Have I Ever Made Daily Entries?

   I am sitting in the classroom I will soon have to abandon because my teaching contract has not been renewed.   I've spent many hours in this room since last August and I'll miss these now barren white walls and my former students.  It was a learning year that overall I throughly enjoyed, working with some dedicated teachers.  Some students will forever be remembered and maybe some will be better from our year together.  i HAVE THE LIGHTS OFF AS i OFTEN DID.  Caps lock can create a diversion in a journal just like it prevents logging on  passwords.  Jane is working at Fabianos today,has it been 6 years now?  nEXT WEEK WE GO BACK TO gRAND hAVEN AS CAP LOCK CONFUSES ME AGAIN.  I'm stretching for material as you can read, no wonder I limit my blogging.  Until I become enlightened again I'd better quit before showing the emptiness within.  I did back to back entries the first 2 days but they were themed and based on intellectual material.  The Daily Planet is playing now waiting on the wall.  I know the uneveness of these floors as I paced them so often during class but nevermore cried the RAVEN, nevermore.    The fever of savage city life       still grips the streets       Hunger and loneliness      or a full stomach and loneliness           day after day            night after endless night     The huddled masses    huddled in shelters ...AMERICUS 1     Lawrence Ferlingetti    2004               

Termination Destination

It is another hot day as this summer gives me my last days at WPCA.  I will soon be turning in my keys and lose the high speed internet access.  The fourth generation of feral cats were born in May as Dippy had four kittens and they now live in the garage.  The Tom Cat has chased away Cloney and Pirate Eye who survived the winter in the garage.  Dippy's kittens are Blanco, Diablo, Melon, and Santana with Blanco being almost all white and also called Pinky Lee.  Melon is orange, black and white mostly on her head which is short for Melanoma.  Diablo has two black patches like horns on his head and Santana has the orange, black and white across his body.  I finally found I could access my journal from school, getting around the inital blocks.  I'm still recovering from an upper respitory and eye infection.  Luke is taking Drivers Ed. and Phillip is playing baseball for Mark's Dewitt 14-U team.  So go the days of our lives cliched as soap operas.

Last Day of School

The last day of school with students was June 8th.  We didn't have any sad good-byes.  Jennifer Tran brought in cupcakes for the class for her birthday and Jane came in for the last 45 minutes as I gave each student a personalized card and some candy.  On Friday the 10th after all the teachers had their final meeting I went to see Mr. Whipple, the principal, about my evaluation.   I was blindsided by his words, "We are not offering you a contract for second grade next year".  He justified this sighting poor performance survey ratings and complaints from parents about not wanting their child in my class.  First we went over the purposely low-balled evaluation I was given and after looking at the criterea he change many of the low marks up.   He then had me schedule a meeting for the next week to check on my status after he "checked" with whoever wanted me out.  He then confirmed at the meeting that I was OUT and my para-pro had been TALKING about me to other parents.  I have found out they have hired a parent from the school who is a friend of our assistant principal, Ms. Benson.  After all the year without being given any indication that my performance wasn't good enough I'm glad I won't be working for the new administation.  Thank You Dr. Bosshart for having faith in me, and my fellow teachers who supported me and made this year special.   On the last day of school Jennifer also brought in eggrolls which I thought were for me, as she never said anything about them when we passed out the cupckes.   When everyone left I checked out the package finding exactly 24 eggrolls probably meant for the class.