The Choice
July 28, 2017
So what will you do with your one wild and wonderful life?
Well in another hour I’ll be walking in Memphis. For the next eight weeks, I will be working as a school counselor at the Immaculate Conception Cathedral School, a Catholic girls high school in Midtown Memphis. I ‘retired’ from a job that I loved. I started it with joy and walked out the door for that last time the same way. I had colleagues who enriched my days and my practice and for the most part they were one in the same.
The students are students are students. The costumes changed. I started in the period of lots of acrylic nails and unisex mousse. Oh yeah, when the fire alarms blared during the rain storm it wasn’t pretty! There was the ‘grunge’ filled with baggy flannel shirts, again unisex, but in more varieties than catholic school uniforms. Every guy claimed to be able bench press 350 pounds and was going to be an entrepreneur. In the time of exuberance the students were either going to a very pricey college headed for Wall St. or they were driving a very expensive car and bragging about their speeding tickets. They would stage fights to get suspended and extend their spring break.
Faculty members had lunch together in the faculty room. Supervisors were available and Faculty meetings were pointless but short. After the crash. Clothes became tighter, shorter and more revealing. Everyone was sporting a new attitude and it wasn’t a good one.
In October every senior was going to Syracuse or Muhlenberg but when it came time for the deposit they were going to Montclair or Paterson. Supervisors became coordinators vague and invisible and faculty meets were still pointless but interminable.
But in the classroom I was rocking it. I was part of every innovation in curriculum and equipment. I had one of the first network folder, I could make paper disappear! When smartboards hit the scene I had one. It had to be dragged out everyday, stringing the wires through an old cabinet.
For a decade I maintained a fully functioning district website. It does looks better today. Easy Grade Pro- how I enjoyed every part of that experience!
So why did I retire. The short answer is because I could. The long answer is all mine, wild and wonderful. So that’s the first entry. My favorite colleagues will understand this. I’m trying to learn WordPress and do everything on the IPad. Besides I haven’t taken any pictures yet. Please leave me a comment.