Blogging On (and in) My Mind

It is a little hard for me to believe that I haven't blogged since August! I guess I've been a little busy....

I don't know if other bloggers experience this, but I find that I do a lot of blogging in my head. It's kind of a neat phenomenon, I have a profound thought (well, a thought anyway), and as I think about it, the words come together as if I were blogging about it.

The words flow as if I were writing it down, but this occurs only in my head, usually pretty late at night, as I sit in the boys' room while they fall asleep and I have the only quiet moment(s) I get all day. Sadly, the wonderful blogs that I have composed in this virtual way never made it to the actual blogosphere - primarily because I fall asleep in their room and awaken only to drag myself to my own bed to fall back asleep.

So, sadly, I am left with some random thoughts:

I found myself very disappointed when I overheard a mom who I thought was an unschooler (an assumption I have stopped making about people that are in the Unschoolers group we participate in, regardless of the group name) having a discussion with a school-at-home mom in our group about curriculums and "teaching" methods.

Another (so I thought) die hard unschooler has her son go to co-op classes that sounded decidely schoolish (but I could have misheard this one).

And this came just when I could have used a little reinforcement about the unschooling life and the sense it makes (I actually never waiver from this, but it doesn't hurt to have some support about it). I must have been feeling slightly insecure, though, because I was really bothered by their display of insecurity. I guess I still think that we are on the forefront of a fundamental change, and how will change occur when even the "outliers" all just fall back on the same old patterns and behaviors?

Another random thought is about how schools have become necessary because we have set up this economy that requires that both parents work (usually) in order to have some kind of decent life. It also occurs to me that school is necessary (perhaps) for "disadvantaged" kids, because many of them would not get exposure to certain technologies or other elements if it were not for school. That is not to say we shouldn't change what school looks like, though.

Random thought #3 (related to the previous one) is about tradeoffs, and is it really necessary to scale back dramatically to manage an unschooled life? I have been thinking about this one a lot lately as I try to juggle working (from home) and spending time with my boys when they need it. Many people in my online groups and even the physical ones live pretty sparsely - and even advocate this. But is it necessary? I think not, but I must say I don't have a lot of evidence for my point of view. I just read something recently that said the recession has forced everyone to look at "what really matters" - I know this has happened at least once before in my lifetime, because I remember the stories about people fleeing to remote regions to live the "simple life".

Random thought #4 is about work and money and happiness - this discussion came up the other day and I think I can summarize it this way: I was brought up with the idea that you should find work to make as much money as possible so you will be happy. I now believe that it is better to find work that makes you happy, and then money will follow (or not, but at least you're happy anyway). This is not a new theory, of course, but it remains one that is difficult for people (even me) to embrace, probably because we are taught pretty early on that our own happiness is unimportant.

Perhaps more on those random thoughts in another blog - hopefully one in print instead of in my mind.