Juxtaposition

As you've no doubt figured, I had a bit of a rough year at school. Today, the last full day (I have a half-day with the runts tomorrow), was no different from any other day. By that I mean things started off fairly OK and soon degenerated into degenerates screaming at each other over petty offenses. In other words, I got the shit annoyed out of me, as per usual. S. and R. were particularly in fine form today, and someone drew a butt with a penis in it on the chalk board. Real fine specimens, you see.

Don't get me wrong, I've got some kickass kids. E. blew away all the tests and is fun, to boot. N. is an amazing artist, even when she is a pain. There are funny ones, clever ones, and moral ones. It's just that the pains are so much louder, in every sense of the word.

So today, while I was trying to calm S. and R. down while trying to get I. and K. to sit the hell down and A. to clean up his goddam mess, Ms. Muscato came by. She tought class 102 this year. The "02" classes are reserved for gifted and talented students. Our school doesn't completely split up the classes, but a lot of the top academic kids are put in one place for excellence. Otherwise, everyone is mixed heterogenously, which, I think (and research shows) is the best way to do it. Anyway, next year I'm supposedly going to teach 202, so, basically, Ms. Muscato's class.

She brought me a pile of letters they had written me, as a way of introducing themselves. They wrote better than some of my third-going-to-fourth graders, and some read on higher reading levels. But the juxtaposition of these great letters while my current students basically wandered around like genetic detritus was a rather potent one. Here's to next year.