I laugh, I cry, but through it all, I do my best to try and teach.

One of my earliest memories of school is sitting in Mrs. Black's kindergarten class, and watching in awe as she had a conversation with a puppet. Yes, a puppet. It had a little home, which looked like a box covered in wrapping paper. For the life of me, I can't remember the puppet's name...but he sang, and I'm guessing taught some sort of academics. I was in awe of my teacher. I thought she was one of the most amazing people ever; she just knew all sorts of information and was kind enough to SHARE that with us, and help us learn. And she talked to puppets. What more could a 5-year-old ask for?

It's stories like this that made me want to become a teacher. My teacher inspired me, my teacher helped me, etc. etc. I wrote books for them, I drew them pictures, because I wanted my teachers to be proud of me. Yet, when I would see them out in public...say, in the grocery store....I pretended like I didn't see them. I'm not quite sure why; maybe they just didn't exist to me outside of school. Maybe I placed them on a pedestal, and seeing them NOT in their teaching environment somehow made them more real to me. Maybe I was intimidated on them, and couldn't fathom talking to them outside of school. Whatever the reason, the fact remains that I thought of my teachers as amazing beings.

That was 25 years ago.

I think that feeling of awe still remains in some schools, with some students, for some teachers. Unfortunately, that is NOT the school I work in.

This is only my second year of teaching. I'm a rookie, so to speak. I feel that I've taken a fair amount of education classes, and I know the content that I teach, and a wide variety of strategies for teaching that content. But wow...nothing prepared me for this. Nothing prepared me for kids kicking desks and chairs...on a daily basis. Nothing prepared me for kids cursing at me for giving them a "red" for the day. And nothing prepared me for what to do when a kid stuffs himself in a cubby, and then shuts the door behind himself.

So these are my stories. Real stories. Not embellished, just TRUE stories. I laugh, I cry...but through it all, I do my best to try and teach.