2020 Global Pandemic as a Teacher

Today was the first day of distance learning with 1 1/2 days of actual prep (learning different technological platforms through trial and error) and about 10 days to think about it.  Yeah, I don't like it and neither do the students.  All the grumbling they do throughout a normal day about school is just an ostentatious display of solidarity amongst them-- either that, or just a bad habit.  Either way, they miss school.  They miss me and their other teachers who love them, and they miss each other.

When the administration called me on the bus on my way home from the 8th grade trip just before Spring Break and told me to tell the students to take home all of their textbooks when they got off the bus at school, I half-thought he was kidding.  I chuckled and thought, "Yeah, okay.  Whatever."  A lot happened in just 4 days while being cut off from the rest of the world. 

As the reality of not returning to school began to sink in on me, I was just... angry.  Very angry.

It eventually turned to Stoic as to not feel anything about it.  Just do it.  It doesn't matter why. 

The general population is basically divided in to two camps on this issue:  quarantine everyone or this is ridiculous.  I get it.  I don't like it, but I get it.

When I started interacting with my students through texts, group chats, YouTube videos, conference calls, and finally Zoom, they didn't discuss it, but I noticed how much the students are grieving their loss.  I'm not even addressing what they will actually miss out on the school calendar but their immediate sense of being stripped away from their peers and their teachers and other staff members at school who impact their lives greatly-- with not much notice.  No time to process or mentally prepare themselves.  No time to say goodbye.  This isn't like going into summer vacation which is a planned routine that they anticipate from the beginning.  It's different. 

I haven't broken down and wept yet.  It's not time to worry yet, Atticus always says.  But when I put it into words in conversations with those who this has directly affected, I get emotional.  I will weep for the seniors.  I will weep for the students who see school as their refuge.  I have just a glimmer of hope yet that we will return to school in May for the last week and have some resolution to this mess and this school year.  The seniors need it.  The teachers need it.  We are a small private school who doesn't technically fall under the state board of education's orders.  We must follow state mandates, as to not break the law, but if the gathering rules are lifted, there's a chance.

As a teacher I suffer from this chain of events every year:  I have my same students for 4 years in a row, 9th -12th grades.  I invest so much of myself into them that I never want to give them up.  Graduations are hard on me.  Beginning a new school year is hard on me because it's always missing something-- the graduated seniors.  It's a grieving process that doesn't really heal until about mid-September.  It's like I finally decide to start over again with the new senior class and start pouring.  It's a curious cycle.  Not that I only focus on seniors... they are just more open to learn more about themselves and the world around them, outside of reading, writing, and arithmetic.  They have their vessels and are collecting the wisdom that flows from our collected experiences as teachers.  They are hungrier than the rest.  The realization that this place called school has an expiration settles in on them and they start preparing themselves.  Oh sure, they will complain due to the syndrome called senioritis and say how ready they are to be done... but they're not.  Not in March anyway.  It's not over.  They aren't mentally ready to walk away just as we aren't ready to let them leave. 

I just pray for closure to this school year.  I promise you, reader, it's not going to come through group text messages or something like Zoom.  And I know I'm being extremely selfish here.  I know that my thin line of hope for this school year's end at my school is not possible for the thousands of public school seniors who have no hope of returning to say goodbye and close the longest chapter of their lives so far.  It's so unfair, but I pray that they don't become bitter and carry it around with them until it becomes too heavy and crushes their souls, because the attitude of "Yeah, okay.  Whatever," should be a short-lived stage of grief-- not a place to pitch a tent.

A hell of a year...

The year 2019 came in like a lion and went out like a... lamb?  I don't know if lamb is the right word, but it did come roaring in.  It actually started with a marriage proposal on Christmas Day 2018.  My oldest daughter found the man of her dreams and he proposed.  As a family, we decided that May was probably the best time for a wedding.  We'd squeeze it in between Rayne's graduation and wheat harvest. I also had my youngest daughter graduating high school in 2019.  We blinked twice and May was here.  My superb organization and all of our experience planning big events made the spring go by very quickly but not too stressful.  Rodney was the one stressing the most because the weather was so wet that it made it impossible to get in full weeks of work.  Our friend Galen said that the spring of 2019 was the wettest one he'd experienced in almost 50 years of pouring concrete.  We believe it!

The graduation and wedding were definitely highlights of the year.  So many of our loved ones were here, like at the house, for many days-- most of the time helping out.  It was three weeks of pure joy, and I relished every moment of it.  People would continually come up to me and say things like "I bet you're ready for all of this to be over with."  Me, always able to disappoint would say, "No.  I'm not.  I have a house full of the people I love most, and I don't want it to end."

Our youngest daughter graduating meant the inevitable was just around the corner...

I busied myself with low-cost projects that were actually way too big for me to accomplish myself.  But, alas, I am very resourceful.  And I'm not afraid to ask for help.  I took on some upholstery projects that decided I didn't want to tackle myself, so I packed my car with boat seats, cushions for the dining benches in the camper, and outdoor patio cushions and drove to Minnesota.  I'm not afraid to drive 15 hours across country by myself either.  I spent another week with my Aunt Barbie. (She had been at my house for two.)  I ripped seams to make patterns while she sewed the new ones together.  We had quite a system and she has quite a talent.  It was a much needed hiatus from everything that had transpired all year and I didn't have to think about IT.

When I got home, I decided to dig much deeper into the family genealogy.  It was cheap entertainment and it kept my mind occupied.  I learned so many fascinating things about my ancestors-- even that Regan's new husband has a couple common ancestors with her about 10 generations back.  Crazy-small world.

Sooner or later the unavoidable, necessary new normal was lurking its-profoundly-painful-self right around the corner.  IT.  The changing of the season was close at hand.  Summer would evolve into... more summer, right?  who am I kidding... summer would evolve into continued hot days but with my going to school instead of sitting on the back porch, dreading the advent of the new school year... without my kids at school, and soon, without them at home even.  Three kids in 4 years was a great idea!... until it also meant that all three left in 4 years too.

It was hard.  Mentally, it was hard.  But it did get easier.  I finished most of my mourning in July before it even started.  I had lots of long days at home with everyone else at work.  Knowing that each one of them was healthy and happy and pursuing life in a way that was pleasing to God made IT much easier to withstand.  Little did I know, it would only be for a short amount of time... a semester, and Rosalind decided to transfer schools and move home, much to Rayne's disheartenment.  They were roommates in the dorm, and Rayne was about to be alone.

Work was still really stressful for Rodney because there just wasn't enough of it.  He just couldn't catch a break.  He was ready to go, but there wasn't enough to do.  We mulled over all of our options and decided to start talking to people and put in a few applications.  By the end of the year, Rodney conceded to hauling cattle again to fill in the gaps.  Twenty-five years later, and it's still not his favorite thing to do.

So, in like a lion and out like...  a lamb?  No, like a geriatric lion with a terminal illness that can barely raise its head who really just needs to be taken out behind the barn and shot... put out of its misery.  Parker McCollum has a song "Hell of a Year" that came out in late 2017.  I just found it this year, and the tune and repeating lines of the title really resonated with me.  The rest of the song does not, however, but I don't even hear it when I listen because it immediately takes me back to the really good memories of 2019 and all that I rode through emotionally-- the highs and the struggles to fight the lows.  2019 WAS a hell of a year, but I wouldn't trade a moment of it for anything in the world.