Songs of Innocence

Dear Mrs. Jones,

I wish to clarify that I am not now, nor have I ever been, an exotic dancer. I work at Home Depot and I told Sarah how hectic it was last week before the blizzard hit. I told her we sold out every single shovel we had. Then I found one more in the back room, and several people were fighting over who would get it. Sarah's picture does NOT show me dancing around a pole. It's supposed to depict me selling the last snow shovel we had at Home Depot. From now on I will remember to check her homework more thoroughly before she turns it in.

Sincerely,

Mrs. Smith

Don’t know if you guys have seen this picture or not before, but it made me laugh so hard when I came across it. I think I read somewhere that it was originally shown on the Conan O’Brien show so it’s not real, but I wish it was, and I hope that I get some seriously awesome drawings like it over my years as a teacher! This is totally the type of thing that will get me out of bed in the morning 20 years in to it.

So I'm Sitting in the Classroom, I'm looking like a Zombie

This morning I slept in and I was just waking up when my phone rang at 9:30. I didn't recognize the number and I wasn't expecting any calls, but I picked it up anyway. On the other end was a lady from a service called "Casual Direct". It is a service you sign up for when you graduate saying what schools in your area you'd be willing to do substitute teaching days at. Now, they've had my info since last November and I've never gotten a call from them once before today so I was shocked. She asked if I could make it out to a school that morning. They had already been in session for nearly 30 minutes at that time and it'd take me at least another 30-45 to get dressed and get over there. At first I said, "No, I don't think I can," but then I changed my mind (and thought about how me and Boyfriend could use the $200-250 for 5 hours worth of work. Sidenote: are you U.S. subs and teachers totally mad that we make that much here? Last time I looked, in Santa Cruz you only make $85-$100 a day!) and decided "What the heck, let's do this!" So I scrambled to throw together clothes and make sure everything was ready in my substitute teaching kit I've had all year, but had no use for, and Boyfriend and I were out the door.

The kids were overwhelming and on their worse behavior. I had fun activities and bribes and prizes and it just did not matter. They were in 5/6th grade and too cool or something. It was a hard day, made even harder when for the last hour I was given a whole new group of 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th graders to do an art project with. The project was one they had already started and basically consisted of turning bits of foil in to a sculpture. The foil instead ended in balls being flung across the classroom! I got them to stop the project because they weren't doing anything anyway and wanted them to clean up and we were just going to do another activity I had up my sleeve, but getting them to clean up and be quiet was the mission from Hell. I have never yelled so much in my life. I was definitely glad when the day was over and all I could think about was, "Woohoo, money!" I was exhausted and dejected. I thought, "I can't do this again." I went up to the office to return the classroom key and sign out for the day when they asked me if I could do a half day on Monday. I said, "Sure!" At least I know what I'm in for this time. Next week's assignment consists of one hour on the other 5/6th grade mixed class and two hours on Kindergarten. Wish me luck and say a few prayers for me!

For the Workforce, Drowning

While I was out dealing with cops and kids, everyone else in my course had already done that round of practice teaching, so they only had about an hour of school for 2 of the 4 weeks then the rest of the time was spent getting ready for our Departmental interviews and doing projects that needed to get done before Internship. I had to do all these things and teach at the same time. I was frantic. Everyone told me my Internship school would be a walk in the park compared to my last school and I lucked out by getting the nicest class in the school. My teacher was alright, he didn’t give me as nice of a report as I think I deserved, but that’s because he didn’t really watch me teach. It was good cause the class became mine and I really learned a lot, but bad cause then he only had the first few lessons of mine that he had critiqued to go off of when writing my final report. I really enjoyed the kids and the work and was ready for a class of my own. The staff at the school were all really great and would do anything to help any of us interns out. After our last day, they took us out to a bar. I wasn’t going to drink, but one of the young teachers (who’s husband happened to be my supervisor at the tough school) was like, “Meh, get drunk, I usually do” so I did and I was embarrassingly drunk and became emotional when I got home that night (and thankfully not at the bar!) and called S. I was just upset about my final report, especially after someone at the bar had told me that not everyone agreed with the final report either and didn’t think it reflected the effort or work I had done. So I was totally embarrassed when I saw S the next day. On top of that, I was a classy bitch and threw up on the train on the way down to his place. Luckily, I must have been psychic that day as I just happened to have thrown a barf bag and a juice box in my purse that morning!
Over the next few weeks, I got my Teacher Research Project done and had to present a portfolio to a professor and a peer justifying to them how I had achieved all of the teaching standards for NSW.
When that was all said and done, I threw myself a Mexican/Halloween/Graduation party at S’s house. It was a good night, I got most everyone super drunk ( I was still over drinking after throwing up on the train) and we had good food and a piñata and most people dressed up as a Mexican or at least Australia’s version of a Mexican or in some type of Halloween outfit. S was a cholo and I was a chola. I found a video on Youtube that was about applying makeup like a chola (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CR0PykHTYY) so I tried to follow it but I have no skills and it ended up looking pretty funny. I got a sharpie and drew “Thug Life” acrossed S’s knuckles, a heart that said Madre on it, and another tattoo on his arm or chest that said Brown Pride. He also had been growing a beard/mo combo for awhile and he shaved off the beard and came out looking sooooo dirty with just the mo!
I a) couldn’t afford to keep my room while I went back home and b) had decided I wanted to live on the Coast closer to S and c)wanted to try living on my own again so I moved out of Benny Boy’s apartment in November and made my way home to California.

School of Hard Knocks

About 4 days after my parents left, I started my 2nd practice teaching job. It was at a rough school. The type of school where when people asked you were you were going and you told them their response was, “Ohhhhh” Again, I was nervous. I ended up with a pretty cool classroom teacher and a pretty cool supervisor. My time flew by there and I learned more there than during my first round of teaching. I started to become comfortable being in front of the class. The kids were difficult at times but I still had a lot of fun. My last day was probably the funniest/roughest day there. We had been playing t-ball for the last 3 Fridays and the classroom teacher thought I could handle it on my own for that session so he went inside. The game was going well when one of the “bad boys” wanted to have another turn batting. Not everyone on his team had gotten a first bat so I said he’d have to wait. He threw the bat down, I told him to sit down, he then said, “Get Fucked, Miss,” I asked him to repeat himself and ballsy kid that he was, he said it again. Someone got the classroom teacher and he removed the kid. The game was back to going smoothly. Then we were nearly out of time so I said anyone who hasn’t had a second bat come in to bat and everyone else go out in the field. Kids rushed to be the first to bat, a girl and a boy got the bat at the same time. They argued over who would bat first. The little boy hit the little kids with the metal bat. She fell down crying. He went running, another boy went running after him, and knocked him over. It was an awesome day. The boy who told me to get f*d’s Mom came in later and called the cops on us saying we were picking on her kid, I had to fill out an incident report. I think it’s safe to say I left a good impression on that school and they’d have me back anytime :)

Another Travelin' Song

I was so freakin stoked when my Mom told me at the beginning of May or end of April that there was a possibility she and my Dad might be coming to see me. They had sold their house and moved to Santa Cruz. My Dad had retired and now my Mom might have a trip to Singapore coming up so he would be able to go with her if the trip went through. They would do the week in Singapore then try and come down to see me for a week. I was so pumped because I had found out I wouldn’t be able to make it home for Californian summer for the year, as I had 4 weeks of practice teaching, a two week break in which I had assignments to do and an interview with the Department of Education so if they didn’t come it would be like not seeing them for nearly a year. They came and we had a great time…of course I had an itinerary because I’m anal and like to make sure that no one misses out on any of the good stuff I know about when they are in a new place. I didn’t mention it but I had one for Hawaii and one for each time S had come to California. We hit up Paddy’s Market, went to mine and S’s favorite restaurant on the Harbour-Malaya, did a day trip and a walk around Manly, had a BBQ at S’s parent’s place with all of his family over to meet mine, a whale watching trip in the rain-Mom spotted the whales for the boat, site seeing around Newcastle in the rain, Mom and Dad hung out with S’s parents and grandparents on the Coast for the day while I was at school/volunteering at a school, and then S and I took Mom and Dad to a really nice Italian restaurant at another part of the Harbour, near where we had stayed when they were last in Sydney. Saying good bye was difficult as always. This time we were in a taxi, it pulled over at a red light so I could get to Central Station so I quickly had to grab my stuff and kiss Mom and Dad good bye before the light changed. I cried the whole trip back home on the train.

Banned From the Back Porch

I know I'm posting heaps, but I don't have a job right now and I wrote down like 20 entries before putting the page up to give everyone the background on me being here and I was hoping to catch up to present day fairly soon is all...
I moved in with a girl, A, whom I didn’t really know, but had met a few times as she had worked with S and was friends with his friends from the movies. She was a really nice and really quiet girl. You would describe her as sweet, in a good way. I knew we could get along at least reasonably well because we both liked the same music!
Everyone knows I’m a freak about the bathroom (like I can’t go in public, won’t go if anyone’s home, etc.) so A was nice enough to let me have the bigger room with the ensuite so that I would feel more comfortable and not have to plan bathroom trips. Believe, if I'm staying at S's or at a hotel, that shit (literally) is planned.
For the most part we got on. We didn’t become best friends, but we didn’t fight or anything either. She had a boyfriend, J, who had started to move in with us or at least that's what it felt like to me and I wasn’t comfortable with that, but could also understand that to them it wasn’t a big deal and truthfully, if S had lived near by, he probably would’ve stayed over quite a bit, too, and I wouldn’t have seen that as a big deal, either (when the shoe’s on the other foot, right?). They were in love and wanted to spend all their free time together and he still lived at home so of course, it made sense to hang at our place. I just hadn’t signed up for having 2 roommates so they were cool enough to respect that. It was not a huge surprise at the end of our year together when she wanted to move out with J, but it wasn’t done on bad terms or anything. I was bummed, but it made sense that they would live together as their relationship had reached that point. So we thought out apartment was sold and they’d find a new place and I’d find a new place/roommate. They ended up getting to keep the apartment, and I moved one floor up in the same building in the end.
At this point for school, I had to get out in to schools and start practice teaching. I was so nervous and I generally hate new things but it ended up going ok. I also had started to make friends at school (as in uni ;) ). The one I was closest to was T and she and I were bitchy and entertained ourselves by making fun of other people from our classes. I was also hanging out with S’s friends from high school a lot, but I’ll talk about them more later as they are all characters and deserve their own post.
I went back over the Californian summer and we took an awesome family trip to Mexico. We rented a house a few hours outside of Puerto Vallarta and we had the best time, eating, exploring, swimming, and laying at.
My parents loved S from the time they had spent with him and we had been dating for two and a half years at this point so they could see we were pretty serious. They really wanted to meet S’s parents and brother as they had heard so much about them and knew they had to be nice for letting me live with them when I needed to. I was doing this weight loss challenge from Mom and Dad then with the prize being a trip to Hawaii if I lost the weight. I didn’t lose as much as I had planned, but I got myself pretty healthy and lost quite a bit for doing it all on my own. Mom and Dad invited S’s family to come to Hawaii with us. S’s Dad wasn’t really in to the idea, S’s brother D said he hated America, and S’s Mom was all for it. S’s Dad and brother eventually came around and we set the trip for after the New Year.
I missed Thanksgiving for the first time ever because I had another round of practice teaching that week. I went home after it was over and this time, S wouldn’t be around for Christmas.
I worked for my parents, helping them to clean out their house as they were getting ready to move to Santa Cruz for my Mom’s work. I didn’t think that that would be the last time I’d be in my childhood home, I thought the housing market was slowing down and they’d be there for at least another six months, but I was wrong and never did get to go back to that house after I left then.