The Good Press — Issue #64: Walking the Path
My schedule is about to get even busier as I continue to walk a unique career path
Hello and welcome to another edition of The Good Press, a newsletter of observations about life, sports, and/or anything else that comes to mind.
Thanks for reading. I hope you find this issue to be worth your time.
Comments and reader suggestions are always welcome.
Walking the Path
When I finished grad school with a Master’s degree in education, I had a sneaking suspicion that I might just end up working as a teacher someday.
Rather than jumping right into the classroom, however, I ended up taking a very circuitous route over the past eight years. My unique path has included a detour through the professional sports industry, one of my many passions.
I have no regrets about the path I’ve walked thus far. It’s led to an abundance of unforgettable memories and experiences, and I’ve had an absolute blast.
It’s hard to know how different things would be if I’d walked any different steps on my path. I met my wonderful partner who will be my wife someday, and although that had nothing to do with my work or career path directly, who’s to say how different my life would’ve been had I not walked that path?
In Other Words
We all walk our own unique paths in life, and just as we should always be mindful to embrace the process, it’s important to appreciate the journey.
Now, eight years after graduating, I am happy to share that I am finally ready to take the leap and walk the path that’s always been my destiny. My career as an educator starts in a few short weeks, and I am thrilled to get started.
I’ve never been so happy to fill out a plethora of paperwork. They are nothing if not thorough when it comes to processing new hires. I’m very grateful to everyone I’ve been working with who has been assisting me thus far so that I can hopefully hit the ground running as a rookie educator in my thirties.
I do think that I will be a better educator now for having had my experiences on the unique path that I’ve walked. Ultimately, I think it’s made me better. Confidence in the classroom is something I struggled with during my studies, which was a big part of deciding on my little detour, but I know now that my confidence will only grow as I get more experience each and every day.
So here’s to the next steps on my path. I can’t wait to get started.
Parting Thoughts
The greatest educator I’ve ever known is my mother, who has taught me so much and continues to teach me so much, about education and life itself.
Today is my mom’s birthday, and I’m glad that it falls on a Wednesday so I can shout her out and wish her a happy birthday in this space before I call her up. This upcoming school year will be my first in the classroom and the second school year since her retirement following the 2019–2020 school year. We may not have formally overlapped as educators but I owe so much to her. I hope to make her proud as I follow in her footsteps in my own unique way.
Happy birthday, mom! May it be a peaceful, restful day. I love you!
This new part of my journey means that I will likely be slowing down my writing schedule once more, to an indeterminate degree. I’ve been able to publish issues every two weeks since I slowed down from my weekly release schedule. I imagine that going forward, I will be publishing far less than that.
That is bittersweet from a creative perspective, but as I wrote about a few weeks ago in my initial schedule adjustment, The Good Press was something of a challenge to myself to fill in the negative space amid an eerily quiet time.
The world may not be all the way back yet (please stay safe and continue to take precautions), but there’s a lot less negative space in my life right now as so many fortuitous things are presenting themselves to my fiancée and me. Career opportunities to add to my loaded plate, planning the wedding, balancing our many creative endeavors. There’s much to be excited about.
So I can’t say I know for sure when the next issue will be published, only that this is not the last issue. Thank you all again for your continued support. Not every Wednesday can be a newsletter Wednesday, but I know that it will make The Good Press Wednesdays even more meaningful to me when it’s a day that I can get something published that’s worthy of hitting your inboxes.
So stay tuned, as always. This is not “goodbye,” it’s more of a “see you later.”
Till next time,
-Jon
