As a teacher, most of my time is spent wishing for a moment to catch my breath. I am running around constantly for meetings, disciplinary actions, returning parent phone calls, attending staff meetings, reading for book clubs, going to professional development or trainings, chasing a student who stole a starburst off my desk, asking kids how their day is going, checking in with those who answered in a negative way, modifying math tests for students with learning disabilities, emailing teachers on student progress, helping kids with homework, helping kids with classwork, helping kids tie their shoes*, having conferences with the principal, having conferences with the vice principal, talking to the front office staff because without them I would be totally lost, visiting with my mentor teacher about protocol and advice, and the list can go on and on and on. I mean my duties are boundless. I love every minute of it and would have it no other way, but when I do find myself in between activities, I am wishing for just a chance to take a quick nap, or rest my body for a minute. Now that it is summer and the time has come for me to rest, my life has become, how do you say?….BORING!
Oh my gosh, I looonnnnng for hectic days. I wish I had students who had troubles coming to me every minute so that I had to solve a crisis. These days, I get up and go to Starbucks and strike up a conversation with the Half-n-Half because no one else is around. I spend my afternoons trying to take a nap but can’t fall asleep because the previous evenings 12-hour slumber was more than enough sleep for 3 days. Most people would think they might envy me if our situations were reversed, but let me tell you something. Having nothing to do is like having nothing to do. And then I end up getting so bored that I don’t know what to do and my motivation is down, and then I get bored that I’m bored and it’s a never ending spiral of boredom. People tell me to get a hobby. Well, people, my hobbies are reading books and scrapbooking. Currently I am reading 4 different books at the same time. YES. F-O-U-R. Because one is just boring. I also have been scrapbooking a little bit, but at the end of the day when it’s beautiful outside, scrapbooking sounds like a terrible idea. I want to be in the sun and soaking up some vitamin D. I want to be getting supppper tan. But, I have found that there are only so many hours that can be spent by the pool alone. Yo0u know, people have jobs. They can’t just be lounging around at the pool with me all day. Albeit, I have tried to convince many of them to play hooky.
So, as a result of my boredom and the other hectic things going on in my life…I have become a recluse. I hate people. I do. And then, I end up fighting any invitation to converse with the human race. My patience level has completely sunk below sea level, and my tolerance for stupidity is at an all time low. (Mind you I am a middle school teacher). So, I have mostly shut off all of my friends. For their own choices really, they bailed on me and I figured that people who bail on me aren’t worth my time. I have stopped calling or texting people back, the ones that actually take the time to say something to me. The only two people I talk to are my mom and dad. Yup, I’m a 26-year-old grown woman who only talks to her mother and father. Pathetic really. But the thought of anything else sounds hard, and demanding and time consuming and like it’s going to end up letting me down.
So, I can’t wait until August 25th because then I can bury myself in my job and my students and forget that life is happening all around me. I can consume myself with my job, my students and their needs, and not worry about anything that’s going on with me. They need me more than I do, so it’ll end up working out okay. It did last year. I survived, and the joy that I had from working with those students is something I will never forget. I believe in the beauty of their dreams and know that given the right push, that they will be successful and talented and upstanding citizens.
I still have a month of this “easy living” and I am just trying to think how I am going to make it through. I am already devising my plan for next summer. I think I might end up going to some Spanish speaking country and work in an orphanage and loving on those kids for the summer months. Rather than sitting around wasting my time and talents and God given gifts on drinking iced tea, shopping and lounging at the pool.
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*Okay, so I teach middle-school students so the shoe tying thing doesn’t happen, but for the sake of the argument I needed to throw it in there.
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