Take a Picture

i work with this couple. they're nice. kinda funny. one is more funny than the other. they're lesbians...kinda but not officially. and it's not just something that is assumed. they act like it. they don't make out or anything. that would be acting like it. they're calm. they just live together and bake for each other and talk alot and stuff. like regular friends, except different. anyway, i feel like i need to start making friends here and actually giving a crap about people. this comes at a very inconvenient time for me, seeing as my room and life and teaching ability all lie in shambles around me. so i'm going to their house for dinner but not really dinner. mostly just to vent for a little bit...because i need that. i might hang out for awhile. apparently there is beer in the cooler. i'm not a big beer fan. so i'm going to hang out with some lesbians. and it's okay. i'm not weirded out by it. it's all a part of my "let's make friends" project. so...this is me making an effort. take a picture. it doesn't happen incredibly often.

suck it up

so i was just on the verge of...i don't know...total unhappiness. i was literally just getting ready to look for different jobs online. i'm not happy today. i'm not happy with myself, in this school, in this grade, with these people. i'm not happy. and my para said, without me explaining my frustration, she said not to compare myself to other people because God has put me here for a reason and i needed to hear that. sometimes i wonder how someone could go through life not believing in something bigger and better and wiser than him or herself. i am here for a reason and i don't understand that reason. i don't know why. this is hard. the students are hard. the people i work with are hard. and i feel like i'm developing a shell...and i crawl into it when i feel vulnerable. i don't want to be like that. all day i've been trying so hard to not be like that and maybe i'm frustrated because it didn't work. but to know that i'm here, i've been placed here, and i can handle it and i can do well and i can succeed...that is comforting. maybe it won't be perfect. it will probably be far from it. but whatever. suck it up, i guess.

face up

i need to be at a meeting with the GLP right now, as i write but i need to vent this out before i go. i feel totally inadequate today. the para is way better than i am at pretty much everything and for some reason today it is glaringly apparent. it's slightly devastating, to be quite honest. everything she is doing and saying, i should be doing and saying. i like her. she's a nice girl but i can't deal with it today. on tv when i see someone comparing him or herself to someone else, i feel like smacking that person and saying, "get the crap over it. you are amazing. do what you do and don't be bothered with other stuff." but when i'm faced with this situation, when i should be smacking myself, i'm not. i'm crawling in a hole and feeling sorry for myself. letting this sorority system defeat me. and i shouldn't. i can't. i need to get myself pumped up to go to this meeting, only so i can be torn down again. this should be fun.

Happy Day

i've only been awake for 2 hours but so far this day is amazing...because...

it's kinda snowing outside which means i can listen to my favorite christmas music
the principal brought breakfast today...holla!!
today is jeans day...in the middle of the week.
my hair looks fantastic
we get out of school at 1:05...let the countdown begin
there is a giant fireplace in my room and it look a-freaking-mazing
the bridge to get to school was opened for the first time in months
and...
tomorrow is Thanksgiving. So I'm thankful...for my the kids, the weather, this food, my family...all those things that I overlook every day. hopefully i can keep this attitude all day.

Happy Thanksgiving. Really, and I don't mean that just as a casual greeting. I really mean Happy day of giving thanks for all the things you overlook. Peace out

Genius

friday afternoon...fantastic. i could, honestly, count on one hand the number of people NOT pissed off right now. people are all complaining about stuff...dismissal, breakfast families, parents night out, homework, notes, blah, blah and also blah. i guess i'm not complaining because i don't have a benchmark. i don't have anything to tell me what it was like before so i can't decide if this is better or worse. well, i guess i can but it won't make much sense. moral of the story, teachers can complain like no other. and i don't blame them. i think we get crapped on alot. but today i'm okay with it. i'm rolling with it. the reason? because i just walked down two flights of stairs while carrying 5 cardboard puzzles on my head. i'm amazing. it's weird to me that no one around here recognizes my genius.

Mime School

unfortuantely, I was right. today was ridiculous. as a teacher, i don't yell. i talk forcefully at times but don't yell...or at least not very often. i couldn't talk today. i couldn't communicate. and a whisper day worked only for about 10.5 seconds. at one point in the day, i actually thought about becoming a mime. maybe it wouldn't be so bad.

missing kid, me MIA

i have never in my lifetime lost my voice. not even after i've screamed for hours on end at concerts or talked the first week of school straight without stopping. never. until today. the last few days have been making this complete voice loss. i thought it was getting better. i thought it was coming back instead of leaving. no. i woke up this morning and it was gone. simply gone. my voice sounds like a strange mixture of squeaks and chirps...all of which are undistiguishable. so i guess today is a whisper day. i feel fine...and i look great but no one can understand me, no matter how hard i try. it's frustrating. and today is my day with no breaks so that means i'm suppose to be teaching clear through the entire day. i'm not sure how this will work out.

speaking of things that are weird, i got to talk to a cop last night. this situation, which i am getting ready to describe, still makes me cringe...partly because it is one of my worst nightmares and also partly because it was only after the fact that i realized the best way i could have helped the situation. so a parent comes in last night at 5:30/6:00. i'm the only teacher left in the building and the janitor and i are pretty much the only two humans left around. this parent comes into my room and tells me her kid never got off the bus to the before/afterschool care program. holy crap. my worst nightmare. so we go down, check the hallway and, as i figured, the teacher was gone. she went home to check at home and i checked throughout the school. the kid is a spitfire...so i checked the bathroom, etc. anyway, she was only at the school for like 4 minutes before leaving and shortly after she left i thought to call the classroom teacher. i don't have her number but it should be around here somewhere. i dismissed that idea because i figured there was no way to get ahold of the mom and i also figured the kid would turn up at home...for some reason. turns out, the kindergartner did not turn up at home. and, unknown to me, the cops were called and were searching the city while i was freaking out and searching the school. i should have called the teacher and figured out a way to contact the parent. i didn't. i'm an idiot. so 6:30, a cop shows up at the school while cops are searching the town, calling people, etc. this cop, Officer Miller, hangs out in my classroom until they figure out there was a bowling activity that the kid was suppose to attend and he rode THAT bus after school. i probably should have thought to think that but i didn't. moral of the story is they found the kid bowling his heart out and his mom forgot she had scheduled him to be there. the second moral of the story is i am apparently not able to think after 4:00. i should have called the teacher and figured out how to call the parent or the principal or something. instead, i sat on my butt in my classroom and didn't take action. dang it. i guess you learn? or i learn? or i should learn?

when i forgot...

i feel like an idiot today. i was standing in the shower when suddenly it hit me...i haven't paid my rent for this month. 13 days late. i'm not usually late with those kinds of things. i get my bills in on time. i was late. that makes me so mad at myself. i'm suppose to be an adult. adults aren't late with rent...or at least the good ones aren't. so today for the first time in a long time i decided having a roomate is very handy. if i had a roomate i probably would have remembered. roomates remind each other of things like that. when i had a roomate, i was never late...partly because she always reminded me and maybe also partly because having someone else around made grow up a little. i guess i'm mostly disappointed in myself. or embarrassed. or alot of both.

my sub just walked in. 45 minutes early and i'm okay with that. i don't have a voice today so it might take me that long to explain everything to her. today is my collab day with my GLP, grade level partner. i decided i'm tired of being frustrated with her. i just can't handle it today. so we're going to spend the whole day working together to plan pretty much the rest of the quarter or year or semester or something. we're going to be working together...and i have high hopes for our work time. i need to prepare my subplans. and maybe grow up a little too.