Monthly Archives: January 2024

Too Late

Pets, poetry, Slice of Life

Part of Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life

It’s too late to slice
It’s too late
There’s no time to tell you
even a
seed
of a moment

I was going to tell you about the girl who exclaimed,
You have an UNO lunchbox?
and I had to dissapoint her by showing her that no, it was just a lunchbox that says POW!
She had been so excited
And now I want an UNO lunchbox

Oh – and there were the boys
lined up
perpendicular to the recess door
like a race starting line
a few minutes before the whistle blew
jut waiting
What time is it?
they yelled after I asked them why they didn’t want to
enjoy the last few minutes of recess
It was 1:59

But it’s too late now
Too late even
for those mini moments

I can’t write about how I was going to go to bed early
but my to do list said
Nope
Nope
Nope
Double Nope

And now my dog is curled on the couch
squeezing me in
and there’s no time to tell you
even a bit about his wrinkly neck

The Not-So-Gentle Tug of Empathy

Pets, Reflections on teaching, Slice of Life

Part of Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life

Today
My dog, Finnegan
wanted to stop and sniff
More snow
I was running late
and I told him
again
that we needed to go home
I tugged
I won
we went
but my heart broke
a little for
Finnegan
even though my tug was gentle

I re-realized, a truth
I am not made for this sort of
stuff
This having a dog stuff

I realize
re-realized
isn’t a
real
word
but one I’ve
real-ized
because I re-realize
too often —
this empathy problem

Wouldn’t it be cool if I could syphon off just a bit of my empathy?
Give it to other people
in need?
When the screen comes up at the grocery store, instead of asking me to round up for charity, it could say
Would you care to offload some of your empathy?

I’d totally do it
So that
Every day at school
When kids are
Hurt
Or even
Gently tugged
Or
God, when they are
Misunderstood
In trouble
I wouldn’t have to re-realize a truth
I am not made for this sort of stuff
this teaching stuff

I think about a conversation I overheard months ago
between two first-graders on the back of the rug

Wanna come to my house after school?

No.

(Pause
Head Down)

Can we go to your house?

No.

Heartbreaking.

One day a few months ago, I was driving to one meeting or another
trying to convince myself to
let it go
to
not care about an issue
that had been getting me riled up
and then I re-realized that I work with
real kids
and their
real teachers
so instead of letting it go
I cried the whole way to my meeting

This is not an interview
I’m not trying to bamboozle you
My greatest weakness?
Oh, I care
too much.

I’m just saying
I’m not made for this sort of stuff
I do care
too much.

Heartbreaking.

Another One?

Family

I was thinking about my daughter
while I poured the hot water into my mug
smelled the peppermint tea

My dad drinks tea
But I never got into the habit really
until these past holidays
maybe it’s because I bought myself a lovely pink electric teapot
but I think
more likely
It’s because of my daughter
home from school
how we made tea at night
and if I was lucky
we’d sit together to watch ER

After an episode, I’d ask her
hopefully
”Are we watching another one?”
knowing it was already past her bedtime

In my mind I’d laugh
It was just the other day when
her preschool self would look at me
with her bright eyes
and long curly hair
as the end credits ran for Little House on the Prairie
and sing with the theme song,
”Another one?”

Confession time
I’d almost always let her have
another one

I sometimes tried to remind her
of all those times I let her watch
another one
she owes me a lot of episodes, I think

She’d look at me
with her bright eyes
and her long curly hair
as the end credits ran for ER
and tell me that we could watch
another one
tomorrow

Free write

poetry, TeachersWrite

I’ve been doing free writes with students for a long time, decades I guess.

I’m now at the point in my teaching career where I can say I’ve done something for decades, I guess.

But I am terrible at them myself. I am an in-the-moment-editor. I am a sharing kind of writer.

But my therapist says that free writing is a good way to help myself let go of anger.

Not that I don’t have some perfectly good reasons to be angry, she assures me.

It’s just that whole pesky thing about how anger only hurts your own self.

So she gave me directions, and I typed them in a note and now I think they are a poem. And not just any poem, but one that may help just about anyone who has a few minutes, a pen, some paper, and any emotions they want to let go of. 

Free Writing
The first rule
Is that you can’t censor yourself 
At all
It’s all over the place
Absolutely no censors
Ignore the censors
Just write whatever comes out
What’s written down is 
simultaneous

Second rule
You have to write 
Not type 
Keep your pencil moving at all times
Don’t stop the pencil
If you don’t know what to write, scribble 

Do this for about 10 minutes
No erasing
Grab 10 sheets of paper
Set a timer
And just start

If you stop to think
You are censoring

Then sit with yourself 
Afterwords

After
Words