At the Beginning

I didn't sleep well on the last night of summer.

Three months is a long time when it comes to routine, and my body in its purest state is designed to wake up at 11am, to do the best thinking just before it passes out fourteen hours later. The working world is not designed for people like me. Certainly the school day isn't.

But I showed up at 8:00 on the first day, took the classic first-day-of-school picture that didn't involve sobbing next to the bus driver like the one in 1989. Handed out syllabi, recommended books, situated the homework hand-in boxes on my file cabinet just so.

It's a very different year.

The house is different. (No more black mold growing in a square above the shower.)

My roommate is different. (My former roommate returned to the States, and my current roommate is in love.)

My kids are different. (My biggest class is now 8, instead of last year's 16.)

My classes are different. (I'm teaching 7th grade Bible, and the rest are the same, but I'm not at school at 9pm, scrambling to make worksheets. There has never been anything so beautiful as folders full of already-created lessons and activities; I have been leaving school by 6 every night. I'm still trying to figure out how this is possible.)

Highlights of the first month:

Overheard on the bus ride to secondary camp, from a 7th grader who had thrown up that morning
Sickling: "I'm so hungry!"
Friend: "Dude, why didn't you eat breakfast?"
Sickling: "I did! It just came back up through my mouth!"

Said by a 7th grader, pensively viewing his White-Out pen
 "Ms. C, can you explain to me the mechanism of this?"

During Bible class, while re-enacting key scenes from the Pentateuch
Boy: (pretends to fall from the sky, then lands with a crash)
Girl: "What is that supposed to be?"
Boy: "It's the people falling from the sky!"
Girl: "No, it's manna and quail that fell from the sky."
Boy: "Oh. I thought that was a couple. Like, Manna and Quail."

While I sat in front of my computer with a thousand tabs open, as per usual
Girl: "What are you doing?"
Me: "Oh, just checkin' my email and some other random stuff."
Girl: "I wonder what that random other stuff could be. Muahaha!"

Conversation with a 5-year old boy/aspiring intellectual
Boy: "In Europe, I only like Spain, France, and England."
Sarah: "What about Italy?"
Boy: "I HATE POMPEII!"
Us: "What? Why?"
Boy: "Because it was full of Romans!"


And other sundry things heard in class
Boy: "Do you have some White-Out? My White-Out's not working." Pause. "Do you have the answer key? My answer key's not working."

Boy: "Hey, don't interrupt; she was calling on me. Come on, you're British, you're supposed to be polite!"

Me: "Stalling will not help you."
Boy: "Stalin? Of course he won't. He's dead!"

Girl: "There are no rules in reading except 'have fun.' That's why I love reading."