… until today ends.

I had some interesting conversations over the weekend. Both Dave and Andy said that they couldn’t remember ever having a teacher that actually cared about them, and they are sure that it’s not just how their young selves interpreted it. Both said that the local schools were very classist, and Andy was the “fat new kid who got straight A’s” and Dave was from Capehart, so “wasn’t worth the time.” That was the general assumption.

Dave, in particular, is amazed at how much I DO care. I bring home a lot from my day, the stress and the (sometimes) joy, and I DO really care about my kids. A lot.

So, today, when two of my bad kids were just incessantly belligerent, calling me “ignorant” and “mean,” and just LEAVING my classroom, well, I was fucking pissed. These are kids that I have stuck my neck out for, and they were just assholes today. Total assholes. On my — no kidding — third trip to the office in the span of thirty minutes, I was fighting back tears. It was awful. I wanted to just walk by the office, go out to my car and drive the fuck away. The principal, on the third visit, gestured to some gladiolas in his office: “Would a flower help?” And through gritted teeth, I muttered, “It depends on where you put it.” He laughed.

When I came back, one kid asked “So, why don’t you get along with [those two assholes.]” I started to say, “I get along with them fine, 95% of the time,” when another student said “Duh, it’s not HER that doesn’t get along with THEM.” The kid who asked the question agreed, “yeah, that’s true…”

Before we went to lunch, the kid that asked the question (a favorite, I think I’ve called her Kaitlin before) came up to me and gave me a hug. “Everyone doesn’t hate you Mrs. S.”

The bell is about five minutes away. It can’t come fast enough.