Now Panic and Freak Out

I randomly selected an AP prompt to use in class today for an activity.  It happened to be from 1993.  The year meant nothing to me.  I picked the prompt because it had the form I wanted, something easy to deal with for a first time breaking them down.  Suddenly in my last class, a student said, "Hmm.  1993.  A very good year," and the pieces clicked together giving me an extremely odd moment.

This class, by and large, was born in 1993/1994.  That means that they were busy coming into the world during my senior year of high school.  I was having the year they're having now when they were being blanket-wrapped and bottle-fed.  It's sort of messing with my head and not just a little.  I am a whole person older than they are.

This is not an "oh-God-I'm-so-old" post.  Well, in truth, the students probably perceive me that way.  (Actually, I have no idea how they perceive me.  I just assume they think of all their teachers that way.)  That doesn't bother me.  It's just that this realization is a bit of a shock, sort of an unexpected duality that snuck up on me.

This also means that they are the first class that are actually young enough to be my children.  I would have had to have started very, very early, it's true, but it's possible now.  That slammed me like a hammer.  I looked at those students sitting in those desks and thought about what it might be like to have a son or daughter that age.  It would not register.  Biologically possible, but not in any way, form, or fashion comprehensible.  Would my children be anything like them?  Would they be as bright and wonderful?  Would they be as full of potential and promise?  I often look at my friends' children and think about what it might be like to have a child of 3, of 5, of 7...what about a high school senior?

Of course, that started me down a road mentally that I will not pursue in writing here because of certain recent unpleasantness...the road of whether or not I will ever have any children of my own at all and what that means to me and my family.  One day, I will write that blog, but I cannot and will not right now.  I'm just going to ignore that just a bit longer, dance and sing and pretend it's not hovering in the corner with wings and claws.