Sunday, Jun. 06, 2004
Long, boring entry, posted at 10:18 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com I have a friend, a good one, who I taught with for two years here in Baltimore. He has since gone on to Oxford, but has been in Baltimore for a month, doing research on the city schools in his PHD program for the school. He transfers to Columbia this summer, though. He also happens to read this blog, I think (I gave him the address, and, when he was in Englad, he e-mailed me about it often, but hasn't said anything about since returning, and I'm fine with that because it makes me feel weird), and his pseudonym is lightly peppered throughout the last three years.Anyone, this friend, who I began calling Nick three years ago on here and I might as well continue, and I have had some interesting conversations during the time we've known each other, and we got into a long one during the Orioles game. We were both a little drunk, and we were discussing the state of education, and then turned to politics, as things usually do. We were discussing Martin O'Malley, who we share very different feelings about. I like the guy. I feel like he's an honest politician, for the most part, a tough Democrat with charisma who has done some great things for the city. Nick, on the other hand, sees him as an opportunist who is using Baltimore as a stepping stone for larger things. I can't deny this, nor do I mind it. If O'Malley decided to run for governor, or, later, President (it could happen in 2012 if all goes well, and I think it could, because the DNC really likes him and the guy is really an amazing speaker), I'd be right there supporting him. Anyhow, I blurted out to Nick that he used Baltimore as a springboard, too, so why should he mind that.
It was the sort of comment I wouldn't have made if I hadn't been drinking, but I think it was fair, as did Nick, or at least he told me it was. But it really got me to thinking about what my plans for Baltimore are, and my future. It's been simmering ever since.
First, point one. Nick seems much, much happier than he ever did teaching. It was always his plan to begin pursuing his PHD after two years of teaching in the city schools, and he's followed through on his plans with great success, making it into Oxford and doing well over there. Looking at the guy, he seems like a burden has been lifted off his shoulders. He's probably dropped thirty pounds, and seems very, very happy.
He reminds me, in fact, of what I felt like last year. I was at the pinnacle of happiness during last year, my second year of teaching. I was working out every day, I was working very hard every day after school, and the year went very smoothly. The third year of teaching has been much different. Working two jobs, having the surgeries, a more demanding schedule with the kids and twice the student load, feeling in general very shitty about things much of the year... it's been trying. I feel like I'm getting back to normal, but I think the rejuvenation of the summer is something that's sorely needed right now in ways that weren't needed last year. This year, I feel like I imagine Nick must have felt last year - overworked, stressed, unhealthy.
Don't get me wrong; Nick was an incredible teacher. But the schedule didn't work for him, much like my schedule this year doesn't work for me.
Seeing Nick this year, it's tough not to feel some longing for that sense of contentment that he seems to exude right now. I don't have it, but I can recognize it in others because I was there only a year ago, and this is incredibly frustrating. But do I long to go back to school, to get my PHD in education? No. If nothing else, seeing Nick again has let me see my role in this whole educational landscape a little bit more clearly, though at the same time it's muddled it a bit.
I'm the guy who will spread myself out over the course of many years and teach. I'll love your kids so much that it will ache when I seem them go. I'll become attached. I'll get passionate about the books I teach and expect your kids to become passionate as well. I'll call up the ones without fathers or any other sort of male influence and invite them to Orioles games in the summer. I'll tell the girls what guys think of them when they wear clothes like that. I'll be nice most of the time so that my pointed comments come off stronger, meaner, more direct. I'll call up parents and ask why they let their kids come to school dressed like that, or tell them that so-and-so has been doing much better, or that so-and-so has skipped twice this week. I'll let the kids get water without a pass because the drinking fountain is right outside my door and I trust them, but I won't let them put down their heads in my class because they're children and need to know when they're limited themselves if they can't tell themselves, and I'll even make them sit without a desk, chair only, if they can't keep their head up. I'll work my ass off to be a good baseball coach, even though I've never been that good of an athlete and can barely see center field from home plate. I'll transport kids in my car because the city cannot afford busses, as long as their parents have signed a form that probably doesn't actually offer me any legal protection. I'll make jokes like, "Don't be as loud as your shoes are" to a girl with gaudy shoes, but only if I know she'll laugh, then I'll open myself to a joke shortly thereafter. I'll pretend it was on purpose. I'll buy spiral notebooks for every student, because they need them. I'll find a used copy of To Kill a Mockingbird if a kid promises me they really can't afford it, and I'll offer long term loans on a $12 book if needed. I'll wear Pajamas to work on Pajama Day of Homecoming Week, and find out that night that my eyesight has been threatened and I'll have surgery the next morning that could very well leave me blind unless everything goes right. I'll tell kids about getting sued by a lying garbage man, and they'll offer to come support me and I'll briefly think about it because, after all, we did read To Kill a Mockinbird.
I love it here. I love teaching. But does this mean that I don't see Baltimore as a stepping stone, as well? No. It very well might be. Seeing Nick, while it didn't make me long to be away from the classroom, it did make me long to feel again what he's feeling. This feeling isn't living right now in Baltimore for me, although I think it could be, very easily. Instead, it's somewhere else, somewhere floating above me, and I have to find it again.
Right now, sadly, the main thing that is keeping me here is my students. When I first moved here, four years was the number of years that I decided I would stay, minimum - just enough for one whole class of kids to progress through high school. But the other night at the Athletic Banquet, I found myself asking a 9th grader on my baseball team - a great kid who I see becoming team captain by his junior year - what he thought this night would be like in three years. I expect him to probably be taking home "Best Student Athlete" Honors for the entire school, just like this year's current Team Captain did that night. He said, "Coach, I think we'll be celebrating our City Championship." And hearing him say that almost made me cry, because I'd like it so much to see him become a star catcher in the city, my 3rd place hitter and MVP on a championship club. He could do it. I could do it.
Professionally, this city has done remarkable things for me, and I can't imagine leaving these kids. My school has embraced me, and, this year, that embrace felt like a warm blanket in winter as the blizzard surrounding the financial shit of the city schools swirled around me. Graduation was this Saturday, and our kids have brought in almost $6,000,000 in scholarship money and financial aid - an average of $18,000 apiece. It's giving me such pride to work at a public school that not only works, but is as good as any high school in the state, public or private. I found my eyes welling up many times as the seniors walked through the procession. Families are so proud. I am so proud of them. Where else could I feel that? Would I feel that in a suburban school? Not a chance in hell. Would I feel it in another urban environment, where I don't feel in control of my curriculum, of what I do in my classroom? No. I can't think of a more ideal place than right here.
More importantly, I don't think these B-more teens attend school anywhere else. I just see so much in these kids, and just cannot see leaving them.
Still, my place in Baltimore still feels tenuous on every other front. I'm not happy socially. I keep trying to tell myself it's because I'm working like a maniac, but this year finding friends or solidifying friendships has been difficult. Really, I don't feel particularly close with anyone, anywhere, right now, and that feeling is remarkably depressing. Maybe it will pass when things slow down. I don't want to be nomadic, moving from city to city as I begin to feel unhappy, like I did from East Lansing, but I also feel like, in Baltimore, I've either got to shit or get off the pot, because things aren't happening right now like I need them to be. I'm 26 years old. 30 is in sight and baring down harder than I like. What's not is any sort of secure future. I'm thinking of buying a house but am not sure if I want to. I'm dating a very little bit but nothing is gelling.
Frankly, my big fear that I've had since I was 19 - that I would end up alone - seems to be occurring, and seems to become more prescient the older I get. I am not comfortable with this feeling, and don't honestly believe it, but I don't ever want to be comfortable with this feeling I have in my life right now, this cycle of coming home every night after working two jobs to my meowing cat and sleepy dog. I'm not sure what I need or how I can get it.
***
(I think I might just need a summer vacation. My Sunday entries usually come after long shifts at the second job and are discolored by that.)