she nods gravely has had time to figure/I may have wanted better for her

I am a more neurotic person, I think, than I have ever given myself credit for.

I've been telling you guys that living and working in Korea has made me into a more anxious person than I have ever been before.

I don't think that's true.

It's true that I have a lot of anxiety about teaching. But my anxiety about teaching is a continuation of my ever-present desire to do my job (whatever it may be) well. This is not a new desire, and not a new anxiety. Why on earth did I care so much about my high school assignments if not because I wanted to do my job well? It definitely wasn't because of any high-flown respect for the education I was receiving. And why did I work so hard that summer I was at Target, or the next summer spent taking verbal abuse at HIO? It wasn't because I had much respect for the organization I was working for, and it wasn't because I enjoyed what I was doing or thought I was helping the world somehow by stuffing those envelopes a little bit faster. It was because I wanted to do my job well, and I wanted to please my superiors.

The difference is that in the past, I felt confident (most of the time) that I was doing my job well. Here, I have severe doubts about whether I have taught anyone anything in my time as an "English teacher," which has made my work-anxiety more apparent than it was before.

So, the anxieties I have here are not new. Neither is my psychotic avoidance/fear of the outside world that has me using all possible excuses to avoid leaving my apartment on days when it is not required of me. (Have I ever told you what I was like in London?) Neither are the deep-rooted insecurities that I've still let prevent me from seeking out the queer community in Seoul. Neither is the body/height anxiety that I still allow to frighten me away from tango with shorter men. (I don't mean that I think there's anything wrong with taller women w/shorter men; I think that's perfectly normal. And I have nothing against shorter men. It's anxiety about my own body and my own height that I'm talking about. Dancing with shorter men makes me extremely paranoid that they are frustrated at having to dance with me because of my height.)

I have a lot of neurotic body habits that I am too ashamed of to reveal even to those of you who have told me some/all of your neurotic body habits. That still stands; I'm not going to tell you about them. But it's a rare day when I don't bite my lips til they bleed at least twice.

I've spent a lot of time pretending to myself that I am not an anxious or neurotic person, but I don't think that has ever been true. I have overwhelming amounts of social anxiety, and I don't know why I'm only realizing this now, or why it's taken me this long to name it for what it is (though certainly some credit goes to @bird_esque and @andmyfeetare for making me feel less and less like neuroses were something shameful and not-to-be-talked-about).

I think I've been trying to create some image of myself as a strong person, because so much of my self-worth in centered on being able to do things and on being unafraid to do them. This is at least partly related to my constant need to separate my current self from my past selves, because I see more of my own faults than I used to, and I recognize my past selves as neurotic people.

I wonder if my "strong image" has fooled anyone. Realistically, I'm afraid of doing a lot of things. I once told one of my co-teachers that I was nervous about going to tango class because I had no friend to go with, and she laughed at me. "Coming to Korea by yourself is a lot scarier than going to tango class by yourself," she said. That should be true, right? Why was I able to make the decision to come to Seoul, but am consistently unable to make the decision to attend the everyday social events that should be filling my life by now?

And another thing: my mom's knee dislocation a year and a half ago made me realize way back then how fragile and how ableist my belief in my own strength is, when at any moment my body could change, could become unable to do many of the things (mountain climbing, dancing) that have come to be part of my identity.

How can I separate my identity from being able to do these things? How can I believe in my own worth without connecting my worth to the things I do well? How can I accept my neuroses and social anxieties without allowing them to prevent me from doing the things I want to be doing?

There is too much to tell you, how can I say it all?

1. I had an open class with Park Mi-Ran this Wednesday, which means: people watching me teach, all my co-teachers watching me teach, 3-4 other teachers watching me teach, the principal and vice-principal watching me teach, no parents watching me teach (for which I am infinitely grateful). Which means: forcibly inserting myself into Park Mi-Ran's good time, no longer waiting for her to make space for me as a leader of the classroom. Because if I wait for her to hand control over to me, she will take control and then the class will be over and no one will know I was there.

2. These days, my relationship with Park Mi-Ran reminds me of my relationship with my mom before I moved out of the house. She is maybe the most significant person in my life here. She arranges my schedule and protects me from unfair treatment and makes me feel so powerless sometimes. She has so much control over my life, she choreographs my entire life within the school and a significant amount of my extracurricular activities; I want to rail at her and assert my independence. But (instead of the explosive fights I had with my mom) the tension here remains all under the surface. Park Mi-Ran is my immediate boss; she has 30+ years of teaching under her belt. If I create a conflict with her, it would essentially guarantee that virtually the entire staff would be hostile towards me for the remainder of my contract. Irony of ironies: sometimes I feel as trapped here as I did during my days at Grandville High School.

3. I've been eating nothing but clementines for hours.

4. I know that it's December now, but I can't quite make myself believe it. No snow no snow no snow no familiar Christmas tunes no Christmas lights lining the streets. What will I do for my 3-day Christmas vacation? What will I send you for Christmas?

il-il-il-il

Seoul likes filtered water. Everywhere, there are water coolers with as much near-boiling/near-frigid tasty water as you could possibly want.

Ergo: the water cooler for my apartment building is in the hallway on my floor, about 4 meters from my door. I frequently leave my door ajar as I go to fill up my water jug, and I did so last night at about 1 in the morning. Only, last night was a windy night, and a strong gust through the hallway blew my door shut. It's self-locking.

The last time I felt like I was losing myself here, I stayed up all night skyping and writing postcards. This time, I sat outside my door for upwards of 7 hours in nothing but my bathrobe, intermittently filling my water jug with hot water to keep myself warm (it's cold here now, did I tell you? Last night was a quite the windy thunderstorm, and I would have loved it if I had been under my comforter). I didn't have a cell phone with me, so I couldn't call my co-teachers or my building manager, so the only thing to do was to wait until the building manager arrived at about 8:30 this morning. By the time I got back in my room, I had a slew of missed calls from Park Mi-Ran, wondering where I was. I'd been having a rough night before I got locked out, so I'm sure you can imagine that I was on the verge of tears when I described to her why I hadn't arrived at school that day. She was quite concerned, and convinced the vice-principal to give me the day off so that I could rest and warm myself up. (Maybe they're worried I'll get swine flu?) The day off was really nice. I spent it drinking tea and eating boiled eggs and reading and napping and trying not to think about lesson plans. I may or may not be recovering from my 2-3 day slump.

I've been having a rough weekend of it. I couldn't really tell you why. I feel utterly incapable of preparing for my classes. I feel sick-ish. I am panic-stricken and convinced that I am not doing and will never do anything worthwhile. (Did you know that my greatest fear is stagnation?) Then, last night, I got a confirmation of sorts that a friendship which I knew to have ended has been severed more completely than I thought, and I still don't understand what I did to make this person hate me so much.

I am at my worst when unshakably convinced of my own worthlessness, and I was certainly convinced of it over the weekend.

Don't take this post too hard, though. You should know by now that I have these days sometimes, no matter where I am or what I am doing. At the risk of cheapening my own emotions, I might go so far as to say that, quite simply, the honeymoon period of my stay in Seoul is over, and I am now faced with a more realistic picture of how hard it will be to build myself a life here.

On the up-side, I killed 4 mosquitoes while I sat out in the hallway, which is totally a record for me with Korea's mosquitoes from hell.

I don't even remember what a milonete /is/ anymore.

I went to meditation club for the second time today, because I thought about it and realized that I wanted to. I don't know if I'm doing it "right" (if there is a right way to do it), but I find it relaxing and feel calmer than usual afterwards. Which I like, and want to continue.

My first class today went really well, and I felt for the first time as though I was getting the hang of teaching. The other two classes I have on Thursdays were not as smooth, but who knows, maybe one day I will feel as though I've got the hang of it again.

I've found another tango place that offers beginner and intermediate lessons (as opposed to Tango O Nada, which only offers advanced lessons). It's called El Tango Cafe. But I need to call them to get their schedule for sure. Shy Pam/the Demon doesn't want me to call them. @warmandbarky @bird_esque if you have the time, would you mind harassing me about this a little?

Shy-Pam waxes melodramatic,

or, on how exhausting it is for me to constantly hold myself open to people/the world:

Remember the day before
I left? I told you I was nervous but
what I meant was: help,
my sternum's been cracked open. Though,
[they said] this will hurt less than two
holes under your breasts, though [they
[promised] here, can't you breathe better
now?

Later, the clamp got stuck [though, etc.] Self-
locking [they said], stainless steel. Sterilized, no
fever, don't
concern yourself, [they said] though the streets are
dirty here and, I don't know,
the swine flu? No wires sewing me together, chest
spread-eagled - I can't breathe better now, I
can't breathe now, I
can't.

Beverly Hills, Seoul

Yesterday, I found out where I was teaching; today, I am at my new apartment.

My school is Seoul Electronics High School, located in Suocho-gu, south of the Han River that runs through the city. I've been told that my district is sometimes called the Beverly Hills of Seoul, and can hardly wait to find out what the Korean version of rich-bitch New York mothers (@bird_esque) is like.

But even though I'll be living and teaching in a wealthy district, the students who attend the electronics school (a technical high school) are generally those who did not do well in middle school, are from poorer areas of Seoul, and have very low comprehension of English (the richer the area, the more likely that students will have received private English instruction). The gap between the residents and the students will definitely be interesting.

The school is co-ed, but strongly dominated by boys, unsurprisingly. I'll be teaching 18 hours a week to classes of 15-20 students, and I'll also be spending 2 hours a week teaching English to my fellow teachers.

My apartment is about 30 minutes away from the school by subway, but still in the same district. It's small, but no smaller than I expected. I have all the space and facilities I need, and I can't wait to get all my things unpacked to make it feel more homey.

Those are the facts - now for the emotions. I began to get nervous yesterday (Friday), especially when I found out that I would teaching mostly boys, but I've never experienced anything like the nervous breakdown I had when I woke up this morning. I literally could not keep anything down: the smallest sips of water had me running for the bathroom to throw up. I was constantly on the verge of tears from the time I woke until I'd been left to myself in my apartment. Shy Pam coming out and trying to convince me that I can't do this.

I can, though, can't I?