I’m feeling a little emotional today, and since I haven’t had a good emotional post here in awhile I figured it was about time.
The teachers in our district go back to school today. This is their in-service week and next Monday the kiddos start school too. This morning I was talking to the kids about school shopping and I mentioned that the teachers had to start school today. They of course asked why I’m not in school, since I’m a teacher too. My first thought was, “welll…..” but instead I explained that teachers in our district start today, but I will be in a different district and the teachers in that district start next week. Which, really, is super convenient for me since I can be home with the kids this week and I’ll start my “in-service” time the same week they go back to school.
On the surface everything is perfect. I have a steady job, with nice people, in a beautiful school, following a philosophy that makes so much sense to me. It will be calm and peaceful at school, and at home since I’ll be home in the afternoons with my kids and we don’t have to deal with long bus rides and daycare this year. Everyone will be happy.
Yet, I can’t help this little part of me that feels totally disappointed in myself and this outcome. After working so hard last year to become a teacher, learning how to write lessons and differentiate and set up a classroom and so much more… then ending up as an assistant and being trained on how to color coordinate the sponges and refill the polishing cream feels depressingly anti-climactic. I was eager for a job in June and feeling stressed because the job listings were drying up, I took this one. It is a good job, but in hindsight maybe I should have held out a bit longer.
Since I took the job several classroom teacher positions have opened up, in schools I’d like to be in. I’ve been encouraged by friends and peers to back out of my Montessori contract and go for the classroom jobs. Apparently “teachers do it all the time!” Unfortunately I have higher standards for myself and backing out of a perfectly good contract just didn’t feel right. Especially since there is nothing wrong with the job, in fact there are many very right things about it… it’s just not what I was hoping to be doing this year. My logical mind says I did the right thing and this is a good step for my work-life balance, but the evil voice inside says maybe I’m just being lazy, if I was really serious I’d go for the prize, whatever it takes. Often I’m good at staying logical and suppressing that voice, but sometimes it pipes up.
I saw a woman from UVEI at Panera Bread this afternoon. She was having a working lunch with her new teacher friends. I also just texted a friend of mine about getting together tomorrow, then remembered that she got hired in the middle school this year and is at work this week. These things should make me feel happy to not be working, but instead they make me feel sad. :/
Often when I feel my craziest it’s when my logic and emotions collide, leaving me with internal debates that can have no winner. So today I am trying to stay positive, relax into the fact that I am home with the kids, not at work, and ignore the fact that it would be super cool (and totally stressful!) to be at work right now, setting up a new classroom and preparing for my first teaching job. Exactly where I wanted to be at this point in the year! Alas, that will have to wait for next year (I hope!) and this will be a calm, quiet year in someone else’s classroom.
In the meantime, who doesn’t love fresh school supplies!?!
