New and Improved with More Angst

The number of personal effects in my office was staggering. The black stacking file crate I carried home tonight contained a light blue fleece blanket with a flying pig pattern; a pair of striped leg warmers, 1980s chic; a Tri-County Viking Band mug I earned my junior year in high school that had once held various writing furnishings; a stuffed pig holding a blanket with a ribbon around its neck, a treasured secret Santa gift from two years back; an electronic Boggle game; a mouse pad with pictures of me and my husband jumping over a stream taken during our engagement photo session; a three hole punch; two ten packs of classic color Crayola markers; three 24 packs of RoseArt crayons; countless dry erase markers; a red glass heart the size of a half dollar my husband gave me for Valentine's Day three years ago; a Ziploc bag full of pennies; 11 bouncy balls of various sizes and colors; a white mechanical kitchen timer; a foot long wooden ruler marked in inches and centimeters; two black plastic inboxes; 5 CDs, including The Coolest Country CD created by BB, John Prine's Souvenirs, Shania Twain's Greatest Hits, BB's Expansive Definition of Country: Volume 1, and Loretta Lynn's Van Lear Rose; a picture frame containing two of our wedding photos; a Nora Roberts/J.D. Robb collaboration, the uber-forgettable novel Remember When; a giant Ziploc bag filled with school supplies, some I had purchased, some I took from the supply room, some donated to me by students, all tangled up together in a huge mess; a box of red fine point permanent markers; two balls of twine; two decks of playing cards; one deck of Uno cards; and one Yahtzee game.

I will have a similar box to bring home tomorrow. After that, I'll never go there again. It will be my school no more.

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She made a special trip to see my in my office.

"Thank you for all you have done for me this year."
"You're welcome. I'm proud of all your hard work this year."
"I'll miss you next year. Even though you won't miss me."
"Oh, I'll miss you. Just not..." I trail off, not sure what to say, what I'm allowed to say. The noise? The coddling? The low standards? The parent phone calls? The constant budget worries? The general malaise of staff? The divide between teachers?
Before I finish, she interrupts my thoughts. "I will miss you," she emphasizes, "even though you complain a lot."
"I don't -"
"Yes, you do." She proceeds to do a perfect imitation of me with my number one complaint - the noise.
I smile. No use defending yourself from the truth.
"Good luck. Keep up all your hard work." I give her a hug and she walks away.


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This will not be my last time in front of a classroom. But it somehow seems so final today, like my chance has come and gone and I've just watched it pass me by in a crazy blur of noise, noise, noise.