It’s a tumble-onto-bed, asleep-before-you-fall kind of Friday night. I got home from having a singular adult beverage with my team by 6 PM.  I sat down on my bed at 6:05, and at 7 I opened my eyes, astonished that, at some point, I must have closed them. It’s not that I worked so very…

My kids don’t think that I can text. Somewhere in New Jersey, my parents just read that sentence and laughed, because they remember how many times in my youth I went over the monthly text messaging limit on our family cell phone plan. Nevertheless, since I am somewhere between 30 and 10,000 years old, it…

The blahs are universal.  They are endemic to the human population, but especially to those of us who spend our days in the Institution of the School, the Training Ground for Young Minds. This week is our state testing window, and so children and adults alike seem to veer manic-depressively from focused attention to mad…

This week… One of my children asked if my haircut could be considered a mullet.  I said that I hoped not. I spent the last 10 minutes of the day on Wednesday cycling between every accent that I can reasonably attempt, much to the delight of 50% of my sixth hour class.   The other…

Here is a universal truth about children: they are all baffled and fascinated by the lives their teachers live outside of school. Here is a universal truth about adults: we don’t grow out of it. After high school, I underwent the modern rite of passage of becoming Facebook friends with my former teachers.  To this…

Teaching is one big identify crisis, I write confusedly on the far side of Spring Break, perhaps a side effect of being somewhat refreshed, rejuvenated, renewed. Warning: This is about to get heavy.  I don’t think I make a single joke or snide comment in this entire post.  I might even say something negative about an…

Spring Break makes you do unusual things, things that you don’t have time to do during the normal work-a-day craziness of life as a teacher. If I were being poetic, I would tell you that the stand out leisure activity from today, my first day of temporary freedom, was wandering through an epically well stocked…

Random thoughts: Taken from the morning drive to North County. Recorded during the last commute before Spring Break, en route to the final four hours of parent-teacher conferences. Influenced by the heavenly aroma of STL Bread Co. bagels for the team in the front seat.   Why is pulchritude such an ugly word when it…