What do you think it means that the meetings of the Science/Math department are harmonious and efficient, and the meetings of my Humanities department are incredibly long and seem to take hours to reach consensus on every little thing? Clearly there is an imbalance somewhere when I keep looking over (longingly) at the laughing chat going on in the dining room and we are always the last to leave our work for the day. I don’t necessarily think the dynamics are a bad thing — in fact, I think it’s going to be an incredibly interesting year with four such passionate and intelligent people on a team. It’s very exhausting, though, and if today was any indication, our conversations tend to give me a headache. Hardly surprising considering all of the ideas bumper-car-ing around in there whenever we talk.

Which is why I would rather tell a funny story about one of my favourite new colleagues than think about what I’m supposed to be thinking about right now, which is the scope and sequence of the 5-8th grade Humanities curriculum (what we want to teach and when). I’m also supposed to be writing a self-introduction for a new teacher mentor group listserv, and punching holes in and filing my papers, since I have a purple folder from which articles and vital-documents-which-affirm-my-legal-status-in-this-country are falling out at an alarming rate. But those things can wait. Because of the funny story.

………………………………………

Okay, I just tried to tell the funny story, but it totally isn’t working, because it’s a really short story and the names I made up to replace the real names of the people involved take so much time to read that the story itself gets lost. So call me, and I’ll tell you the funny story. Or, maybe I’ll just ramble incoherently because I’m so tired.

Clearly, I need to figure out a way to work hard during the day and still save enough mental energy to write reasonably interesting entries here at night, because otherwise all of my posts will look like nlaaaaarrrrrrrfghh. If you have any suggestions, please let me know. In the meantime, send me your good vibes and keep checking for the latest updates. Don’t be discouraged if I seem to have disappeared; we’re going to be cancelling our DSL line here at the old house and will probably be without an internet connection for a little bit. But never fear!

For like an old sock that you thought was gone forever, one day I will show up inside the sleeve of your shirt.