"I know this year was hard for you. You weren't the same carefree person you were the year before. Still, I hope it was all worth it. "
I think it was pretty obvious this year that my stress level was up, and my general happiness was down. But reading Ms. PianoSinger's card, I realized that people may have had a wrong impression about what I was going through. It suddenly dawned on me that people thought I was starting to hate the job... that I was disappointed in the students or the musical product. That I was in constant dismay over my principal went without saying. One of my colleagues even said that he wouldn't be surprised if I tried to move down to the elementary level.(1)
Truth be told, I was afraid that I was burning out. I was feeling the return of a demoralizing pattern that I got caught up in at my last school... where it seemed as if every day was just cycling around to that moment where I woke up and realized that I had to go to work.(2)
But the funny thing was... I never hated the job. I just had my confidence rattled, and I was beginning to doubt my ability.(3) At the end of 2006-2007, I'd had a series of conflicts with Principal Palpatine that left me bereft of the will to teach. I closed the year out badly, and spent the entire summer avoiding doing any prep work. I feel like the 2007-2008 school year was a constant struggle to recover from that. In short, I was miserable because I felt like I wasn't doing my job right, and I was afraid that I didn't have the will or the spirit to fix it.
So here is Ms. PianoSinger... hoping that the year was good enough for me... and here I was afraid that I wasn't a good enough teacher for her.
There's a bunch of warm fuzzies in there somewhere.
What she doesn't know is that she was instrumental(4) to my recovery. I had a bigger plate to deal with than ever.... and I didn't have the strength to handle it. Ms. PianoSinger, Captain Bass and a score of others jumped in to take part of the load, and had they not done that, there's no way we would have finished the year. But they did.... and we did.
It's only now, at the end of the year that I really feel my old self coming back(5) And here's the conclusion I've come to:
Whatever funk I went through this year... it was all my own doing. As much as I'd like to blame Palpatine, she wasn't the one keeping me from doing the prep work I was supposed to, and she wasn't the one that told me to procrastinate on just about every important project that I was involved with. I suppose you could say that had I kept my wits, 2007-2008 could have been better. Not that it was bad... but is was hard, and had I managed it better, I could have been happier. As it was.... I think it was a year-long sulk on my part.
But this post isn't about beating myself up. (6) It's more about a promise to take more responsibility for my situation. I've got my momentum back, and I intend to make next year more productive. I'm not saying that I'm not going to complain about Palpatine... I'm just going to stop blaming her for things that I have control over.
As for Ms. PianoSinger... I'm going to write her a long letter back. I think I'm going to say something like this:
There's that old parable about the man dreaming that he's walking with God on the beach. Well, it seems to me that the sands of 2007-2008 are littered with footprints of the people that carried me through. You are one of them.
1. We had a laugh over that.... we both know it would never take.
2. It was like my whole life was a series of dread-filled mornings.
3. A note to you rookie teachers: You're never to old to doubt yourself. I've been teaching for fourteen years now, and every once in a while I still get my cage rattled. It happens to the best of us. Just keep faith that things will get better.
4. Piano player.... instrumental.... *snort* get it? *snort*
5. How do I know? It's been six days since graduation.... and I've found a reason to go to my office every single day.
6. You guys know I'm reeeaaalllyyy good at that.
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