May 21, 2012

• The Daily News

  1   So...Robin Gibbs walks into a bar...

  2    Happens.

  3    Always sad news when someone leaves us.

  4    With all due respect to disco folks, I never liked the Bee-Gees or disco. I always thought they were a bit of a lounge act.

  5    Still, it's always a part of our own history when someone leaves.

  6    So it goes.

  7    Moving On, Part the First: I walk into a strange universe today. I have two classes that have completely disappeared. I look up at the solar eclipse and see nothing. I'm not going blind; I just see a mist.

  8   They have dissipated. They are now particles, and memories.

  9    This is the week of the walking wounded. On Friday, I saw a group of sophomores staying until six p.m. working on a film project for some class or other. I assume it was a Spanish class, because they were all speaking Spanish, even though they were all Asian. Ah, diversity! What a salute.

  10  I was still cleaning up from a vastly emotional and sensational day of poetry. It was nearly everything I had hoped it would be. I put out tons of food all day long, allowed my students to have breakfast, lunch, and dinner, changed the recipe for each period, brought in some Starbucks later in the day, and finished with my last class having pizza and Pepsi, cheese sticks and sauce.

  11  My sophs enjoyed the day immensely, while my seniors LOVED it. Their poetry was sweet: some funny, some philosophical, but most all about friends and hope. Several of them wrote stuff that was wistful. It was like watching You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown's Happiness Is scene, with friends holding together through an extremely emotional day, and enjoying each other, getting along.

  12   It was as it should have been. I planned the last three weeks for the seniors, and I'm not sorry for it. Rather than challenging them with "rigor" I understood them and gave them lessons for the ages.

  13   What's nice is that I wasn't doing it for myself; I instinctively did it for them. That's the beauty of being a veteran of these wars. Using peace and understanding works. I've reached a point in my career where I don't really care what anyone thinks about my teaching. I think it has gotten better, but there are those who would think otherwise.

  14   Screw 'em. We teach students, not subjects.

  15   Good teachers know that.

  16   Interestingly, I felt on Friday that the year was ending too soon, that I still want to keep creating new lessons, that I wanted to teach these guys well into the summer. Have I gone mad?

  17   I'm usually counting the days. I can't really believe that technically, I am done teaching at around 10:30 a.m. on Thursday. Having seniors really shortens the year, because two of my classes are completely disappeared, and all I have left is finals for sophomores.

  18   It's weird, because Friday actually seemed like the last day of school to me. I worked late getting all the food and stuff cleaned up, and walked out of the parking lot triumphant. I knew going in it was going to be a vastly emotional day, but a good one, and I was right.

  19   It really was fun to see those kids still working late on projects. They seemed a bit clueless to the fact that school was ending. At least two of them were sensationally brilliant sophomores and juniors I taught this year and last.

  20  I went into a wonderful weekend not really having the pressures of grading a bunch of papers and worrying about this week.

  21   So this is going to be an interesting couple of days.

  22   I already miss the seniors even though I report to Raging Waters on Wednesday morning at 9 a.m. for their fun day. What a strange duty. I'm pretty okay with it though. Should be fun. That's probably why it's called Senior Fun Day.

  21  Moving on, Part the Second: I'm not going to mess with the Bay Bridge series except to say that as a Giants' fan, I'm more than a little worried about Timmy Lincecum. He looked horrid yesterday, and he has looked horrid all year.

  22  I'm not ready to say he is washed up, because history might prove me way wrong, but I really am worried about his head. His mistakes are clearly not physical. His mental state eerily resembles Barry Zito's. Zito is suddenly well again, which is a minor miracle, and Lincecum looks almost like he needs to go to the minors for some therapy. It didn't help any that he got taken out at the plate last night.

  23   It was a bit fun listening to Brian Wilson in the booth yesterday, although Santiago Casilla seems to have filled his shoes pretty easily.

  24   Moving on, Part the Thoid:  I dunno. I spent most of yesterday walking around the house cleaning up the debris from our remodeled kitchen. Suddenly we are no longer washing dishes with a garden hose, and we actually could cook on a stove. It's still far from done, but things are rapidly returning to normal, if there is such a thing.

  25   Normal.

  26   I once lived on a street called Normal. Normal Avenue, although a lot of people call it Normal Street.

  27   Life is a poem, I swear.

  28   All in all, Friday brought in a sensational weekend, and a wonderful summer staring right at us. Great weather, and good times.

  29   Lovely days. Birds, gardens, wine, and solar eclipses.

  30   Well, it's Monday, and time for all of us to get back to whatever it is we do.

  31   You all have a good one. Fly low.

  32    See you soon.

  33    Peace.

  ~H~

  

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