Woah-oh-oh Sweet job o' mine...

After 16 years in the same classroom teaching the same subject,  a new position at my campus opened up; and after careful consideration consisting of  inhaling heaping hanfuls of NIlla wafers followed by a two-mile "guilt-jog", I decided I would like to try it. It involves working with all three grade levels, helping kids who struggle with reading, for what I have learned can be a variety of reasons and factors. I quickly signed up for summer trainings and pondered the set- up of the classroom and then took a little time to cogitate over it all. Here is an attempt to describe it.

Ahhh.   While basking in the glory of doing nothing and resting afterwards that IS summer,  I caught wind of a mildly popular country music video and song of which I couldn’t help but take notice. Kenny Chesney may be balding, but does faded, ripped up jeans such justice! And Tim McGraw, claiming tightly to his youthfulness, doing an above average job I might add, isn’t too hard to take a gander at either. So there they were wielding their guitars and shiny cowboy hats crooning about doing “what makes ya feel like a rock star!”

Hmm. I’m a card-carrying member (Member’s Only-like the jackets, ha ha!) of the 1980’s and all its glory of big hair, guy-liner and riffs that still stick in one’s head…eight- six -seven, five- three -ohhh niiiine. AND, I’ve watched a LOT of episodes of Behind the Music- I know Motley Crue’s life stories almost by heart.   And any airhead could tell ya while being a rock star may be lucrative and provide life of excess- it’s dramatic turns are almost always undeniably ugly. Downward spirals of substance abuse, media exploits,  hotel trashing,  brushes with the law. Oh, and untimely and preventable death. So why would you want to feel like a rock star?

I get it…millions of screaming scantily clad members of the opposite sex, mostly…reaching desperately for but a drop of your sweat. Being idolized and loved by throngs. Getting up on a stage and being paid, quite handsomely, for doing what you love.

I’ll take the last part. The very last one.

And even though the video would be not quite so enthralling, I would rather sing about my profession, my calling, what I get up and do for one hundred and eighty some odd days of the year.

Forget rock star, “ Do what makes ya fell like a reading in-ter-ventionnnn-iiiist” . Guitar solo, dramatic drums, pyrotechnics, lasers and such: and the crowd goes WIIIILLLD!!!

Well maybe not the crowd, but hey …I now have the two quietest-as-a-mouse kids having full blown conversations with me! Academic vocabulary is flowing like AquaNet in my little classroom, the thinking more rampant than alcohol at a Guns and Roses backstage party!  We set learning goals, we reflect, we think, we talk about thinking, and we LIKE it! So maybe I’m not asked to sign any caps, shirts, or body parts…but being told “I can actually learn in here.”, and being begged “Can I stay in here???”-well that’s more valuable to me than a backstage Bon Jovi pass. (Ok so I went through a little teeny feathered-bang infatuation). So do what makes you feel like a ( insert dream job here.) I promise you’ll want to sing about it!

 Just stay away from leather pants.