Back to School

Here we go.

This is year number 17 for me as a teacher.   17!!  Jesus H.

Every time I go back to school, and I hear the hum of the building (before any of the students have even come to school), I get a little panicky and nauseous.  It's not that I don't want to teach; it's more like the Nausea of life going in circles again.  I have to start (again) with a different 200 students whose names I don't know, whose life stories are a mystery, and who (frankly) don't give a shit about 75% of what I say on any given day.

No wonder most teachers quit within the first five years of teaching - it's utterly, absolutely, unequivocally, mentally exhausting.

But I must be a glutton for punishment, because I keep going back.  I keep thinking that even if I only reach a small percent of these people, I am doing what I am supposed to do as a member of this strange human race.

I have one more child to escort through this melodrama which is called "high school", and then I will fade into the ocean mist. (Or maybe into the river with the stones and all that Virginia Woolf kind of thing...)

I will be positive.  I will listen without prejudice.  I will be prepared (usually).  I will use my leverage to help people in need.  I will make people think, even when they fight it.  I will provide a comfortable cot for those in distress.  I will feed the hungry (they steal my food anyway, so whatever).  I will brew coffee for those who can't keep their eyes open (myself included).  I will do what my school asks of me (when it doesn't annoy me too terribly much).  I will teach and counsel and learn from people half my age.

I got this.