La llegada

We crossed the border three weeks ago.  After a grueling first day on the road, we made it to the Houston area.  Late in the evening, we stopped at a rest area that described itself as "secure".  As I walked on the little raised wooden paths in search of the bathroom, I began seeing signs that were anything but secure.  "Beware of poison ivy" and the more sinister:  "Stay on paths.  You may not see them....but rattlesnakes are watching you".  After locating the bathroom, I got lost on the less than secure paths and ended up where all the eighteen wheelers were parked.  Great, I thought, truckers, poison ivy and rattlesnakes. 

The second day, we drove south toward Nuevo Laredo.  We had our car permit, our Mexican car insurance and Lola's paperwork, as well as our passports.  In true Mexican border fashion, we were waved through without even being asked to slow down, even with Lola barking like a vicious beast.  We actually wanted to get our tourist cards; Alec would be flying home and they ask for it sometimes at the airport.  We circled the town with its bumpy narrow roads for at least an hour and could not find a customs area.  We drove by the river where Mexicans hung out on oneside and Border Patrol sat staring at them from the other.  We finally gave up and headed south.  About ten miles out of town, we were stopped at a customs checkpoint.  Good, I thought, maybe they can give us tourist cards.  The man at the gate asked for our passports, examined them, then asked us where the customs stamps were.  I explained to them that we hunted all over and couldn't find the office.  He looked at us, and told us to drive back to Nuevo Laredo and get stamped. 

We drove back angrily.  It was hot.  We drove all over town again.  Suddenly, Alec hit a massive tope that smacked the bottom of the car loudly.  The smell of gas filled the car.  Liquid was dripping from underneath.  We made it to the customs area and spent nearly an hour getting stamped, then slowly drove around the town, late on a Sunday afternoon, looking for a mechanic.  We actually found one who waived us into his yard.  Alec walked Lola while I stayed behind with five men in a junkyard while they checked the car.  They jacked it up, climbed under it, combed over it and revved the engine.  Finally, the oldest man told me there was not a leak.  We paid him twenty dollars and hit the road again.  When we hit the customs checkpoint, we were waived through emphatically, though we finally had the toursist cards to show them.  When we finally made it to our destination outside of Monterrey, all I could think of was beer, which was not being sold because of an election. 

Monday afteroon, we arrived at our destination near Lake Chapala.  The house we rented was even better than we had thought, with multiple terraces and a pool.  Lola snaked along the stairwalls and terraces as if she had lived there her whole life. 

We had arrived. 

The Love That Won't Give Up

Post planning days are usually pretty easy going affairs.  Post some grades, clean up your desk, check your computer out for the summer in case you actually decide to get ahead for "next year", hand in your keys.

To the contrary, Monday was a grueling, full day of work.  We spent the day with state DOE and district folks, re-writing our new, obligatory, standardized test and the bevy of accompanying paperwork.   By the end, I was stressed out and bitchy.

Tuesday was a second day of fun times with standardized test writing, as well as finishing grading a four part test for 150-ish kids and a two part test for around 100 kids.  And, entering all of those grades in the system.

Wednesday brought a new type of hell, with posting additional end of year grades for all 250 plus kids as well as determining the amount of growth each child accomplished, via heavy data entry on Excel spread sheet and additional entries in the system to report this growth.  And cleaning up the desk and doing the check-list.

Thursday was supposed to be the first day of summer!  Yet, the district requested another day from us.  That morning, I took Lola to the vet for her Health Certificate for international travel.  She nearly trashed the place and by the end, she was panting, I was sweating and shaking and the vets were looking at both of us like we were nuts.  We left with the certificate.  Later in the day I reported to the district offices to finish our work.

Friday, I prepared for vacation.  Late in the day I received a message that the district required still more alterations to our rubrics for our standardized test.  It could be completed via email, but some forms needed to be signed, at the office, within the hour.

Saturday, at seven a.m., Alec, Lola and I pulled out of the driveway and drove to Mexico. 

The One in My Heart

Oliver nashed his teeth and grabbed his head.  His eyes were tearing up.   The front of his pants were wet.  I had never seen him like this before.  The wild schedule of the last week of school made most of the kids happy.  Not Oliver.  But I had never seen him this way.  This upset.  No eye contact.  Pulling at his mouth, grinding his teeth, hands and arms covering his head.  A fragmented shell of the child that I looked forward to seeing all year.

There is a tradition at the school where I work.  On the last day, the faculty lines up outside of the buses and waves goodbye.  I couldn't wait.  Kids ran up and hugged me and said their final goodbyes.  When our principal gave the buses the okay to go, all of the project kids ran through the crosswalk in front of the buses, wild.  They go on foot.  The bus drivers started rolling and honking, arms in the air as they rolled forward, our students hanging out of the windows, yelling and waving to us.  I could not wave hard enough.  My Mexican student locked eyes with me and waved furiously, the one that made me give him self addressed envelopes so that he could write me letters over the summer. 

I was worried that I hadn't seen Bailey in the bus line.  His teacher sighted him and I walked over to   say goodbye.
"I'll be back" he told me.
"My little brother is still here, I'll come to Open House".
I made him hug me.  I know that he will be okay.  It doesn't matter that he is biologically female.  He is sound and firm in his mind and he will be what he wants.
I was surprised when glass-eyed Fulton approached me.  He had presented the Spanish poem in an assembly, which shocked everyone.  I liked him, liked him alot, but couldn't always click with him like I did with Oliver.  I wanted to, but I couldn't make it happen.
"When will I see you again?" he asked.
"I don't know, Fulton....I don't know..."
"Will you be here a while?" he asked.
"Yes.  Yes, I will be here for a while.....for a long time".
"I will see you in two years.  That is when my brother comes here". 

I saw Oliver and I chased him.  I had to.
"Oliver, I will miss you".
"Yes" he responded, without eye contact.  He didn't know who I was.
"Can I hug you?"
"Yes".
I grabbed him and hugged him hard, pressing my cheek to his.

He let me, and then walked away, eyes to the ground, as if he had never known me at all.

The End of Days

"Fuck!" I hissed at myself, fumbling with my phone near the lobby of the elementary school where I work.
How did the music button get activated and begin playing "Holiday in Cambodia" loudly at seven o'clock in the morning?

I walked the students through the test prep for their latest standardized test.
"Ass click" the automated voice said loudly.
Ass click?  What the fuck? I stared back at the screen.  It was trying to say 'haz click', in Spanish.
"Why is it swearing at us?" one of the students asked.

The fifth graders were beginning their big, year end presentations.  One of them started an interactive game.  I pulled out my phone, thinking it would be cute to play as I monitored the presentation.  As I clicked on the Safari button, my latest internet search came up. 'Goatse' appeared boldly, as I tried to shield my phone from the parents that surrounded me.  

"Hey, you know my dad!" one of my students exclaimed.
"Huh?"
"He saw your picture in the yearbook and said you used to work together at....."
"Really?" I responded, still unsure who whe was talking about.
"Kyle Davis" she announced proudly.
Aw shit, the guy I made out with that time after getting completely wasted?
"Oh....neat...." I responded, at a loss for words.
"That was, uh, a really long time ago....".
She stared at me, naive and smiling.
"Do you know my dad?!" a bunch of other girls started asking me.
Um, I sure hope not. 

I stood in the copy room, making, uh, copies.  I saw some of my students in line outside of the door, stuck in a hallway traffic jam.  We started making faces at each other through the window and I shoved my nose up like a pig on the glass.

Another teacher's face suddenly appeared.
I jumped back and opened the door.
"Are you trapped in there?"  she asked, concerned.

"Um, no, I'm good". 

Hot Fun in the Summertime

"You were in my dream last night" a newcomer to my morning duty, coffee clutch corner announced.  I have been teaching her all year, but this was this first time that she had hung out to talk.
"Really?  That's funny.  You guys wind up in my dreams all the time." I responded.
"You lived in this hut in my backyard and you would call me on your cell phone when it was time for Spanish," she responded.
"you remember the fortune tellers hut in the Harry Potter movies?" she asked all of us.
"It was like that... you had all kinds of cool nick knacks in there and pet birds were flying around in the hut....".

Oliver presented himself before me, almost touching his belly to mine.
"You're back!"  I exclaimed.
"YES!" he responded and smiled and spun around.

"Last night, you were flying a kite, you were at the park across from my house...."
"I love kites"
"You kept smiling at me and waving and asking me if I wanted to fly the kite....."

I folded the red piece of paper with the rudimentary drawing of a penis on it and put it in my bag.  "Act right, Jerry, act right...." I warned.
"or else I will laminate this, cut it in the shape of a heart and give it to your mother."

Oliver walked past me again, giddy.
I high fived him.
He grabbed my hand and wouldn't let go.

I drove in the broad daylight to school, in a bit of a haze.  I grabbed my stuff and got out of the car, walking around the front.

Clouds of smoke rose from under the hood.  It looked like it might catch on fire.

I glanced at it and walked toward the school doorway.

I would just deal with that later.  

Trouble All Around

"Thank you, ladies." the desk clerk said offhandedly as she stared at the computer monitor.  Alec and I looked at each other, eyes widening, but remained silent.

I finally bought this perfume that I have wanted for forever.  The Spanish teacher that I worked with last year always wore it, and I loved it.  I am not really into perfume, but it smelled like rosemary and tea tree oil, fresh and clean, every morning.  

I walked to the car, laughing my head off, after our waitress referred to us as 'ladies' as well.
"Jesus Christ, twice in one morning!  What the fuck is wrong with these people!?"
"If people are going to mistake me for a WOMAN, I want to look like Sofia Vergara, not Maude." Alec responded.

When the perfume arrived, it smelled nothing like she did.  I was perplexed.  But I realized I had been smelling that smell in the Spanish office long after she had left.  It was the stuff the custodians use to clean the floor.  My one hundred dollar perfume. 

The fourth grader looked at me with piercing eyes.
"The Rebellion in Baltimore" he stated.
"Rebels".
"I can't stop watching it" the little girl next to him stated, staring at me with burning eyes.

"I can't either stop either.  It is a rebellion".

April Fool

I sat in my corner in the early morning darkness watching kids ascend the stairs.  Abe kept me company by chasing a small, annoying insect that flew around us.

“Come here, you little asshole….” Abe instructed, trapping it on the side of my chair and killing it.

“I am TRAUMATIZED!”  Abigail announced with exaggerated zeal.

“Puberty class?”

“YES.  Okay, why is it okay to say ‘vagina’ but not ‘butt’?  She kept calling it ‘your bottom’, but didn’t use some weird word for ‘vagina’!   I’d much rather here ‘butt’ than ‘vagina’.  Oh my God, and then she gave us free pads and COUPONS to buy more.  TRAUMATIZED!!”.

“Cassius, you have to show your video.  We worked on it for two days in class, it is just unacceptable to refuse to show your work after all of that time”.

He tried to snatch his iPad from my hands.  It pissed me off.  Then I noticed that his nose holes were flaring and his eyes were tearing up.  He’s not a crier and I could tell that he was pissed off, too.

“Come over here, let’s talk privately”.

“WHAT is going ON??”.

“I was having trouble recording my voice in Explain Everything.  I said ‘goddamn it’ two times and slapped my iPad.  It recorded THAT”.

“Class, Cassius actually does have a legitimate reason for not playing his recording.  My bad”.

“So, did you learn anything you didn’t already know in Puberty Class?” I asked one of my newer friends while smiling sarcastically.

“Man, I knew I had three holes” the fifth grade girl responded. 

Well, apparently there was some detail to the class.

“By the end of the day, we just didn’t care anymore and someone left those free pads laying around.  Ricky asked us what they were and we told him, you know, that they were pads.  He had no idea what we were talking about and asked if he could smell them.  I almost threw up”.

That makes two of us. 

“I am not feeling getting up at 5:30 for the Tybee trip.  People need to realize that this,” she said, waving her hand around her face, “takes more than two minutes”.

I started laughing.

“The worst part is that it does only take two minutes!” I responded, looking at her pretty, effortless eleven-year-old face.

“I have been getting up at five all week just to practice.” she whispered, smiling. 

“You are going to have a great time”.

The boys in her classroom were sword fighting with their free deodorants. 

I woke up and went to work, feeling a lot more bright eyed than I normally do.  I ate my quickie breakfast of choice, a hard boiled egg, before starting my first class.  A wave of nausea hit me and I vomited in the trashcan.  Woohoo, I thought and figured it would pass.  I went to my first class.  During my second class, I broke out into a cold sweat.   I sat at the table with some kids, helping them with a writing assignment, when waves of nausea hit me.   I ended up getting a sub for the rest of the day, a first for me.  I went back the next day and finished the week without problems.  Yet over the weekend, I had an amazing vomit fest.  Multiple people asked me if I was pregnant.  I am surprised at the zeal people feel for a forty-three year old having an unexpected pregnancy.  Anyone up for a three-headed baby?  I am not pregnant. 

On the eve of April Fool’s Day, I decided to start the festivities early.  I chased Lola through the house and thought it would be funny to pick her up.  All ninety-plus pounds of her threw off my balance and I crashed into a folding door that goes to the laundry room.  Lola ran off and I went to the bathroom mirror.  I was shocked to see broken glasses, big red bruises on my forehead and cheek and bloody scratch marks.  Great. 

As a joke, all of us at work had asked for last minute personal days on April Fool’s Day.  My excuse was that I needed to get a tan on my legs.  What if I really couldn’t go to work the next day? 

Just claiming domestic abuse was an easier explanation than what really happened while at work the following day.  After work, I drove across town to the cheap glasses place to order a new pair.  It went fine, but when I returned to the car, it wouldn’t start.  I called a wrecker. 

“I’m really sorry but there is a four hour wait,” he instructed me, “you are in the middle of the epicenter”.

I got the car started and drove toward my mechanic.  I was on fumes but feared stopping the car because it probably wouldn’t start again.

After an hour in traffic, I made it. 

The following day, I was called into an impromptu meeting because of angry parents.  I was really sick of their shit. As I walked to the meeting that occurred when I was supposed to be having lunch, I implored the administrator not to throw me under the bus.

“I got you, Ms. Wagner.  I will be there.” he responded, staring at the bruises and scratches on my face.  

I haven’t had a meeting like that in years.  Parents so determined to find someone to blame instead of recognizing a problem in their kid and trying to help him with it.  References to me in the third person while I sat two seats down from them.   Refusal to shake my hand or look at me when I introduced myself. 

“I have been contacting you since October because I am concerned and want Lawrence to be successful.”

“I find that hard to believe” the mother responded.

“If SHE cared at all she would have tried harder”.

“So, where are we going with all of this?” I responded.  “The data collection, the meetings, the emails.  What is our plan?”.

“SHE should have told us about this sooner” the mother responded, turning her face away.

I bought a six-pack on the way home from work, though I have been avoiding drinking during the week.  The mechanic called.

“Hey!  It’s really not that bad!”

“Really?!” I responded.

“Yeah, just $475!”.  My heart sank.  Nearly five hundred dollars in addition to the two thousand I have put into that car in the last couple of months.

“Actually, that really sucks.  When can I pick it up?”.

Friday.   And not just any Friday but the one before Spring Break.  Finally.  I went out for drinks with friends from work and headed home.  I kissed and hugged Lola and went inside to talk to Alec.  A few minutes later, I saw the gate to our fence wide open and Lola’s little booty and curled tail exiting our yard.   We ran.  I could hear her but not see her in the vacant lot by our house.  Alec and I ran in opposite directions.  I couldn’t hear her anymore.  I ran to the other side of our house and saw Alec with his hand on Lola’s collar.

“She’s been hit!” he yelled, picking her up and carrying her up the hill. 

I grabbed the keys to his car, locked the house and told him how to get to the emergency vet.

We were there three hours.  Lola didn’t break anything and the ultrasound showed no internal bleeding.  We were presented with a four hundred dollar bill. 

I laid with her on the cold tile floor, questioning what I would do if anything ever happened to her.

That is honestly the one thing that I really can’t take.