The First Day of School

For those of you who don't know, I got a job at Madison High School in Madison Heights, Michigan.  Yesterday was my first day of school.  I lucked out because it was a half day and I didn't have to have everything ready to go - and believe me I did not.  It was just a chance for me to meet and greet with my students and get them psyched for a great year.  I think a lot of it had to do with psyching myself up as well, but at least I was able to kill two birds with one stone.  But I can honestly say that I am pretty excited for what's going to be coming here in the classroom.

There was a time, not too long ago, when I was ready to be done with teaching.  My student teaching experience, while pretty rewarding and very informative, drained me.  I balanced a full-time teaching job that I actually had to pay for with a few shifts at the Writing Center, more shifts in the laundry room, and daily practice.  I was beat up and didn't find the most joy out of my situation.  I began looking for National Park jobs and was looking forward to utilizing my degree in a nontraditional way.  But then I went to Africa, which was, for the most part, a complete debacle...but I got to teach.  One of the days I was there I went into a classroom and was given the go-ahead by the teachers to create a lesson plan and teach it to the students.  The teachers then closed the door and left me in the room with 20 Kenyan children and nothing else.  And let me tell you - I had a total blast!  The kids were attentive and engaged and I felt like, even though I was probably talking way too fast, they were learning.  I was one of the first, if not the first, white person that they had ever seen.  It was such an incredible thought.  Almost instantly, my excitement about teaching returned.  If there was nothing else that I had gained from that Kenya trip, my teaching mojo had come back.

I spent last year subbing and working at Domino's, pulling down 16 hour days for the pay of a typical 8 hour wage earner.  While I was happy about many other things in my life during that time, the grind of such long hours doing things that I necessarily did not want to do started to wear on me.  I was lucky enough to have a great group of people to surround me and help me through the toughest times with a kind word or a hug, but I still struggled.  And before last Thursday, I was about to do all that again - albeit with less support.  I was not looking forward to it.  I was beginning to lose my eagerness for life.  The teaching bug was also going away again. 

And as suddenly as I lost it, it came back.  I'm feeling invigorated.  I have my syllabi written, my rules up and ready to go, and some lesson plans being thrown around the old skull.  Things are going...interestingly for me now.  In this case, interesting is a good thing.

Just as the first day of school is the beginning of a new year and new opportunities for high school students, so is it for me.  What's going to come next?