If you're a bird, I'm a bird

It's weird. We were at school on that Tuesday (October 4) and I told my students that we were having Wacky Wednesday the next day and I was bringing a jar of pickles for all the students that had great behavior that day. I'm sure they had forgotten, but I didn't forget. I picked up a jar of pickles at Piggly Wiggly to take to school. After school that Tuesday I was conferencing with our reading instructional coach when our administrator came on the intercom to tell us we didn't have school for the next three days. She and I discussed when we would evacuate because our husbands probably still had to work. My teammate brought me some papers to hand out as I was packing my bags. I left them lying on the table and said, "If the wind doesn't blow them away, then they will be sitting there when I get back." The rest of my team was like, "I don't know what to do. I feel scattered. Should I start planning for next week or just go ahead and leave?"

In 2007, I moved to Athens, Ga alone. I had survived a break-up 10 months earlier. I graduated from graduate school with a Masters in Elementary Education and took a job at a Title 1 poverty school in Athens, Ga as a 4th grade teacher. I had taught 3 years prior in private schools and had been a substitute in public schools. I had been making $18,000 a year and now I was making $40,000 a year, just like that.  I moved to a new city, had my own 1200 sq ft 2-bedroom apartment for $725/month. It was a pretty amazing, spacious place. My first year teaching in the public school was rough. I did plug into a church, Rock Church, right away. It was a small, spirit-filled non-denominational body. There were quite a few people my age and I was on the dance team. We did stuff outside of Sunday church too. I was still an avid runner, which I used as therapy after the intense break-up.  I asked a friend in Bluffton, SC if there were any single guys at her church, Lowcountry Community Church. Sh