A Barbarian's Tale

I spoke about a week ago about how I feel like I'm the one dancing off kilter while everyone else around me is dancing to the beat of the world. Especially on Mondays and Fridays. On Friday, everyone wants to be off and on Monday everyone wants to be miserable. Fighting the urge to complain is like fighting that two-headed serpent from "Conan the Barbarian." You need the will of some long-haired barbarian to survive the pratfalls and expectations. My mornings lately have consisted of my morning devotions and journaling. I read Luke 12:25, which basically tells us, "What's worrying going to get you?"

I started thinking about the current situation of my job and all this senate-bill driven hysteria. Rouge principals, 50 kids in a room, no health care! I look at my 29 kids and think, what's going to happen to them? No one has really come out and said anything about how all these changes will affect the students. Not the politicians, not the political unions. Then again, I've had classes of 18 and classes of 31. Both classes failed to live up to the standards placed before them. I wish I could have taught them again from what I know now.

Recently our school was featured as one of the 31 Columbus City Schools that have failed to reach adequate progress on state scores. They blotted out our kids faces as they played during recess. And they interviewed a parent. So on this nondescript day when the news van parked across the street to gather news, they got an answer they probably weren't looking for. "It's not the teachers." Do I think that the rest of this man's message was indeed a coincidence? No. There's some assurance in my mind that God was directly speaking to me. I immediately smiled and ran to a colleague. "God is good!" We both amen-ed and went off to work smiling. The other parent they interviewed from another school? Not so good.

I know a lot of this is politics. How convenient that they show a new school like ours as failing? A few of my kids asked me if I saw the news. Yes, I told them, but I didn't elaborate. There's learning to go on. Do you feel like you are failing? No, they answer. Do you feel like I'm failing you? No. Good, now get our your blue notebooks.

If anything, this has made me more aware of what I'm trying to accomplish. I've seen the movies, I hear the pundits, and it just makes me that much more committed. I know there are other things out of my control. Kids suspended, moms who baby their kids' sicknesses as they miss yet another Monday. What happens when a kid does 11/29 homework assignments in a quarter? Will I be fined? What happens when one of my kids writes a sentence using the word "despise" as, "I despise my dad because he left us"?

I have a jar on my desk filled with about 2 dollars in quarters and an assembly of pink classroom economy tickets. Every time I say something discouraging, I put a quarter in. Every time they do, they put in a ticket. They asked me if they could pay in advance. No, we're not encouraging discourage-ness. The kids call me out on it. They hold me accountable. They watch me hold back my tongue. They get after each other. They don't like it when someone tells them "I don't care" or "shut up." Little things. Not reinventing the wheel. Life skills. Family. Get our your blue notebooks, kids. Let's get to work.