The End of Week 1

My first week as a teacher at my new/old school is done.  It fairly flew by.  I'm tired, but not the bone-weary exhaustion I have felt, not the "and-I-have-to-do-this-again-how-long?" that I've known before.  My co-workers are so tremendously helpful and welcoming, the students are well-behaved (for the most part), and constant little drops of happiness (treats in the lounge, a free shirt, jeans on Friday, a goodie bag from a student organization) keep coming along.

The little details, in fact, keep blowing me away.  The food in the cafeteria is genuinely good, and there is always enough of it.  There are several choices for entrees, lovely vegetables all the time, ice cream and ice-cold bottled water in a cooler at the register.  Nobody winds up with quickly-reheated chicken patties and corn.  I heard a student in line say, in fact, "Yeah, my mom always packs me a lunch, but sometimes that's not so good, so I always get a tray."  It's quiet enough to have a normal conversation in the cafeteria.  My head doesn't pound because of the noise.

I'm starting to stop looking for the other shoe, but I can't quite let go of the fear that it is going to drop at some point.  I don't know how long I will keep subconsciously waiting for that thud that means some hidden cray-cray is coming out of the closet.  I know I can't keep living like that, though, always looking over my shoulder, so deliberately, I'm trying to focus on all the good.

Part of me misses my old home for so long, too.  I sort of miss the view out of my second-floor windows and those long, comforting, red-brick halls.  I wonder how my newspaper staff is getting on.  I worry about my teacher friends left behind there.  I hope that things are somehow managing to change for the better for them, too.

For the most part, though, the relief of not having to be in that environment of stress is nearly overwhelming.  I get up in the morning, and I don't dread the day. When I reach my planning period, I get things done or visit with one of my fellow teachers.  I don't have to just sit behind my desk for awhile and try to get myself together for the rest of the day.   And while I have mostly kept my rule about school work being done at school and home being about home, I will admit that I sat here the past two nights slicing open tennis balls that someone donated to me so I could put them on the bottoms of my desk legs next week to silence the noise of desk movement.  I felt good about doing it, too.

I also had enough time and energy to find a new lesson plan template and beat it into submission.  It was enjoyable to do stuff like that again in a way that the vast majority of things related to education had not been for me in longer than I care to contemplate.  I actually did it before they were due instead of putting it off needlessly as a form of avoidance of something that was frustrating and that I could not change. This time, I didn't feel angry when I worked on the lesson plans because they didn't have to be filled with random glittery bits of edutrendiness that had been culled from some seminar someone had been to or had seen online.  They're set up my way for my classes, are easily adaptable, are actually legitimately reusable since they're in Excel (not my favorite thing, but very good for this sort of document as it turns out).  I'm going to be able to print them off and use all of them, not just have pages and pages of stuff I have to shuffle through to get to the useful bits.  It's deeply satisfying to have my plans be a tool to run my class again and not something hijacked for another purpose.

Next week will be a much more accurate sample of what everything is actually going to be like.  All the new will be worn off, and everyone will be settling in to their regular behaviors.  That hovering shoe might be about to make its appearance known.  Or not.  I'm going to try to be so busy being happy and making things good for my students that I don't notice one way or the other.  

The Edge of Something

Tomorrow, I'll go to school for the first of the obligatory teacher days, something that happens at the beginning of every new school year.  It won't, however, be just another year.  It's the start of the first year at a new school.

Usually at this time, I have acid in my stomach and a headache on the horizon, worried about whatever new challenges and assignments were going to be waiting on me, dreading the hours of meetings that served little purpose.  This time, though, I'm actually looking forward to all of it.

That feeling of optimism has been missing for longer than I care to consider.  I have always been ready to see the students again, but to be honest, for about the last three years, the other parts of going back ground me down a little more each time.

This year, something is different.  Someone asked me the other day if I were ready to go back, and, with a big silly grin on my face, I said, "Actually, yes."  I may be the only teacher in the history of time who has said that, and at the end of the day tomorrow, I may feel like I have been run over by a bus, but for now, here on the edge of something, I am hopeful.

And that's everything.

The Price

I read an article from a teacher blogger I follow about how she was rediscovering all these things she loved to do now that she has moved from what she called a "low-performance, low-support school" to what is apparently its opposite.  She's about 3/4 of the way through her first year there, and it's like she's coming back to life again.  The particular thing she was talking about was cooking, specifically baking.

I had such a mixed reaction about that article.  Part of me was felt happy that she was able to recover.  Part of me was more than a little jealous that she could.  Part of me was absolutely and completely numb, so tired and stressed and dead that I don't think it ever will be able to come back to life at all.

That last part is growing.

It made me look at my own life.  There are lots of things I used to love to do.  I liked to go work out, to swim and go to the gym.  I loved to cook, to have friends over and make food for them, to bake and take those things to other people and places.  I loved to fool around with plants, to do calligraphy and stained glass, to write.  I loved to research things, go around and get in trouble taking photographs, travel, have silly conversations online with people who were interested in the same things I am.

I do so little of any of that anymore.  I go to school.  I teach.  I come home.  I sleep.  Rinse.  Repeat.

It's not that I don't love what I do.  It's just that I am coming to believe that the price for it is a lot higher than I ever realized.  I also don't know what to do about it.  I still feel that I am where I am supposed to be.  What do I do if it uses me all the way up?  Is there something I should be doing to stop it from using me up?  Is there really anything I can do to prevent that?

Is this what life is supposed to be?

I feel very confused.  Well, at least part of me does.  The other part, that part of me that has turned to stone and that is slowly, slowly getting larger, can't quite work up the energy one way or the other....

A Good Man Is Hard to Find

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you odd.  

The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it. 

- Flannery O'Connor

Listen to Bessie while you read this.  She's never, ever a bad idea...

Tonight, I taught Flannery O'Connor's short story "A Good Man Is Hard to Find."  Although I've read it several times before, this was my first time using it in instruction, and as is always the case, I learned an incredible amount about it through the process.  Sometimes I think I get more out of teaching the stories than my classes do from being taught.

Tonight, the moment of transformation that takes place for the grandmother really struck me.  The whole way through the story, she is obsessed with things that are surface or things that are gone.  She romanticizes the Old South where every old homestead was a plantation, where every plantation had hidden silver waiting in the walls,  and where "gracious living" with dress codes and manners marks the worthy.  She believes she can tell a "good man" based on what he looks like, what his speech patterns are, who his "people" are.  She believes herself to be a good woman, a Christian person.

And then reality comes crashing in, quite literally.  

When she is staring down the barrel of the gun, for the very first time in her life, all the externals she has used to insulate herself from real application of the religion she gives lipservice to are stripped away.  There is no protection to be found in her white gloves and navy straw hat.  There is no grace given because she has manners and respect for the place she's from.  Her comfortable life which has allowed those moments before where she's been snide, snobby, or indifferent to the suffering of others is on the verge of ending.  Only in that moment does she understand the reality of the world, the reality of her faith.

She reaches out, and in her sudden and total acceptance of someone who is going to reject it, in her compassion for someone who is going to take her very life, she connects to the core of Christianity.  The same woman who callously ignored the needs of the little child on the roadside is reaching out to the Misfit, and when her hand touches him, something far more significant occurs.  She becomes the thing she's only been pretending to be.  She becomes a good person.

And it's dangerous to be genuinely good in a world that prefers superficiality.  It's costly.  At the end of the story, though, even after she's paid that price, she still smiles.  Something that the Misfits of the world cannot take away even through violence remains.

I need to read more O'Connor.  She's portraying something she calls Christian realism, and the combination of those two concepts intrigues me.  I'm going to be thinking about this one for a long time.  

That Was Unexpected

I went on a trip recently.  I wasn't expecting much from it.  In fact, I had totally negative expectations.  I was grumpy.  I stomped my feet.  I did not want to go.

Shows what I know.

I had a great trip.  Unexpectedly, I found myself with lots of people whose company I really enjoyed.  Some of them were old friends rediscovered.  Some of them were brand new acquaintances I hope to know better.  We had meals, saw the sights, talked together, and it was refreshing in a way I really needed.

Additionally, we got lots of new information and ideas to bring back to our school.  We had conversations with administration at the school and district level.  That hasn't happened in a long time.  I feel more positive about the upcoming school year than I have in a long, long time.

The most unexpected thing was meeting someone who caught my attention.  He's cute.  He's smart.  He's interesting.  Of course, I did what I always do in such prime situations.  I ran like hell, couldn't even talk much to him, he unnerved me so much.  (Sigh.)  I don't know if I'll see him again, but it's likely.  We're both "local," so I imagine we'll run into each other at some point.  Another chance to run away on another day....

Despite my general lack of sense and courage, the trip I was dreading turned into something quite refreshing.  It's nice when that happens.  Hopeful, sort of....

Orphaned Pencils

Like most people, I have a lot of little idiosyncrasies.  I look for four-leaf clovers every time I walk through a patch while I'm walking my dogs.  I collect bobbleheads when I travel.  My favorite clothing is a literary tshirt.  I always carry a fancy vintage handkerchief.  Added to all these other oddities, I am also a rescuer of orphaned pencils.  

There is something heartbreaking about an abandoned pencil.  I find them frequently on the floor of my classroom, sometimes almost used up, sometimes barely sharpened.  I always scoop them up and put them in a brown ceramic cylinder some student made in Ceramics and left in my room one year.  I call it the lost pencil cup.  Students know to look there for something to write with before they ask me about it.

I think the sadness for me comes from seeing a tool so closely related to all the things my heart holds most dear simply cast aside.  There's power in a pencil, power to change the world, power to change someone's mind, power to change oneself.

When a student comes to class and has no pencil every day, there is a kind of hopelessness to it.  It's like seeing someone who needs to put out a destructive blaze but who has no bucket or hose.  They simply lack the right equipment to save themselves.

A pencil lets a person draw a picture to clarify, solve a math problem, make a list.  It allows a poem to be created, things done or cast aside to be crossed off, dots to be connected.  There is a universe encased in a slim wooden or plastic sheath, infinitely malleable and portable.

There's a quote in You've Got Mail about bouquets of freshly-sharpened pencils.  I always smile when I see that part because I know that feeling.  There really *is* something about a brand new pencil.  They're among my favorite school supplies.

There's something to be said about the old ones, too, though.  When you see a pencil that is only as long as your little finger, that has its eraser gone, even one with the indentations made by teeth or the impact against the edge of a desk or table, you're looking at a battle-scarred veteran of the war against idiocy and ignorance.  It deserves the chance to continue its service.

Today after the last bell, I walked around my room and tidied everything up as I always do.  Under one of the desks in the back, I found one of these forlorn instruments.  Except for its eraser, it had almost no use.  I picked it up, carried it over to the turn-in table, placed it next to the others in the cup.  I gathered all my belongings and headed down the stairs to my car.  On the way, another pencil was sitting on the end of our wide wooden banisters, almost as though it was just waiting for me.  I smiled, tucked it in the back pocket of my school work bag.  Monday, it can join the assembly of orphaned pencils waiting a second chance at usefulness.

Things They Don't Tell Teachers to Get in Education Classes

I was in OfficeThing Friday night making a last-minute, last-of-the-year provisioning run.  As I threw things in my cart and ran through the inventory of frequently-used supplies mentally to see if I was forgetting anything, I thought to myself, "This is just another one of those things they don't tell preservice teachers:  Friday nights involve trips to OfficeThing."

And then I started thinking of all the things I have that are "outside of the usual" that make life easier. Consider this blog a public service message.

1.  A small personal heat-seal laminator - You can get one for about $30 if you pay attention.  Mine came from Wal-Mart and was on sale.  I use it for tons of things from making ID cards for my National Honor Society Officers to protecting bell schedules and labels for things.  I still have my large posters done in the library because of size, but for all the little stuff, I do that myself.

2.  Self-adhesive magnet discs - You can buy them from Wal-Mart or a craft store, but I find the best value to be online.  I use them for countless things.  They turn anything into something easily hung and easily removed.  I hang notices, labels, posters, the term cards that compose my word wall, instruction signs, everything really.  I don't have to fight stick-tac (which only sticks SOMETIMES or FOREVER), and it makes it easy and fast to change things out.

3.  Ceiling Hanglars - (yes.  that is their real name.)  Almost every classroom now has drop in "grid" ceilings. If your doesn't, these are of no use to you.  If it DOES, then these are a display/decoration dream-come-true.  I use them to suspend artifacts from my travels, mobiles, and tons and tons of student projects.  Again, this is about easy-up, easy-down with no damage to the fixtures.  Everybody loves the fact that I've used student work to decorate, too.

4.  Command Velcro Strips - I'm not sure that this is the right name for these.  They have a plastic surface that meshes with and holds to another similar surface, so I am calling them that.  They might be picture-hanger strips.  Again, no-damage hanging is the goal.  I found these and tried them for some things I wanted to put on my plastered walls.  They work like a charm.  No nails.  No mess.  They go right up and come right down perfectly.  They hold fairly heavy frames, too.

5.  A small plastic box each of Sharpies, Post-its, pens of a different color (green/purple), and highlighters - My students use these all the time, but some of them either cannot keep up with them or can't seem to get around to getting them.  It's easier to have them on-hand and easy-to-access than to fuss or hold up an activity because of their lack.  I use fliptop plastic boxes that I think were actually made for cds or something.  They hold a lot of each thing. I put them out when we need to use them, and the students (with the exception of one particular class awhile back) have always been very good to use what's needed and return it at the end of class.  No fuss, no hassle.

6.  Index cards - millions and millions of them.  I use all sizes.  The 3X5 blanks are fabulous for quick notes/passes/etc and also exit slips.  4X6 is what I put my word wall elements on.  5X8 is what I use for instructions, labels, and my "quote wall" of interesting student sentences from their papers, etc.

7.  Endless plastic baskets from Dollar Tree - I prefer the ones that are colored vinyl with a metal frame.  I use them for every kind of thing.  If we need to draw strips to choose something, I cut them up and put them in a basket.  If I need to put candy out for Parent-Teacher Conferences, I put it in a basket.  I have one for completed exit slips, one to collect the pieces of a bulletin board my students are creating and one to hold extra blanks.  I use one to hold student project CDs as they're turned in.  They're just good for organization.

8.  A small bookshelf stereo system - I have my laptop hooked up to mine, and whenever we watch movies or listen to Hamlet, the sound is crisp and clear.  I show YouTube videos.  We do a version of "musical chairs" involving walking until the music stops and picking a poem taped to a chair.  I have my students do multimedia projects often, and even if the recording wasn't the best in the world, we still hear.  I use it to play music while they write and to play textbook supplemental CDs of professional readers or original authors presenting the work we're dealing with.  During my planning period and after school, I use it just for me.  I don't see how anybody manages with just a pair of computer speakers.    

9. A scented wax warmer - You have to be careful with this one, but classrooms can be stinky places.  Since science has proven that smell influences mood, I think this is something important to deal with.  I said that you have to be careful with it, and I mean that, because if the fragrance is heavy or cloying, it can give those with allergies or asthma big problems.  I always stick with things that are clean (citrus or lavender) or at least non-floral (apple cinnamon, vanilla, sandalwood), and I have never had a problem with it.  The students seem to like coming in to it, too.

10.  A tape dispenser, a stapler, and a 3-hole punch for at least two "stations" in your room - unless you want kids constantly at your desk for stuff, put it out for them elsewhere.  I have two sets of the basics out on two sides of my room.  When not in use, it sits neatly on a Dollar Tree silver serving tray.  One set is near the printer.  One set is next to the turn-in baskets.  This works really well.

11.  A pass just for the bathroom - I fabricated mine from a cheap unpainted wooden door hanger, painted it black, and put a tiny silver cutout of a man (like the standard men's room icon) on one side and a tiny silver cut out of a woman on the other.  I don't like to let the "big pass" our school issues us out of my sight very often since sometimes students just wander around with them.  With the bathroom pass, it's really obvious they're not supposed to be anywhere but the restroom.

12.  A laser printer - I actually have two now because I have a laptop cart in my room.  Mine is not a $400 job; it's a fairly inexpensive Brother.  It was some of the best money I've ever spent because where I used to go through two or three ink jet cartridges a month, I now go through toner about every other month for about the same money.  It also duplexes, meaning that if I get in a bind to print something off in the morning, I don't have to fight my way to the copying machine.  I love it.  The extra for the laptop cart can't be praised enough, either.  It's set up wirelessly, and so everybody can print to it from the laptops, no muss (as long as our network is up), no fuss.

13.  Plastic shower curtains and small "cafe" rods - A shower curtain can hide a multitude of sins on a big bookshelf.  Just saying.  I put mine up with small extendable cafe rods that are supported by a Command hook on either end.  They keep all my supply and book shelves looking neat even when they are really not and give my classroom the illusion of neatness when it's just not possible to have the reality.

Yeah.  Well, if you're not a teacher, this probably bored the crap out of you.  However, I've been thinking about this list for awhile, and I wanted to share it.  I probably have left off some things that others consider to be essential.  That just means they get to make lists of their own.

Bee Herding for Fun and Profit

Today was another day with no air conditioning in my classroom.  It was more than 80 degrees by the time we were in the middle of first block.  Yesterday, similar conditions triggered a migraine, one bad enough to warrant Maxalt and 12 hours of unconsciousness.  To combat the ridiculous heat, I opened most of the windows around the perimeter of my room.  While this did help the temperature to drop somewhat, it brought in its own batch of problems.

First there was the noise.  Schools are active places.  Classes move hither, thither, and yon.  Even though I am on the second floor, there were still periods of activity where somebody was taking a class to the library or when some random kid was yelling to a friend across the green.

Then there were the bugs.  Yesterday when I had the windows open, it was wasps.  One stayed overnight in the curtains, and I started my teaching day trying to kill it.  It was remarkably resilient.  I hit it about six times before I finally crushed it in the window sill.  Wasps are not my friends.

Today it was bumblebees.  No.  I do not know why.  I guess that's all Central Casting had to send after I violently eliminated the wasp.  Two flew in during second block.  One landed on the back of a miniblind.  I thumped my side hard enough to eject it out the open window behind it.  Its companion made its clumsy way between the open window and the unmoving panel, thoroughly trapping itself.

This is how I became a beeherd.  I tried to gently shoo it toward the opening.  No deal.  Apparently, bumblebees are not to be "shooed."  I finally gave up and waited on it to decide to find the opening itself.  Yeah.  It seems the bumblebees quite stubbornly insist that the one place they currently are is the only door to freedom.  Finally, I gently slid the window closed, took a bright red folder, and carefully, carefully slid it under the bee.  It clung, politely folding its wings down as if it liked being on the red folder for some reason, and I moved it to the window sill.  The folder was too large to sit there, so I gently laid it on the desk nearby.  The bee, irritated that I was moving away from the light coming in the window, buzzed back up to the glass.  I quickly flung open the window, herded the bee back onto the red folder, and propelled it outside again to all our very great relief.

I think I can file this as #356 of the things nobody ever told me school teachers were required to know how to do.....

So, Yeah. Thirty-Seven.

One of my students came by and hugged me in the hall today and said, "I won't ask you how old you are.  Women aren't supposed to tell."  I smiled to myself.  I claim every minute of mine.

I woke up this morning draggy and totally preoccupied with an order of 136 dozen Krispy Kreme doughnuts that were coming from Columbus today.  After checking Swackett, I saw how cold it was going to be, and I pulled on my new Hamlet sweatshirt from Out of Print.  I finished the outfit with black pants and my new blue Chucks.  Having thus fortified myself, I walked dogs, sacked trash, and headed out.

School rolled in as usual.  Everything was business as usual until 2nd block started.  I noticed that they were all a little twitchy, but I didn't think much about it.  Suddenly, my administrator walked in the door carrying a cake.  They all sang and even had those little blowout party favors.  I was so surprised!  They gave me a wonderful little book of Peanuts "wisdom for life" cartoons and a card that plays the main theme from Star Wars. They dressed me in purple glitter glasses, Mardi Gras beads, a birthday badge, and a pink princess crown.   We ate cake, took pictures, and had a great time.  Fourth block came in, and suddenly, they burst into song, greeting me with a card all of them had signed.  It was all so sweet and so unexpected.  This batch of students is so sweet.

The doughnuts came, and I took my 4th block class down to unload them.  They seemed tickled to meet my mother who was driving the "delivery van" for us.  We got it done quickly and went back upstairs.  After school, several of my NHS members showed up, and we tagged and sorted the doughnuts for distribution tomorrow.

At last, my big day was done.  I sat in the quiet of the empty library waiting for the students to take a load of doughnuts out to their car, and I popped open one of the boxes I bought.  I bit into that fresh Krispy Kreme, and suddenly, all the effort was worth it.

I went by my favorite Thai restaurant on the way home and got my traditional massaman.  Mom and Dad came by and led me out to her empty van.  Only, as it turned out, it wasn't quite empty.  In the back was a MIG welder in a box.  I've wanted one since I took that brief welding course years ago.  It was the only kind of welder I did well with.  I have walked past countless pieces of metal and sorted them into other forms and combinations wishing I had something to make that happen.  Since a MIG welder is a bit like a glue gun for metal (yes, a gross oversimplification, but still), maybe I'll finally be able to make some of those idle fancies come true.

Added to all these things have been the constant notifications from FB filled with well-wishes and kind words from my friends and family.  It has been so good to hear from everyone. It's nice, just sometimes, to be on the receiving end of it.

And so 37 has arrived.  I am fairly certain it will have its share of joy and change like its fellows, but at least it has started sweetly.

Flat Tires and Fake Babies

The past couple of days have been more of a rollercoaster ride than usual.  I got up to go to school yesterday, threw all my crap in my car, got almost across the interstate bridge, and I heard the distinctive thump-thump-thump of a flat tire.  It took just long enough for me to get onto the on ramp to process, and I pulled off on the side of it to get out and check.  The tire was so flat the seal had broken.

I just sat in the car for a minute, trying to think of what the best thing to do would be.  I finally decided to back up the on ramp, praying nobody came speeding down it.  I managed to get turned around and limped slowly home.

The rest of the day was about what you'd expect from such a beginning.  Late arrival at school.  Not having the stuff I needed when I thought it was ready.  Technology stupidity.  A feeling of being rushed and just somehow dull.  An unexpected meeting.  A lack of Diet Mountain Dew everywhere.  The big stuff and the little stuff all went to perdition in a handcart.

Today, I drove another vehicle.  I took an entire 8-pack of Diet MD to my little fridge.  We ordered lunch from a local restaurant.  I wore a new sweater.

And my students made me laugh.  They came in chatting about babies.  Suddenly, according to them, I was expecting imaginary ones myself.  They started coming up with baby names.  I wound up with imaginary twins:  Shakespeareonte and Shakespeareonce (a boy and a girl).  It made me smile, and I needed it.

It also made me a little sad for all the obvious reasons, but I tried to focus on the sweetness instead of the bitter.  Some days, that is easier to do than others.  I'm lucky with the students I've got right now.  They are a great assistance with it gets difficult.

Actually, Quite-a-Lot

Quite a lot has happened since I wrote last.  I've sat down with the computer several times, but each has wound up involved with other things than coming here.  I am taking a moment now to try to catch up.

I got a call yesterday saying that I'd been nominated to be the Star of the Week, a community member profiled and highlighted in our local newspaper.  I was floored.  I do not think of myself as overly interesting.  I was honored, though.  I saw the completed interview in today's paper.  It was strange to see myself there, picture and all, but nice, too.  I don't think I came off sounding like an idiot.

I was also informed that I have been chosen by one of students for a special kind of recognition.  It was totally unexpected, but I am so grateful for what it represents.  To be chosen by one's students as worthy is probably the highest honor and vote of confidence a teacher can hope for.  Once I am sure all of it is official and not-a-secret, I'll talk more about this.  Right now, I've said about as much as I need to.

I found out about and have been working on an application for a two-week summer trip to Japan to  collaborate and exchange information with teachers there and with other teachers from around the States.  I finished the application last night, and now all that's left is the waiting.

I'm also waiting to hear about the AP Reading this summer.  I think it's time or past time for the first round of notifications to come out (I can't find my letter), so I might not have been selected this time.  I am worried that missing last year for TGC has hurt me in the selection process.  Only time will tell.

Regardless of all the things still up in the air and while tomorrow might be a hammer right between the eyes, I have a good, good feeling about 2013.  Thirteen, for a variety of reasons, has always been lucky for me.  Maybe this whole year will be.

Long Days, Tired Days

The past two days have been wearying.  Neither day did I get home before 7:00.  Both days, I ate bites of lunch between dealing with student issues and makeup work.

Yesterday, every piece of technology that could rebel did.  I think the devices coordinate these little coups at night while I'm gone.  Even the iPad was in on it.  I would try to type in a password, and it would type all sorts of gibberish all by itself.  It was as though it was trying to communicate with me and doing a really bad job.

Of course, as is ALWAYS the case, when our tech guy came to look at it, it magically had no problems.  Next time, I'm going to film the behavior with my iPhone so I won't feel like a freaking nut job when some exotic oddity arises in my equipment.

Today, I fought printers.  And printers.  And my MOBI.  And printers....  Then I graded until 6:00 when I left to go get 100 copies of 1984 from Books a Million.  While it's cool that I now have 100 copies of 1984 in the back of my car, the hour it took to get that accomplished was sort of the icing on a big crap cake.

Tomorrow promises to be another replay of today.  Grading.  Emergencies. A hurried lunch.  No moment for myself without someone who needs me.  A cold, dark parking lot waiting for me at the end of it.  I'm just about worn down to nothing.  I need the holiday to get here.  That may be selfish, but it's just  the truth.

Dear Josh Ritter

As if your songs weren't fabulous enough, you also named two of your albums with direct quotes from Hamlet and Horatio (So Runs the World Away and To the Yet Unknowing World).  I caught the Horatio quote last year as I taught the play.  I didn't catch the Hamlet one until this year's adventures in education.  Nicely done, sir.  Nicely done.

A Beautiful, Double-Edged Sword

I firmly believe that teaching something you love can be one of the best and most rewarding experiences of which we as humans are capable.  There is so much richness to the action.  I always learn more, see more, when I am the one teaching.  I don't know what it is about telling it to someone else that makes the hidden wonders of whatever it is, literature, mythology, even grammar, reveal themselves.  

Even better, there is that moment when I see enjoyment, recognition, comfort in the eyes of my students.  They connect to something larger than themselves, and it's like seeing the sun cut through storm clouds.  There is absolutely nothing like that, like knowing you've been a part, however small, of helping to add to the world around somebody in a positive way.

The blade has another edge to it, though.  Sometimes, that beautiful experience can turn around and cut you wide open when the effort to share meets hostility, rejection, apathy.  I've had years like that, and what is usually a source of shared wonder becomes painful as the teaching instinct is repeatedly thwarted.

This year is not one of those years.  I have had several wonderful days lately that have reinforced that, days where everybody plays along, days where I have overheard students with nothing to gain and who weren't even aware I could hear them saying, "I ain't gonna lie.  I got into it yesterday," when talking about Hamlet.  These are the days that make the moments of darkness bearable.  These are the days to fold up and store carefully away so when the blade in my hand accidentally does me some harm, I can use them as a magic cure and wait for the good to come again.

Come On, Thanksgiving

(a list)

We're almost to a week-long holiday.  If it doesn't hurry up and get here, I'm going to have to "take a day."  I'm that worn out.  Why, you ask?  Let me tell you about today...

• 5 AM - Wake up.  Stare balefully at the betrayal of the iPhone. Try with limited success to make finger slide across screen to stop annoying alarm.  Eyelids slam shut.  Impatient cat attack finishes awakening process.
• Then proceeds about an hour and a half of running in circles, sacking up trash, and forgetting to put supper in the CrockPot followed by a mad dash down the driveway during which some of the trash fell off the roof of the car.
• 7:10 (ish) AM - School.  Restart the computer.  Try to get my bellringer up.  Fight the computer.  Try to get the bellringer up.  Pray/curse/beseech the computer.  Try to get the bellringer up...
• 7:30 AM - DUTY.  (or, as I like to think of it, my little monthly slice of hell...)
• 7:50 AM - "Let's get ready to rumbllllleeeee...."
• 9:50 AM - Hi.  I'll be observing you today, but I won't be telling you what my magic rubric says.  I'll just sit over here in the corner and intimidate the crap out of you, K?  Carry on like I'm not over here scaring you.  
• 10:15 AM - Prezi rebellion.  Mad flailing at computer.  Prezi recalcitrance.  Nervous restructuring of lesson plan.  Mad scratching on scary top-secret rubric by observer.  Prezi compliance.
• Then proceeds a pageant of Medea, administrator-in-my-room, trying to balance giving instructions to my TA and teaching....
• 11:50 AM - WRITE.  STOP TALKING AND WRITE.  
• 12:10 PM - REALLY.  WRITE.  STOP TALKING AND WRITE.  Yes.  I will fix your computer.  Bring it here.
• (repeat as needed)
• 1:20 PM - four hundred and eighty seven problems.  And a jalapeno pimento cheese sandwich.
• "Off period" - take down bulletin board.  put up bulletin board. make a large paper turkey.  staple silk leaves to bulletin board.  grading.  cleaning.  99 emails.  grading.  bulletin board.
• Last bell - DUTY.  (funfunfunfunfunfun)
• After school - grading.  grading.  singing along to the music.  grading.  redo whiteboard for tomorrow.  water plants.  print off paper turkey feathers.
• 5:45 PM - WTW?  It's DARK OUTSIDE.  Time to go home.
• Dinner with the parents....not cooked by me because of 5:00 AM snafu.
• 7:45 PM - singing along with the radio.  an unexpected puppy looking for a home.  mass canine violence and chaos ensues.

Except for the unexpected dog, today wasn't all that out of character.  Now can you see why I need a holiday?

And Then There Are Those Other Days....

Today, I ran out of fight.  I was trying to get a class through a portion of a novel, and everywhere I looked, heads were lowered, eyes were closing.  Every answer I was getting was just pulled desperately out of the air.  I guess I could have launched into an angry tirade or a lecture about the importance of it all, but I just couldn't.  I felt as fragile as spun glass, like any sudden movement was going to shatter me in such a way that I couldn't ever put the pieces back together again.  I told them to spend the remainder of the period doing SSR, and I graded the quiz on the section they were supposed to have read.

Most of my students this year engage, or at least they "play along."  There are days though, as there are in every teacher's life, when it doesn't click.  Lately, because we are having the students read a novel, it's happening more and more.  I refuse to believe they can't do it.  If they were genuinely incapable, I would have more patience with it, honestly.

What I cannot stand, what is destroying me, is when they can but they WON'T.  It is unbearable to me to sit and watch somebody choose ignorance over knowledge.  It's never wrong not to know something, but it is wrong to continue to shun knowledge when it is offered to you.  Any time you don't take an opportunity to better yourself, you have broken one of the great unwritten commands of the universe - Go forth, do, and learn from it.

And yes, I know they're young.  I know they're distracted.  I know that apparently, I am failing to make it "relevant" enough despite all my best efforts to the contrary, a fact that continues to depress me.  And no, it's not everybody.  I can't learn to let go of the ones who do.  I can't deny that some part of me envies teachers who just sort make the sign of the cross over it and go on.  I am sure their blood pressure stays much lower than mine, that they don't get nasty ripping headaches.  I just don't know how to stop letting it affect me so much.

Today, just now, I need to be grading, doing lesson plans, prepping materials for the week ahead.  Instead, all I want to do is sit very still and try to pull my pieces back together.  Maybe if I can do that, then I can find what it's going to take to try to get up and go again tomorrow morning.

Heart in My Throat

I just pressed send on one of the biggest requests I've ever made of an employer.  My heart is in my throat now as the waiting begins.

I want to apply for a Fulbright, but I am going to have to have the backing of my district to be able to participate, and I know that what I'm asking for is a huge, huge thing.  I truly believe that I am competitive for it.  I am by no means the best there will ever be, and I'm sure there are people who have done more to ready them for it.  I am not going to put myself down, though.  I want it.  I have wanted it for quite some time.  Therefore, I am going to simply close my eyes and go after it.

But I can't stop the birds-in-too-small-a-cage fluttering my heart is doing....

Elvis, Doves, and an Owl Cake

The other day I was using Poll Everywhere with one of my classes.  We were putting up answers to a question, and since a great number of students had been called from class for a quick meeting with the counselor, I wasn't in any great hurry to move through them quickly and leave the rest of the students behind.

We lingered, and the students put up good answers, thoughtful answers to the questions.  I am still trying to remember how we got on the subject, but suddenly we were talking about what it would take for me to get married.  I have tried, but I can't figure out how we made that leap.  I'm sure it was there in the literature we were studying.  The actual steps between points A and B are just fuzzy now.

Anyway.

I think the students were a little shocked when I told them I didn't exactly have a lot of faith that would be happening for me now.  I shouldn't say things like that to them, I guess.  They are young and precious, and most of them still believe in the idea of everybody pairing up like animals heading into the Ark.  The simple truth, though, is that some of us are unicorns, Chimeras, phoenixes, and dragons, and we really didn't get on the boat in time....

After seeing their faces, I hastened to assure them that it was really reaching a point where it didn't bother me as much, that I was okay with it.  I told them that I was free to travel, free to move, free to do or not do whatever I wanted.  I told them that I wasn't easy to live with.  They weighed all this, and then they more or less dismissed it out of hand and started planning...no, that's not really the right word...plotting... my wedding for me.  It got funny really fast after I told them I have always had a secret dream (okay, not so secret....everybody who knows me has heard this) to get married in Vegas by an Elvis.  They found this acceptable as long as there were doves.  Apparently, there have to be doves.  The doves are key.  And a cake shaped like an owl.  Or a cake from which someone dressed as an owl leaps.  And Shakespeare.

It was so funny.  I could see it all so clearly in my mind.  The birds, the inevitable white cape with red satin lining on the bejeweled Elvis, the owl-shaped wedding cake, some guy in a doublet and ruff.  The hilarity of it.  And you know what?  If that's the closest I ever get to having it, that was a pretty good deal, actually.

Random Items

...likely to be found in the pockets of my "teacher apron" at any given moment.
(a list)

• a blue Pelikano Jr. fountain pen
• pick any three:
• red grading pen
• Sharpie highlighter
• Sharpie
• dry erase marker
• Uniball Vision black ink, micro tip pen
• the last three orange Post-its on a pad which have now become sort of free-form origami
• pick any two:
• stereo remote
• projector remote
• PowerPoint clicker
• lightsaber laser pointer
• library passes
• a box of Maxalt
• a pair of purple scissors with a polkadot sheath
• pick one:
• peppermints
• cinnamon disks
• small roll of colored duct tape
• dry erase board eraser
• bulletin board tack stapler
• at least one pin that has fallen off the front and needs mending

What do you carry around in your "pockets" during the day?

Up and Down

It's been a day of mixed feelings.  I woke up with my throat sore and a general sense of ickishness. I stood morning duty, always a joy, and came in to start my day as best I could.  I made a pot of tea and drank it.  Tea always helps me feel better when this stuff comes on, soothes my throat and warms me from within.  I ate about a million hard cinnamon disks.

Then, after first period, two of my students showed up at my door.  Apparently, they had composed an ode in their creative writing class.  It was about me.  It just made my day.  This year, the students are so sweet.  They seem interested in their teachers, their school, and each other.  It's refreshing.  I like that they feel connected enough to all their teachers that they use us as the fodder of their projects.  That the things they say are usually kind things is even better.

I got to hear a colleague get an award today.  I was so happy for her.  Too often, the things my fellow teachers do go unnoticed.  I know she works extra hard for all her students, so to see that recognized was very satisfying.

By the end of third block, though, I was feeling very bad.  I stayed about halfway through fourth and then I went to see my administrator to request early leave.  He let me come home, and I was medicated and asleep by four.  I got up only when my mother came by to check on me and drop off some soup.

As I ate, I fell back to my comfort resources, Downton Abbey and the afghan my grandmother made for me.  I have no idea why I always want to watch Downton when I feel like crap, but there is something about it that soothes me.

I got online to see what was happening in the universe while I watched, and I found that Punch Brothers are releasing a new mini-EP in November, available for pre-order now.  On it is the version of "Another New World" I saw on YouTube.  I am so happy about that.  "Another New World" is one of my favorite songs from Josh Ritter.  It always, always reminds me of Robert Walton in Frankenstein.  Thile's version of it is fantastic.  It never ceased to amaze me how a good song performed by two different excellent artists can come out two kinds of great.  I love that.  There is also, apparently, a version of a Gillian Welch song on this new thing from her latest effort, and that, too, is a thing that makes me happy.  I wish all these people would get together for one giant recording.  Then, even if this crap I have now kills me, I guess I could die happy.  (ha)

Now I'm about to walk my dogs, take more medicine, and go back to bed.  I don't know if I will be able to do school tomorrow or not.  I guess only time and Nyquil can tell.  Regardless, I have one new song now from Chris Thile and a couple of really good things from the day to counterbalance, so I'm not very bad off, right?  (that's my story, and I'm sticking to it...)