Super Blood Wolf Moon

"Faggot!  I think I can spell faggot!"  Tyrone announced during our weekly Scrabble game.
"Don't say that.  It's bad, it's not an okay thing to say...." I answered, trying to control my anger.
"But Neva spelled 'raping' last week!" he responded, genuinely confused.
"Rape is a bad thing, but it's not a derogatory statement."
He looked confused.  I knew 'derogatory' was a word he wouldn't understand, I just couldn't think of another.
"The word you said...faggot... " I whispered,  "is not just another way of saying gay.  It's like an insult for being gay...." I continued, watching his face get more confused.
"I don't want to use this analogy....but, it's like the difference between saying someone is African American or Black and using the N word to describe them." I said, worried and watching his face closely.  I saw recognition.
"Okay, I get it now." he answered.
I was relieved when he smiled and started reshuffling his letters.

I walked into the public safety office after signing a contract for the rest of the school year.
"Welcome back to the county!"  the woman at the desk announced.
"We are so glad you're here.  We need experienced teachers.  Our kids need you."
"Thank you.  Thank you for saying that." I responded, genuinely touched by her statement.

"So, here's your desk...." the principal stated, showing me an old empty desk in the corner of the computer lab.
"You get a laptop because there isn't a desktop in here...." she continued, handing me a Chromebook.
"And here's a roster of your students.  So, walk around, explore, meet your students.  You have all day!"

I organized the few things I had brought with me inside of the empty desk.  I made lists.  I felt oddly like George Costanza in the episode where he shows up for a job he wasn't actually hired for and ends up sitting in an empty office, pretending to work because he has no idea what to do.  I looked across the room at the substitute teacher occupying the other teacher desk.  He was sleeping.

I met the students, one by one.  They were from Mexico, Thailand, Burma, Cambodia, Haiti...some just said 'Africa' and didn't know which country their parents were from.
I knelt down and spoke quietly to the little kindergartener.
"Hi, I'm Ms. Wagner.  I'm the new Mr. Creedy.  I'll be working with you like he did."
The little boy stared at me shyly.  I asked him questions about his family, about his classes.  Finally, I wished him a happy Friday and a great weekend.

"You're welcome." he said, instead of 'thank you', smiled and walked back into his classroom.

The Ultimate Law of Life

I sat at my kitchen table, alone.  Food was spread out everywhere.  My crown of thorns was really starting to dig into my forehead, but I realized that I probably deserved it for being so sacrilegious.  I imagined my neighbors glancing in my windows from their houses and thinking, oh God, how weird, our horribly lonely neighbor is sitting all by herself in front of a banquet of food dressed as Jesus on Christmas Eve.

My sister and I had decided a biblical costume party was in order to spice up my family's annual Christmas Eve party.  I helped Alec make a giant Middle Eastern-style spread for the occasion.  We love that kind of food and it is a vegan meal that other people actually like to eat.  And, it was regionally appropriate.  I was relieved when the cars started pulling up.

New Year's Eve came and went and after a feast of beans and greens and Bloody Marys on the first, I began my second annual, thirty day Soberuary.

The calls and emails resumed when the principals returned to the schools after the break and realized they needed to fill some vacancies. I visited a school that I really have had my eye on and got a relatively lukewarm response during an interview for a job I am wildly overqualified for.  I anticipated the classes I am starting next week, embarking on round three of graduate school and two new areas of study.  I accepted an interview from a school practically composed of English Language Learners, located not far from where I grew up.   I randomly decided to apply for a couple of jobs in the district where I started my teaching career, a place I thought I would never consider returning to that surprisingly seemed not so bad now. 

"What are your goals, you know, we know you have a lot of things going on, but what is your, you know, GOAL....." the principal asked a matter of days later, after processing my application and contacting me in record breaking time.
I glanced around the little low rise, old-fashioned school building.
"Well,....."  I said and started laughing.
"I'm just trying to be the best me I can be."
Everyone started laughing.  And then they offered me a job on the spot.

If You Loved Me at All

New Year's Eve. New Year's Eve. So much to think about.  I thought about life.  And I thought about death. 

I thought it was my last night to sign up for Obamacare.  I had an extension, because I "lost" my job.  I thought the extension was until December 31st.  Papi came home and we started making dinner.  I had to pull the trigger on expensive, shitty healthcare (dismantled and fucked up for you and I by the Republicans).  I logged in to the platform, ready to put a $250 a month premium on my credit card.  I message came up.  I was outside the extension.  It ended on the 30th.

Papi started making pasta.  I tried to help.  It's New Year's Eve.  I played 'Sunspots', a Julian Cope song I loved when I was fifteen.  We take turns with music in the kitchen.  I thought of Margaret.

*Photo, Obliteration Room, Yayoi Kasuma
*Title, Julian Cope

Everything Is

My face felt horrible.  I woke up, and it was swollen on one side and when I scratched it, it bled.  I am well into my forties, but don't think I should be fat, wrinkled and experiencing some sort of cystic acne, face eating virus all at the same time.

I walked into the dark hallway and saw a couple of people already waiting.
"Is this where the test is?"  I asked, motioning toward the closed door with a sign on it. At the university that I have attended off and on, for more than twenty-five years.
They made a few monosyllables that indicated yes, barely looking up from their phones.
They looked young, but multicultural.  What a bunch of badasses, I thought.  They'll make amazing ESOL teachers.

They let us inside.  I watched as they wand-ed people, like at the airport.  Made them lift up pant legs, shirt sleeves, actually shirts.  A turban.  And then it was me, pulling my shirt up in front of a big window, raising my arms, pulling my pants' legs up, re-signing my name multiple times before they thought it matched.  I sat in front of that test for nearly four hours, after waiting a half an hour to get in, blowing of my break, just because I was afraid I would invalidate something or do something wrong and blow the whole, nearly three hundred dollar thing.  And the preparation I had done.  Yeah, I waited until a week before I was supposed to take the test to study, but when I did, I did bust some ass.  And, I am supposed to know this stuff anyway.

I stood in the Infinity Room, feeling like my feet weren't below me or that my head was above me.  The more I looked, the more I saw.  We were on a boat, that was floating, through everything.  Through infinity.  When I looked down, I saw the Blue Mosque.  When I looked far, I saw everything.  The heat hit my face.

I saw my sister, and we spoke and laughed.

I saw everything.

*Photo of Yayoi Kasuma's The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away, Infinity Mirrored Room.  

God Bless the Child

The holidays are upon us.  I usually like them, but I have been in high job hunting and making sure I am ready for taking classes in January mode. And, I was taking a test to add a field to my teaching certificate.  One of those long, multiple hour, multiple hundred dollar tests.  It's weird, I've taken them before, the GRE, the PRAXIS Spanish test so that I could teach it, my GACE Curriculum test -  the one that validated my degree and ensured I got an eight thousand dollar a year raise.  This new one though, one that shouldn't be difficult, for some reason was worrying me.

As I drove to the Housing Authority, my phone was exploding.  I thought it was about a different, gossipy thing.  I like gossip.
"Hilary, um, call me.  I don't want to text you this."
"Have you heard?"
"Hilary, call me back."
Finally, "Hilary, he's died.  I didn't want you to read it on Facebook or some weird email."

I put my phone down and started preparing to hand out pizza to the Housing Authority kids.  Every year, they have little parties all during the week before they get out for Christmas break.  I knew he was ill.  When they mentioned his name, I almost expected it.  I thought I had it together.

"I see trees of green, red roses too...." Tyrone sang.  He is one of my students.  They were making them practice for February's Black History celebration.
"I see them bloom for me and you...." he continued, low voiced and off key.
"And I think to myself, what a wonderful world..."

And then I cried.  And cried.  And I couldn't stop.

Warrior Pose

"Highs and Lows?"  I asked the students.

"My high was that we got extra recess today, my low, I got sent out of the room for throwing scissors at the teacher." Theo responded.

"What did you gain by throwing scissors at her?"

"What do you mean?"  he asked, genuinely.

"I mean, you like extra recess, did you get that for throwing scissors at her?"  I responded.

"No,  I got sent out."

"Did you like that?  Did you want to get sent out?  Did you get something you wanted, like extra recess?"

"I didn't want to do math.  So, yeah, I didn't have to do it."
He got his reward.

"The Christmas festival is this weekend.  That's my high.  We'll get presents...."
"Wait, when is it?"  Zoey asked.

"NO.  It's only for Muslims, because we don't get presents like you do."
I watched Zoey's face fall and felt completely pissed off that one low income kid would say that to another.

The days are shorter and grayer.  People ask me what I'm doing.  So, what I'm doing.  Still working in the projects.  Subbing when I feel like it.  Taking a bunch of classes in January and testing in to more endorsements on my teaching certificate.  Working shit out.

Being the best me I can be.

I Felt the Lonely Comin' Down

"Ms. Wagner, why is the sky bright yellow?"
I looked outside.  It was bright yellow.  At 5:30 at night.
My boss looked at me.  "Emory cancelled the tornado drills because people would think it was real."
"Aazim, I have no idea, but I don't like the looks of it." I answered.
"You're supposed to be smart.  Why don't you know the answer?"  he asked.
"Can't win them all!" I answered, chasing him through the yellow parking lot.

"Let's get physical!  Physical!"  a strange, blond boy yelled, arching his back and shaking his ass.
"What's your name?"  another yelled.
"Hilary."
"She got destroyed by Trump." a brutish boy announced, his broad face widening in a mean smile.
He turned and screamed in a girl's face.
I had noticed him a month ago.  Two months ago.  Now all his behavior made sense.  But, why his parents chose a school that emphasizes kindness made no sense to me.  I watched each 20K a year kid run around and felt confused.

I drove to the Housing Authority.  I stay the same whether I am in the projects or at a private school.  I speak the same and act the same.  They are all my babies, but my project kids are my loves.

"How old are you?"  one of the private school kids asked.
"Guess, and then I''ll tell you."  I answered, knowing the responses would be funny.
"Twenty-five" he answered.
"Twenty-six" another seconded.
"Fifteen!"  a third yelled.
"I know you're not old," Blair declared, "you don't have wrinkles!"
"I have wrinkles when I smile,"  I answered, pointing at my eyes.
"Those are the good kind."

I sat in the room with the kids that where in trouble at the private school.   I told them what they were supposed to do, then picked up a book off of the bookshelf.
"I WAS ON FIRE."  I read to myself.
"It was my earliest memory."
I watched them and read, feeling content and happy in my world.  I glanced up occasionally, when the problematic boy, the white kid that I had witnessed throw money at a staff member, looked at me.
"I was standing on a chair in front of the stove, wearing a pink dress my grandmother had bought for me.  I felt a blaze of heat on my right side. I turned to see where it was coming from and realized my dress was on fire."

"It sounds like fun out there," I said out loud.
"Everyone is doing their choice activity.  I know you'll get on your game so that you'll be with them next week."
"Yeah..." he responded.
"You guys can go.  Have a great weekend."

"Who'd ya vote for...?"  Tamira asked me.
"I'll tell you if you tell me first who you think I should have voted for...."  I answered.
"Stacey.." she answered, eyes glowing.
"But....some people didn't..." she started to answer, before stopping herself.
"Mean old white people in the sticks, " I answered, "didn't vote for her."

Tamira's eyes glowed brighter and she ran around the table and hugged me.

*Title, Dolly Parton
*Quotes, The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls