is how much the bookshelves in my classroom are bugging the shit out of me. It's 7:39 am and I am ready to go into school and take care of the shelves. WTF is the matter with me. I have reached some kind of work-a-thon situation where any and all spare time must somehow be devoted to work so that I don't get behind. I don't think I spent this much time working when I taught high school. I know I didn't when I did middle and certainly not this much at my last school. I am starting to think that elementary school teachers should be paid more than upper levels because it is so much more freaking work.
Oh and I also have a cold which means I have almost no voice. That made for a swell week this week.
Thankfully, it's only two days of teaching this week and then Thanksgiving. I do need to shop for that and get ready because we're having guests for it. Oddly I am not tweaked about that. Maybe because working has dulled my brain. Actually it does feel that way, like I can't get clear thoughts. I don't know what's with that. I actually took my evening medications (including the help you sleep pills) in the morning yesterday by mistake. Maybe that's why I'm foggy?
So after the break we've rearranged the kids and now I will be teaching all subjects even math. I have never taught math. But I'm going to do it.
It's been a wonderfully humbling year. Maybe this is what I needed even. Because for the last few years I have felt like I was really good at what I do and that I knew how to do it. But now I am in a situation where I have no idea whether what I knew was right before will be right for these kids now. So it's all trial and error. Some skills transfer and others don't. I feel completely incompetent, despite the numerous people who say I am doing well. At least I've reached an age where this level of doubt is not undermining me. Had this happened even 5 years ago I think I would have hung it up and run away from the challenge. Because it is no small challenge. But while I feel totally useless much of the time, and while I feel like I am not doing the job I know I did with the kids I *know* how to teach, I also feel like it's a really good chance to overcome the hurdles and challenges. In some ways, while my year off was what I really wanted, maybe this wall is what I really needed. I'm still unsure about whether or not that's going to prove to be true.
In the meantime, I am going to go get a bagel and fix those fucking bookshelves before they haunt me all weekend.
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