Megalopolis

“It’s something that happen with Cold Wars and that happens with countries and dominoes.”

“Like if the USA was a domino and they gave up war it would fall and then other countries would fall because they were in war with the US.”

Or as i like to define it: When one fifth grade boy begins to sulk and i do not pay attention to them, thus rendering them further helpless, other fifth grade boys will join in. Soon you have a class of sulky fifth grade boys with problems ranging from “but i been saying i don’t go with her and she been writing my name on her folder” to “man them tacos just ain’t done right!”

For my mood, simply reference the poem i wrote about January. For my optimism, see Judy Garland’s “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” I am fine. My life is better than it’s been….ever? Seriously. I say that seriously.

I can feel the grinding in my lungs
my heart
my brain
like I’m going up some monumentally tall hill.
January, my soul eeks outs
between ragged breaths
it’s…
only….
Jannnnnnuuuuuaaaryyyyy!

So I switch gears.
Retool a little, you know?
What makes a bike really shine?
Oil, patch a tire, new chain and then
Before I know it

Legs out from under me
Wheels spinning freely
Faster than I can control
Children flying
Out of control
“off the handle”
and my arms are flailing
(because at this point why hold on to the handlebars)
and I’m screaming at people as I pass by
“IT’S ALREADY JANUARY! HOLY SHIT!”

And yeah,
There’ll be the bottom of the hill eventually,
I’ll coast
And slow down
And catch my breath.
Won’t I?
Or will I flip over a stick
And break my shoulder?
Or hit a car?
Or bust my head?

Or will I hit a perfect flip
And land and impress the waiting crowd?

(Shh. It’s January- I can dream…)

It seems like only yesterday I was crying to myself about how much time was left in this awful two year  what was i thinking who in their right mind would ever agree to live in this godforsaken pit of a commitment. Ahhhhhhh, the memories. And now, only a semester left until they kick me to the curb, Americorps payment in one hand, inflated resume (though still a polisci-english double) in the other. And what do I have to show for it?

I have no clue. I feel like a better, older, wiser, smarter, more capable, calmer, more appreciative, more compassionate person. Was it teach for america and my classroom that make me this way, or was it simply going out into the “real world”? Am I even in the real world? Is what I am going through, what we (the collective thousands of us- that we- thats the we I always refer to), is that really what you can call real life? I hope not. I hope at some point it sort of gets easier.

I was teaching my kids about equivalent fractions the other day, and how to simplify them. We focused on that word- simplify. “Simple things are easy,” I said, ” and easy things are small.” Yes, they all nodded in agreement, they certainly were, and we set to work reducing 400/800 to 1/2. It was that night, in a conversation that I had with my dad, that i realized this rule unfortunately applies in life as well. He allowed, at the age of 50, that things were only getting more complicated. I asked, hopeful and optimistic as ever, if my life was about to take the turn towards clarity. He laughed at me- no, he said, not at all. Age, growing older, dealing with life, is just like numbers in fractions. My 10 year old kids have it easy. Their number is small. The problems they deal with are seemingly microscopic.

The bigger the number, the more complicated the problems. Such is life.

All this being said, i recognize that my kids are being forced to simplify fractions way beyond their numerical value. My babies shouldn’t have to deal with improper fractions and mixed numbers in their lives yet but….ahh well. Delta, poverty, etc. That’s what teachers, back rubs, shoulders to cry on are for.
It’s analogies like this that are making me a really good math teacher- our average on our last landmark was proficient! Read it and weep folks, 63% Well, 62.7%, but I round on occasions such as this because thats freaking incredible. That means that on average, my class is proficient. 8 of my kids scored proficient, 1 scored advanced, 4 scored basic, and 4 scored below basic. To meet my schools standards, I need to bump up those 4 basic kids and I am good to go. I can do this! I have 4 months to do this. I really know that I can.

In lit, we are slowly and steadily improving- our average on our test before semesters’ end was a 54%, which is solidly basic. I’ll take it, because literacy in a classroom where children greet you with “what that is that you got, Mz. D?” is not an easy thing to master. We’re working on it.

I am working on finding ways to feel NOT panicked about next year, including but not limited to extensive research of culinary schools, longer naps, more time to read, and a LOT of baking (I now own a 9×13 pyrex dish, a food processor, and a double boiler!). If I had realized how valuable these things were last year, I may not have been a better teacher, but I sure would have been a happier person.

All this and baseball season starts in only 105 days. AND it’s Christmas time!  Boy, life is good when you really just take a second to think about it.

It’s not that it hadn’t been graded. It’s that it’s been sitting here and there, around the house, in piles. Staring at me. So tonight i took it upon myself to organize these papers so I could hand them back tomorrow. An hour and a half later, all papers alphabetized and sorted, I hauled it into the bathroom to discover that I’d been ignoring 8.5 lbs of paper…

Ew.

In other news, I am having an incredible life, all things considered. I went to New Orleans over Thanksgiving Break (oh are you from here? No. Just leaving your family behind? yep) and discovered that it’s possible for my heart to ache for places outside the Delta. Not just the cultural aspect of it, because i love the Delta and at this point in my life appreciate every aspect of the culture in which I am immersed- I don’t need the museums and the concerts- but the need to help other people. In New Orleans moreso than a lot of other places, it’s very evident that there are people who need help that are being ignored. Driving around New Orleans and seeing the lack of action combined with the hope- it’s there. can you blame me for wanting to be a part of it? Especially that in some small way I was part of it before, though the house in which I lived is washed away.

That’s all a veiled explanation for the fact that, in my searching for what I’m doing in the future (next year future, not tomorrow future), I am considering New Orleans.  And Mississippi. And culinary school. And publishing. And grad school.

Life, I told my kids- sometimes you get what you don’t want, and sometimes you want what you don’t get. You make it work, and then when it finally does, you don’t know what to do with yourself!

Maybe all this comes about because I got my new phone. After two years of waiting, one toilet phone, one phone that only operated on speaker, I finally got it- the blackberry. Signed under my name, it was mine, and all I had to do was take it home, charge it, and dial *228 to activate. Eagerly I plugged it in, allowed it to charge while I went out to dinner, and then raced home. *228, I dialed, and listened as it rang once, twice….beep, beep, beep- “Activation was unsuccessful!” In cheery blackberry font, it reminded me of my inability to connect to a bigger network. I dialed again. “Activation was unsuccessful!” The exclamation point was a dagger. You, Verizon reminded me, have failed in some particular way, to connect with us, this network to which EVERYONE can connect. What is your problem? Can you hear me now? No.
I called the 800 # and discovered that I was in something rather philisophical sounding called Verizon’s footprint. They could see me, but I was out of their reach. I could see them, but I could not connect. I knew what I wanted, but I couldn’t get it. LET ME DOWNLOAD RINGTONES DIRECTLY ONTO MY PHONE. WHAT DO I PAY THIS DATA PLAN FOR?!?! I wanted to use my browser to google useless facts on my phone, damnit. Frustration abounded, though in a calm collected manner, as a man named Devin and I discussed nearby populace epicenters towards which I could migrate. I detected confusion, then sarcasm, then pity in his voice as I described my location.

“How far are you from Little Rock?”

“About two hours.”

“How far from Jackson?”

“About two and a half.”

“Memphis?”

“Three.”

“Oh…mmmk.”

Devin and I both eventually gave up and parted ways.
I thought about my phone today during school. My children were not bad, nor where they overwhelmingly wonderful. They were fifth graders- frustratingly talkative, at times focused, at times overwhelmed, at all times ten years old. We lost the multiplication contest by 1% point to another class after weekly quizzes. One % point. Our test averages have been declining as the difficulty of the material (and its newness to my students) increases. Oh and, What’s that, Ronesha? You want time to talk? Well we’re in school. We’re here to learn, not to relax and chat. I know it’s just the time of year, but I also know this is a failure on my part in investment- my kids aren’t connected to a bigger picture.

We know what we want, but we can’t get to it yet. Right now. I don’t know what the proper descriptor is.  We’re in a footprint.

October is not my least favorite month, it’s my second least favorite. I remember last year everyone telling me that October was the worst, only to discover that in November, I truly perfected the crying-in-fetal-position technique. Well October started out well, and even half-way through I wasn’t upset. By the end, I was flustered, but not defeated. Now, 5 days into November, the ugly faces of disrespectful children who haven’t had a break since Labor Day cause me to wipe my face off onto my cardigan. Not with tears, just with total frustration.

Add in some IMMENSE frustration with my administration (I feel like I’m writing a political poem), and I make for a 40% of the time not happy camper. Luckily my life is good otherwise. I’m still lightyears past where I was last year at this time. I honestly don’t even remember last year at this time, so this year is an improvement. The fact that I can wake up is an improvement.

Well the votes are in, and the song “It Won’t Be Like This For Long” by Darius Rucker was recently voted (by Caitlin and myself) as the #1 most cried-to song of the 2008-2009 academic year. What’s funny if not a little awkward is that in both our minds, this song is about teaching. Listening to the words now, I hear these verses about… what’s this, his daughter?…and I’m just confused. I get angry, in that I do not remember hearing these words last year!  I remember hearing a consoling message about how hard things can be and how you feel like things are impossible and just watching her it breaks it his heart because he already knows it won’t be like this for long and oh god i’m such a horrible teacher and let’s just listen to this song in the dark, curled into the fetal position on a bean bag chair next to a mound of ungraded uneccessary busy work in an effort to delay the inevitable failures that will occur in anything real and valuable I could try and do with my time.

This song WAS my last year of teaching.

But I realized something, listening again to the song that still gets radio play this year, as well as frequently on itunes playlists such as “stop looking for distractions and LP already!” This song, this schmaltzy if not totally gloriously sad country song, is about THIS year too! Only now, teaching at LUES is almost over (well…some days it feels like almost, some days I wish it was almost), and really, truly, Hootie McBlowfish, it WON’T be like this for long. Holy crap, it’s the shapeshifting song of the century!

How on earth did Hootie manage it? How did he write a song that works for both first and second year emotions? Well, I imagine part of it comes from being himself. With a name like Hootie, the road could not always have been smooth. Alright, I kid, I kid, but I think it might just be possible that Hootie needed to express something just like I try to every once and a while through these vapidly sarcastic posts. Maybe Hootie had two really rough years and just wanted to write a song about it, too.

Or it could be that I’m still not listening to the words, the song is just about his daughter, and I’m selfish. Either way, it’s a great song.

I have not written in a while. I think this is because I do not…need this as much? Last year this blog served as an empty room into which I could step and then yell as loudly as possible about all the things that scared me or made me angry or confused me. This year is different. I don’t need to yell, and that’s AWESOME.

I am exhausted by the end of every day, but as opposed to last year when it was out of frustration and confusion, I am exhausted out of…effort this year? I overexert myself with teambuilding cheers and energetic lessons, and yet I am honestly rarely frustrated or confused at hte end of the day. Last year I found myself sitting in my room or in the dark on on a bean bag chair staring blankly into space asking “what the HELL just happened?” This change from total cluelessness to acceptance and…some semblance of confidence. It’s a HUGE change, but I love it.

I love my kids, I love teaching, I love progress, and I love feeling ike I’m not a failure.

All this being said, it just means I have a lot less to write about. I could quote how hilarious and wonderful my kids are, and sure, I’ve got the usual amount of 11 year old girl drama, but those seem relatively repetitive in the face of last years anger.

I’m just…happy with how this year is going. I can and soon will be doing more, and maybe once I’m truly overexerting myself I’ll have more to write about. That or I’ll go into stage 2 hypertension and I’ll just blog from the hospital…(my BP now is averaging 145/95. I call that fifth grade teacher BP.)

As soon as something catastrophic or magnificent happens, you’ll be the first to know, internet audience. Until then, no news is good news

Turns out, I am susceptible to illness. This is not a surprise. This is not news. It is, however, incredibly pathetic that the fact reared its ugly head so early in the school year (read: not even 2 weeks). Yes, my friends, I got swine flu. No worries, I survived, though quarantine was NOT my favorite time. I am easing myself off of two naps a day (though I’m about to go take a nap right now), and it’s definitely still somewhat in my system, but the doctor’s note I had to get in order to gain re-entry to my school says that I am no longer contagious. And I like to think of myself as a missionary, bringing awareness of swine flu to those in the greater LV area who perhaps had not heard of it beforehand. Luckily, the pamphlets we were subsequently required to send home provided some good reading materials.

I am mountains behind in feeling prepared after a week of not being coherent enough to care, and it’s difficult to get back into the groove. However, I’m doing my best and the fact that my kids are happier and more willing to try new things (or anything, really) makes the job easier. I am creating more involved, partner-reliant lessons since I know these kids won’t beat each other up as much. I am reading them higher level texts.  I am testing them more, and I hope it pays off. It’s so hard to tell this early in the year when all i want are results and all i have is high expectations.

The Delta is being harvested, slowly. The corn is gone, burnt down, and the beans are leafless and being whisked away in the dead of night. Soon the cotton will be more beautiful than ever and I’ll find myself once again stopped on the side of the road, pressing my face into squares of white, delaying the inevitable grading and lesson planning and whatnot to simply enjoy the beauty of the earth. You can do that down here, you know.

“When I had my first date, I was very excited. I thought that I was never going to get a girlfriend. But God sent me that very beautiful girl. She was smart, nice, and trustworthy. I know that I can trust her in my entire life. She is the girl of my dreams. She is the perfect match from Heaven. I really do like her very much. So do my family and my cousins. She is the girl that completes my heart, and my love.” - Dallas.

I am really excited to work with these kids. Dallas, by the way, cried twice this week.