friend and become close friends with my, now, ex-boyfriend. It was nothing romantic, she just found that she liked him very much as a friend and thought that he needed her support more than I did. That whole summer was difficult; I had gone from believing I had found a soul mate to being single (eh, that wasn't so bad) and with all of my friends alienated. I felt alone and unaccomplished. 
          I began college with my head held high, though my spirits were low. I resolved to make a new life and a new start for myself. No more serial monogamy; I would date for fun and meet many new people. I didn't want a relationship. I didn't want a boyfriend. On my first day of college I dolled myself and went to my classes. During my break I purchased my books at the bookstore (an exciting endeavor in and of itself!) where I caught the eye of a young man buying used text-books outside of the store. I wooed that boy without a word for three days, waiting for him to finish his shift and go to a class where I would follow him and feign being lost. On the day that I gave up on said boy, he called me over and asked me out. Point blank. To Disneyland, where, two years later, he asked me to marry him. 
         The worst year of my life became the catalyst for the best years of the rest of my life. That boyfriend from my senior year was a serendipitous disaster.

* The CSET is a standardized test for prospective teachers in the state of California. Each test consists of several substests and there is a tests for various fields of education. I have a multiple subject credential for teaching grades k-8 in a self-contained classroom. I want to teach math in middle school. So I had to pass subtests I and II of the math test (which covers algebra, number theory, geometry, tig, probability, and statistics) to be qualified for such certification. I will hopefully be certified to teach middle school/high school math by this June.

**Names have been changed to protect the skanky.