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January 29, 2005
Heading for the hills
Nothing like a trip out of the city to regain perspective and energy. Patch must have known how badly I needed a break. Various bloggers and boyfriends made for the hills this weekend. Some went skiing, some worked on projects, and I worked on my kids’ report cards. Work seems so much easier when surrounded by a serene landscape.
Of course, a trip outside of civilization wouldn’t be the same without a stop at Denny’s. Enroute to Vermont, we went into one in some highway city of Connecticut. Just like that kid in the Sixth Sense, Michael leaned over to me and said, “I see gay people…” A couple of cute gay men were totally giving us the gaydar look. It must have been gay night at Denny’s with a discount for the early birds. We had lewd and lascivious conversation and jokes, discussed bad animal experiences from our childhoods, and I ingested a huge amount of cream gravy atop country fried steak. Apparently Derrick is rarely disgusted by my food choices, even though he is a vegetarian, but my licking the gravy off of the spoon made his gorge rise. Once we were all sufficiently bloated, we wobbled our way back to the caravan of cars.
It was so sweet! The little gay boys who had been making googly eyes at us had left us little handwritten notes inviting us to karaoke night at the bowl-o-rama. They must have spotted our cars because of the out-of-state tags. It was very sweet and we almost went, but we really wanted to get up to the cabin before midnight.
I’m sitting next to a toasty fire, sated from some homemade guacamole, sipping on a beer. I’m regaining a little perspective on work. I have to remember that for every really horrible moment, I also have kids who are progressively getting better, despite the really horrible problems of their environment. Pity party blogs don’t list kids like student K, who turns in her homework EVERY day, struggling to figure things out. I didn’t mention student M, who has absolutely no skill with the English language, but is a genius with math. I didn’t mention student S, who writes absolutely brilliant poetry, or Student I, the boy who was able to master the concept of scale because he tags buildings with graffiti. No kids vandalize my student work, because they know he’ll whup on their asses.
They’re worth mentioning also, because they’re why I’m actually teaching. Queue sentimental music, please.
Posted by G at January 29, 2005 07:53 PM
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Comments
"my licking the gravy off of the spoon made his gorge rise"
And reading that just made mine rise a little bit, too. Damn. :-)
It was good to read you remember why you're teaching. You can make an impact. You do make a difference.
Posted by: palochi at January 31, 2005 11:32 AM
Amazing what a little perspective and a wood fire can do. Well written.
Posted by: Ron at January 31, 2005 02:32 PM
Smile, here.
Posted by: Mr. Hells Kitchen at January 31, 2005 08:53 PM