Another doctor-ordered vacation

I was ordered to post...love ya Karen!

You know, it is a shame when you have to be too sick to get out of bed before you take time off when your body is crying out for it. Dontcha hate workaholics? Wait a minute; I resemble that remark! My name is Liz, and I'm a workaholic. Evidently, I have two separate viral infections going on -- one upstairs, and one downstairs. Oy! Let's just say I'm all output and no input right now and leave it at that. I'm on antibiotics, steroids, codeine, and something to help the tummy. I think I have consumed a gallon of water today and a half gallon of orange juice, but I still have cotton mouth. Also, codeine makes you sweat, and your sweat smells funny, too. I don't think I am the most pleasant person to be around right now, but my husband still insists on trying to kiss me. Either he is crazy about me or he is simply trying to get out of work. A doctor-ordered vacation is better than no vacation, but man, I'd rather be on the beach. :::chants mantra::: toes in the sand, toes in the sand, toes in the sand...

I truly do need the break. So many of my students have turned into little buttheads that at this point, it's either me or them. I loathe my fourth period right now. I've had major issues with them over the past week regarding lunchtime; it's a large class (28), and they seem to physically incapable of being quiet for the one minute (literally, it takes about a minute -- I timed it) it takes us to walk from the room to the cafeteria. Seventh graders have the attention span of gnats and the memory of goldfish; I say shhhhhhhh so much that I sound like I am losing air. They will be quiet for about 5 seconds. Next thing you know, girls are dancing and singing the "walk it out", boys are playing the "cup check" game (yell CUP CHECK and punch your buddy in the nuts; nice game huh?), someone is banging out a beat on the glass walled atrium as we walk by, someone got out of line to go to the water fountain, someone is peeking into a class that is in session, trying to whisper to her friend, etc., etc. Again, shhhhhhh I say. I completely understand the rationale behind the "no talking in the hallway while classes are in session" rule; I simply find it damn near impossible to enforce when there is one of me and 28 of them. The administration says that effective teachers should not have any trouble at all getting students to follow the rules. I want the drugs they have.

As I am job hunting, one of my questions I am asking in each interview is, "Do you have duty-free lunch?" I swear, I'd take a pay cut if I didn't have to walk my class to and from the cafeteria. It's not just the transitional time that makes me nuts. It's also the act of eating lunch in the cafeteria with students, when they can truly be themselves, at full volume. A teacher eating lunch in the cafeteria looks like a prairie dog, popping her head up and down to scope out the scene while she tries to scarf down the mystery meal of the day. She breaks up fights, she stops students from throwing food, she makes them stay at their assigned tables, and she oversees the cleaning up when everyone is finished. She must keep students who are not in her class this period from messing with her students. She does not enjoy her lunch at all. When she is starving in the evening, she can't actually recall what she ate for lunch or if she even ate. I say she cuz I really mean me and I'm a she. Did I mention I am taking codeine?

The doctor says in the next 24 hours, I'm going to feel a lot better, so I may enjoy this viral vacation after all.

Rest in peas (and other thoughts)

I'm saddened to report that a student at my school lost his battle with bone cancer this week. You've never seen such a determined kid; with a ready grin and neon green crutches, he kept going and going after an amputation, chemo, radiation, and god knows how many surgeries and procedures. For the past year, he fought for his life against an aggressive cancer that attacked first his bones, then spread to his organs. He lost his hair and a leg, but he never lost his determination and sense of humor. He was spotted many times dancing in the hallway on his crutches, laughing with his hat pulled over his eyes.

How strong was his desire to keep going? The week before he died, he attended a Relay for Life fundraising supper at school even though he was too weak to stand. A couple of days later, he was racing remote control cars in his neighborhood with another one of our students. Just a short day or two after that, his lungs filled with fluid and he was rushed to the hospital, where he began to slip away. He spent his last hours surrounded by his family, telling them he loved them. When he could still speak, he told his mom that he needed her help to go, so I guess he just needed to know that she would be ok.

This young man was the proverbial class clown, even when he was in the grip of the damn disease, so I think he would get a belly laugh out of something one of my ESOL students wrote in her letter of condolences to his parents: "God bless your son, and may he rest in peas."