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I cried in my classroom today. This wasn’t like the angry, stressed-out, frustrated cries I’ve had so many times before in that room. This was more like the breakdown you finally reach over a casket or grave site.
I stood over the blue action packer I’ve had on top of my cabinet since day one as a teacher. The one with my truly precious classroom stuff in it. The sun and moon-shaped cutouts I hung from the ceiling when I taught “Romeo and Juliet.” ~which i would show you if my fucking camera wasn’t broken~ The Montague and Capulet signs so we could sit facing off to compete in finding cool stuff from the play and putting it up all over the walls. ~and ceiling, and podium. some silly notion i had about surrounding us with great words~ The comic strips students wrote about Frankenstein and Prometheus. The Vonnegut door my 5th period class made when he died, including the self-portrait Vonnegut did, traced onto larger paper by J.H., who gave me trouble every day of the year except that one.
The drawings of Cupid and the grim reaper that M.H. did for me to illustrate the dichotomy of love and death in “Romeo and Juliet.” She did it because she loves art and because she’s sweet and beautiful. ~and because shakespeare is great fun. she reminds me of my cousin barbara~ It wasn’t an assignment. I still have everything M.H. ever made for me. She once cut out a little kitty-cat face out of stray construction paper, and it’s been on my bulletin board behind my desk ever since.
This is why I knew I needed to start moving out early. I’m a slow-mourner. ~is that like a close-talker?~ It took me all this time to work up to opening that blue action packer. I’ve gone to great lengths to avoid it.
Now it’s done.
I carried so much stuff into the faculty meeting to give away to other teachers I had to make two trips. Scary, pod-person admin saw me and said, “Wow. You’re busy.”
What a bitch.
Like she doesn’t know why. Nobody has acknowledged my resignation letter ~although i didn’t expect it, or even think of it until twitter buds asked me what their reaction was. um… none. interesting~
And in case you’re wondering if it’s me — if I’m just a no-account teacher who’s doing the system a favor for leaving — I draw your attention to the aforementioned box. The one with the toilet plunger painted green with a surgical glove attached to the top of it inside. The very same creature I had to carry to the faculty meeting and offer up, hoping someone would realize what a treasure it is. ~numb skull teacher: what the heck is this thing? me: if you have to ask, you don’t deserve it~
Something significant is ending. Maybe the whole world didn’t stop, but does it stop for anyone’s losses? I don’t know if I’m leaving teaching forever. I just know it’s not working for me right now, at this time and place. If I stay just because I’m afraid of what would happen if I left, I may as well bury myself alive.
I don’t want to be that person. I don’t want to be that teacher. If I don’t leave now, I’ll always wonder if I stayed in teaching because it was right or because I got stuck. I hate to quote the most over-used doggerel in English, but this reminds me of a quote I saw about a thousand times too many growing up:
If you love something set it free. If it comes back, it’s yours. If it doesn’t, it never was.
To that, I would add:
If it doesn’t hurt to set it free, you never really loved it in the first place.
Crying in that classroom today was the first time I’ve acknowledged that I really am leaving something I love.
8 responses so far ↓
1 diane // Apr 16, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Taylor,
You are mourning the death of something significant: your career as a teacher in that particular district. The difference you’ve made in young lives is your legacy.
I’m so sorry for your loss. If you choose to begin again somewhere else, your new students will be incredibly lucky to have you.
But that doesn’t make it any easier right now.
Good luck in the future. We believe in you.
diane
diane’s last blog post..The Sum and Total
2 GingerTPLC // Apr 17, 2008 at 6:09 am
It is a true mourning of what was and what could have been for your future kids in that school.
But if you’re really that touched, you’ve not lost the love of teaching. Let the toxins go, and feel empowered to start again. This is the painful shedding of an old skin.
Not easy to be re-born. But it won’t be long until you’re posting new joys and new frustrations in a new location. That’s life. Enjoy the feeling of this pain now. Embrace it as a needed emotion; one that allows you to grow.
3 Linda // Apr 17, 2008 at 7:42 am
Taylor-
The time to be sad will pass.
I found this passage from
T S Eliot’s “The Waste Land”
She turns and looks a moment in the glass,
Hardly aware of her departed lover;
Her brain allows one half-formed thought to pass:
‘Well now that’s done: and I’m glad it’s over.’
When lovely woman stoops to folly and
Paces about her room again, alone,
She smoothes her hair with automatic hand,
And puts a record on the gramophone.(255)
That being said, here is what I wish for you-
you have chosen to take the risk and search for ‘greener pastures’. It is like a free fall right now-but there is always exhilaration in the unknown. Carry with you all of our best wishes and love. You are only leaving a bad, dark place-the sun is shining where you are going.
4 ken // Apr 17, 2008 at 10:56 am
let’s pretend we’re co-workers. let’s pretend we’re friends. let’s pretend that I’m writing your a farewell letter.
Now let’s presume:
1. we are, in a sense, co-workers
2. we are, in the new, modern sense of the word, ‘friends’
3. that I will, and that I am
I’ll ‘give’ the letter to you when it’s finished.
your friend,
ken
ken’s last blog post..probably not worth a trophy
5 mandy // Apr 17, 2008 at 7:24 pm
wow, just, wow
mandy’s last blog post..yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyy
6 jose // Apr 19, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Holy shit. I’m so sorry to hear about all these proceedings. This is the human side of teaching that we don’t often address unfortunately, but I’m glad you did. Thanks for sharing your experience, however gruesome it is, and I wish you luck. When I find myself in times of trouble …
jose’s last blog post..Can’t Tell Me Nothing
7 Anne // Apr 23, 2008 at 12:52 pm
I quit teaching once - 14 years ago. It was the best thing I ever did in my teaching career. That year away from the classroom taught *me* how much I loved it, missed it, and gave me a chance to start over.
You are so passionate about what you do and how it works. I hope some of my students (and someday my own kids) will have a teacher like you.
8 Taylor // Apr 23, 2008 at 4:41 pm
That’s very encouraging. My husband keeps saying I’ll go back to teaching someday. I’m indifferent. Not dead set against it, but not pining for it either. If it happens, it happens.
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