Frankie Says Relax

I check myself over, like a car mechanic.

It appears that all systems are go:
sleep has returned to normal; I drink a glass now and then; I'm not binge-eating; I’ve attended to some financial and medical paperwork that was long overdue; I don't feel disdain for most of humanity (well, not daily).

I am fine.

"You look great", said my friend RMcG when I met her at the art museum café yesterday. Looking at me closely, she asked, "What's different?" 

Nothing. My hair, eye glasses, weight are the same, I was wearing jeans and a t-shirt, as usual...
"Maybe I look relaxed," I said.

That must be it.
Later, bink thought so too.

"You were always in distress at the thrift store", she said. "The things you'd say: 'I had to wait 5 minutes before leaving work because there was a shooting outside; I blessed a toy for a homeless sex-worker who wanted it for protection; I went to a Narcan training because there was an overdose in the parking lot; I lent money for rent to a coworker living in their van; I went to the food shelf for supplies to make lunch for staff, some of whom had no groceries;
... And management did nothing.'"

I forgot! (I didn't forget.)

 Send in the Clowns

I volunteered at the store for the fifth time yesterday. I love it.
I set aside a couple clowns for Emmler, who does rude alterations to them.

Now I'm working at a place that tries to help—children, anyway.
The school is not perfect, by a long shot, but systems are in place to TRY to help the students.
Society pulls together to try to launch young people.

Once you're eighteen, it drops off...
In the store parking lot, a couple of young people living rough were rootling through the dumpster. They could be the students I see now, a few years and some hard turns down the road.

Sunny Afternoon

With the support of the art teacher, the students and I did turn lemons into lemonade on Friday. Three of the fifteen had made fresh lemonade before.

I said to them, "If life is sour or unpleasant or sad, you can do something---you can add your sweetness, you can water it down, you can stab the lemon!"
And I stabbed it repeatedly.

The teacher yiped.
"I thought you were going to cut off your thumb!" he said later.

I told him I'd worked as a cook and am good with food safety.
This is a lie. I did work as a cook, but I'm kind of a kitchen klutz and have stabbed myself.
But it led to a conversation about how he'd worked as a cook too--and both of us had worked at collectively run, hippie restaurants that had started in the 1970s!
(He's in his fifties, I think.)

So that was good.
What the students thought of it, I can't know. 
They paid attention, and about half of them came up and squeezed a lemon, and many of them accepted a glass of lemonade.

"They'll remember this," said the art teacher.

I don't know that it was significant, but what I would want them to note is not the cooking, not the expected moral, but rather that you can DO unexpected stuff (like stabbing a lemon) in a locked-down setting like high school.
In a tight place?
Find yourself some wriggle room… Try anything! 

The Trout

I also took myself on a tiny field trip---to the science wing of the high school. I didn't even know it existed, but it's a new wing on the old building. What a difference from the run down old half (much as I like old things, this shows a lack of funds--but some big bucks went into the science wing, with large modern classroom labs.

I went there to see rainbow trout that an environmental-science class has been raising, in coordination with the DNR.
I knew about this because teachers announce field trips in all-school emails, and the class is taking a half-day trip to release the young trout in a rural river.
How cool is that?

With a couple exceptions, I'm disappointed by the teaching staff I work with. (Granted, just a few people.) I'm not seeing genius or great energy.
I'm seeing a lot of grown-ups putting forth minimum effort. They default to letting the kids be on their laptops.
I can imagine the staff is tired. Mostly, they are benign.

My job is good. I don't love it though.
I do love the kidlettes.

And there are a lot of teachers in the school--I only see a small handful. The other day I walked past a teacher standing outside her classroom, as some teachers do to greet the students.
Something about her caught me. Her stance? Facial expression?
I stopped and talked---she teaches US History and is beginning the start of WWII.

"I just started rewatching Foyle's War," I said, "a detective show set on the south coast of England in WWII. Have you seen it?"

She hadn't--so the next day I brought in the first season on DVD.
"It doesn't fit your class, though--it's England."

"Oh, but I'm interested for myself," she said.

I've worked 7 weeks now = 35 work weekdays, and 8 of those were days off--unpaid.
Or so I thought.

Here's something I do love:
not only am I paid more money (plus I work more hours, but they drain me far less), but I just found out that assistants get quarterly "retention pay" bonuses, and the last one for this school year will be on our forthcoming pay check.
So I actually will be paid for my spring break!

No wonder I look better.

———//////

P.S. bink just came over for Sunday morning coffee and gave me the news that Iran has attacked Israel, so I just want to add, it's (been) nice knowing you all! 💓💔💕💖

______________________

Schubert: Trout Quintet: Theme & Variations, Norwegian Chamber Orchestra, with a couple youTube comments:

@KnowledgeCoffee798
my Samsung washer machine brought me here.

@vintage1962
My washing machine chime brought me here too! Someone at the factory had a sense of irony!