Like in my classroom, when my students seem to be on an unbending course of genuine sincerity, but then, at the slightest provocation, veer off into uncharted and uncomfortable territories faster than a slow-moving wheelchair turns on a wet tile floor, so too can this blog. Sometimes I need to suck in the refreshing air of unplanned writing after hours on end of stifling seriousness.
With that in mind, let me tell you about why I love my friggin' job, despite the insurmountable responsibilities, my fried emotions, and my stress-induced receding hairline.
Answer this: What other job gives you the power to control humans with a single word, a gesture, or sometimes a mere look–besides a Subway sandwich artist?
If you said teachers, you're correct. Teachers control humans. In my classroom, I ascend to the highest order of greatness. Students, despite their incessant rudeness and challenges to my status, crave the tiniest inclination of my head that signifies the slightest acknowledgment of their existence. Do I think this is okay–this strange system of education that has evolved in our species? No, I think it's absurd. Do I revel in the power that the students naturally give to me without having to earn it? Absa-fuckin'-lutely.
For example, watch this:
It's near the end of the day. My last class is filing into my room. I'm holding the door open for them, trying in vain to act like I'm happy to see them. After about two minutes of this masquerade, I remember I forgot to write the Do Now on the board. I panic as past experiences of not having something for the knuckleheads to do as they sit down flash before my eyes. Without a Do Now, there will be yelling; there will be laughing; there may be a game of tag; and there most definitely will be at least seven of them repeating my name over and over and over.
Three months ago, I might collapse under the pressure of this problem. But now? Now this problem is a drizzle on my jog, a hair sneaking into the corner of my mouth, the ones that are easy to snag and pull out.
L., could you do me a favor and write something on the board for me? I forgot to write up the Do Now.
Oh pardon me, L.? You don't want to? Maybe I should make a phone call home to let Mom know...what's that? You will do that for me? Thank you L., I do appreciate it.
Problem solved. Hair pulled out.
But even more than this teaching power, I enjoy the moving kindnesses that students can dish out because many of them are still too young to adhere to the taboo of genuine male-male kindness, and that female-male kindness can only be borne of sexual intentions.
One such kindness happened with one of my female students. She is one who I haven't really connected with. When I give her consequences during class, she becomes very abrasive. When I give her praise, she hides any emotion she may be feeling under a mask of disinterest.
But anyway, one day I was feeling jovial, so when I chanced upon her at her locker, I decided to snag her unattended pen and act like I was going to pocket it. She sensed that I meant well–that I wasn't actually going to steal her pen–so instead of griping at me to return what was rightfully hers, she only smiled, and I handed back her pen. She doesn't smile at me often, so I'm hoping that was a pivotal moment.
Here's another one. One of my basketball players has a younger sister. She has to walk over to younger sister's school to pick her up every day, so usually younger sister hangs out on the bleachers during practices.
I like to playfully chat with younger sister when I get the chance. She's pretty shy, so it's usually one-sided conversation that goes like this: Hiiiii. And how are youuuuu?! Hey! How old are you now? You look like you've grown since I last saw you! Are you fifteen? No. Ten? No. Seven? Ahhhh, seven.
I say stupid shit like that, and it lights her face up brighter than her sister's cell phone that she's always playing with.
Anyway, one day after school these two knuckleheads come bombin' into my room like they own the place. Which is fine, for I could use a break from the hordes of phone calls to parents. I say hiiiii to little sister, and she just smiles and continues munching on her Honey Bun, which is the size of her face. Big sister and I chat for a minute or two, and then big sister says they have to go.
I think that will be it, that they'll leave and I'll go back to my banal duties. But before they leave, little sister wordlessly waddles over to me, arms opening in an unmistakable pre-hug gesture. I shift in my seat to meet her, open my own arms for embrace, and let her tiny ones wrap around me in what can only be described as the best hug I've had with someone who's said zero words to me. I'm pretty sure sticky Honey Bun residue smears into my hair, but in that moment I couldn't have cared less.
Sweet nectar, this blog is all over the place.
I believe there are two types of writing–the kind that I call premeditated, like murder, and the kind that's meditated, like Warrior Two. This blog is definitely the latter, which is good because I like yoga.
Speaking of religion, there's this character in the novel we're reading. She's uneducated, and one of my classes is chatting about this one day. The character sees a bear in the woods and thinks it's the devil, which to her is a sign that the world is ending. I tried to push the class to thinking that this is evidence of her being uneducated, because a bear in the woods is perfectly ordinary, and it's absurd to think the world is ending because of such a natural event like a bear in the woods.
Then one student raises his hand and says, But God could end the world at any time.
I said back to him, That's (can't say what I thought because I'm a teacher), in my head before saying out loud, You're right in the sense that the world can end. Does anybody have another idea on how it can end?
One of my rather perceptive students raises her hand. The sun can blow up, she says. But actually we learned last year that the sun will expand before blowing up. So it will melt the Earth before it explodes.
Perfect answer.
So I say, Right... So the world can end in two ways. One way is natural–the sun expanding and destroying our Earth. The other way is unnatural in that it has not been proven possible. One way is ordinary and predictable, the other isn't.
One small victory for science. One small victory for bringing the knuckleheads closer to the light.