Inward

So here’s the long and short of what’s been going on with me for the past two weeks or so:  teaching, home, sleep, repeat.  Throw in lots of dog-walking and a few visits to the hospital to see my aunt, and you’ve pretty much got the whole story.

Things at work are tough—regardless of how much I love my students (most of the time) or how much learning I want to accomplish, every day I learn a little more about how unimportant teaching is to the people in charge.  They want numbers, paperwork, statistics, and whatever else they can get to make themselves sound good.  The teaching, I’ve discovered, is secondary to all of that.  I can’t hold students accountable because I’m not allowed to give them the grades they earn (that’s a long, long story…google “Texas SB 2033″ for more on that shit.).  I can’t set high expectations for achievement because I’m not allowed to adhere to them (for example, I’m required by district policy to take late work no matter how late it is…which essentially defeats the purpose of a due date…).    And that’s just the beginning.  I don’t want to be disillusioned about this career.  Because it’s my second one.  Because I believe in teaching.  Because the students deserve the best that I can give.  I chose an inner-city school because I wanted to work with kids who desperately need good teachers.  And I expected the kids to be tough, yes.  I just didn’t expect the administration to be so willing to do whatever it takes, no matter how unethical or contrary to the purpose of education, to yank up its numbers and make itself appear to be doing better than it is.  Is No Child Left Behind to blame for all of this?  Where does this problem even start?  I want to be a part of the solution, but I have no clue where to begin.

So I’ve been a bit drained in the evenings, and haven’t found a lot of time (in the midst of my zoning out and dog-walking) to discuss anything intelligently.  There are a lot of questions floating around in my head at the moment (for instance, what should I be learning from all of the mini-disasters that have been popping up in my life lately?  Am I doing the right thing with my life?   Will I ever find some sense of balance?  Am I merely infatuated, or is love on the horizon?) that are certainly worthy of a post or two, and my hope is that this weekend (all three days of it!) I’ll get enough rest and free time to do some catching up.  In the meantime, forgive my brevity, but it’s almost 9pm and my bedtime is quickly approaching…

Elections for sale, and a return to nerd-dom?

So, when the conservative-majority Supreme Court made this ruling last week, the first thing I worried about was the idea of oil companies and health insurance conglomerates pouring their billions into controlling the upcoming mid-term elections.  But I didn’t even think about the implications this decision could have in terms of weight discrimination.  This post from the F-word sheds some light.  There’s also some info about Rep. Grayson’s proposed legislation that would reign in the scary potential that comes with giving corporate interests free reign over the political system.   Check it out if you have a chance.

On to less weighty matters… I’m tossing around the idea of going back to school.  Never mind the fact that I have no idea how I’m going to pay for it, no idea what I want to study, and no idea how I’m going to muster up the energy to attend classes when I’m ready to drop when I come home every day.  I’m a nerd by nature, and a nerd not in school will eventually get restless.  I’m thinking about another master’s degree, because it seems to be the most practical approach.  Maybe library science?  Back to English?  Part of me thinks about taking on something in the social sciences or going back to counseling.  I definitely don’t want a K-12 EdAdmin degree, because I have no desire to become part of the administrative machine that makes my job such a pain in the ass.  I didn’t become a teacher so I could use it as the launch-pad for a better paying career in K-12 bureaucracy, and one of the things that bugs me about my job is that I’m surrounded by a lot of people who did.  I do worry that too many people, including teachers, view us as the underbelly of education, the lowest, the pawns, when the truth of what we do is so incredibly important.  But that’s another post for another day.  I just want to be a student again.  Or maybe I just want an excuse to buy school supplies.

It’s a process

I’ve been thinking a lot about grief lately.  I’m much more familiar with the “somebody died” grief than I am with the kind that you get when a person is most certainly alive, but no longer in your life.  It’s very new to me.  My relationships have always ended relatively amicably,  and when I’ve lost friends in the past, it’s really been more of a trailing off because someone moved away or we just grew slowly apart.  This is the first time in my life that I’ve ever been hurt so badly that I made the choice to sever a friendship completely.  And I’m surprised to find that the process of working through it is a lot like death-grief, in that it’s completely non-linear:  just when you think you’re moving on and doing ok, it comes up from behind and knocks you on your ass.

I’m no expert on holding a grudge, and the truth is that even though I’m moody and have a temper, winning me over isn’t too hard.  (My sister is well aware of this and has been using it to her advantage since she was old enough to talk.)  Until now it’s been next to impossible for me to stay mad at anyone.  And I don’t want to be mad, believe me.  I want to be in a healthy, loving, accepting place.  Some days I feel like I’m getting there.  I start to feel tendrils of forgiveness slowly wrapping around my heart, slowly erasing all of those feelings of betrayal.  But when I least expect it, all of the anger and sadness and hurt and confusion and loneliness comes surging back and I feel as much pain as I did almost two months ago.

I don’t like this back-and-forth.  I’m impatient and I want things to be neat and tidy:  either I’m happy or I’m sad, either I love you or I never want to see you again.  But I do realize that life is about living in the shades of gray in between.  And I know I’ll be okay, whether we reconcile or never speak again.  Because I am blessed with a life full of amazing people.  The void is being filled, and I know that even painstakingly, tediously slow progress is still progress.

Sexism and American Apparel

I was never a fan of this company, despite its fair-trade status.  Thoroughly enjoyed this Shapely Prose post, which puts it way better than I could.

In which I am defeated by a billboard « Kate Harding’s Shapely Prose.

Also, way to go Democrats…first I was mad at the Massachusetts voters, but really it’s the fault of the left, who completely took this election for granted and let a bozo fill the seat due to their shit campaign.  I have serious fears about what this means for health care reform.

Not happy

Today sucks.  I’m upset about the 26 students who failed my class this six weeks because they were too fucking lazy to do their research papers, in spite of over a week of CLASS TIME they had to do them.  I’m upset about my aunt, who is out of the hospital and now in a “rehabilitation facility” (read:  shithole nursing home) until she’s able to move around ok.  I’m upset about my sister, who keeps putting off her doctor’s appointment.  I’m upset about my mom, who is stressed and now I’m worried that her health is going to end up down the tubes.  I’m upset that there’s a full week until payday, and I’m broke, because the first payday of the month goes for rent and credit cards and I’ve spent whatever was left either on gas driving back and forth from the hospital to my mom’s and home again or on meals out in between all of the driving.  I’m upset about Haiti.

And then while walking Gracie tonight, I stepped off of a curb, fell, and rolled my ankle.  Which hurts like absolute hell but appears to be intact.  On the upside, it was an excellent opportunity to purge all of the upset-ness with a good cry.

It’s just a lousy day, and I know they happen.  And at least I’m not crying about doomed friendships or my love life.  But damn!  When it rains it pours.

Time to take a pain pill and hope for a better tomorrow.