Things are looking up. Finally.
After my not-so-great last day of school, I had a not-so-great last day for teachers. My children came to work with me, and I thought they might be helpful, but instead they were bored and underfoot. I tried to keep them busy and slogged away at taking things down, cleaning, organizing, covering, labeling. At last I was able to palm the boys off on a friend — having promised to take her sons the next day — and managed to finish up. At the end of the day my pedometer read 19,000 steps, which was a personal record. (My previous highest was 18,000, and that had only happened once.) And most of those steps were in my classroom, just trudging around, cleaning up.
I said goodbye to people, but not with any real sadness. It was one of my uncomfortable realizations this year that I don’t have any really close friends at work, and that I never have. Odd as it may seem, I just don’t have that much in common with them. Ah well. My close friends exist, they are just not at school.
Then, Friday came. My first full day of summer vacation, and it was wonderful. I had four boys in my care who immediately went out back and started playing with water. The weather was gorgeous, the boys were happy, the grass was green…it was great. I can’t remember a single thing I did on Friday, just that I enjoyed it.
After a very full weekend — which included both a visit to the theater for a play AND a trip to the movies to see “Hulk” — I had a nice quiet Monday. I slept in, got one boy ready to be picked up for camp, drove the other boy to his camp, accomplished a few things, went to a wonderful yoga class, and just breathed in the cool fresh air that was coming in through the windows.
It was a good year. I accomplished a lot as a teacher, and I learned a lot as a mentor. I know I have a long way to go to be a good mentor, and I’m going to give it another year.
In a little while, I’ll start reading about reading, and I’ll think about the fall, but for now it’s going to be sleep, novels, and yoga.
It seems like you’ve found some lovely ways to start your summer.
Enjoy!
Thanks for a lovely posting. I’ve just finished a very hard first year of teaching and I’m looking for a job for next year. I find myself struggling with a lot of negative emotions. I found it heartening to see that even an accomplished teacher can experience difficulty and disappointments. Understand, I’m not happy that you experienced them, just glad that I’m alone, and encouraged that you can have difficulty but still keep a positive attitude about yourself and your teaching. Don’t know if this makes any sense, but thanks for your posting.
Amendment: meant to say I’m glad to see that I’m NOT alone in having had disappointments with my teaching this year.
Lesley, thanks for commenting. No, you are definitely not alone. Teaching is hard, and it is hard for all of us, no matter how long we have been teaching. Hang in there, and the rewards will become more apparent.