It might or not be a cliché that when one gets older and has a conscience (something not evident in the entire republican party and their voters) one starts evaluating one’s life. Cliché or not, I find myself doing that sometimes.
Being an introvert who starts sweating every time I have to pick up a phone to call someone lest I disturb them, I don’t ask to follow anyone on social media; but if people I know ask to follow me, I follow back. That’s how I have come to follow some of the amazing students that have crossed my path; and sometimes, getting these mediated snippets of their lives triggers sessions of “life evaluation”.
Thinking back, I must say that I was totally unqualified to teach at the high school level for the eleven years that I did. I was fully qualified to teach art, but because of the (clusterfuck) way the school was structured, one did not need an education degree or certification with which one might have learned something about teaching young minds. … Though as it turns out, the one visual art teacher that had such a degree turned out to be a predator; but I digress (and here I go, opening my big mouth that always gets me in trouble- hahah- bring it on trouble, I am used to you)…
Anyway, when I look back at those eleven years, eight of which seemed idyllic (though I now know to have had deep structural flaws), and from whence so many great kids came out, I know I made mistakes I wish I hadn’t, most of them having to do with my temper and my expectations. I wish I had been more gentle and that I had understood the fragility of young minds. But, my god, when I look at “my kids” (the ones I know about), I am so amazed and so very happy to find out what they all have accomplished in all kinds of different ways. For all of them, I hope for a gentle future.
Well, there - back to trouble and cats …
