First Birthdays and Keeping a Career

Sydney turned one on the 16th. Last Saturday, we had his party and he was in his element. Syd isn't an uninhibited child at all, but he did have an excellent nap before everyone arrived, and the smiles didn't stop (until we put the cake in front of him - what on earth is this stuff? Why is it so sticky? Why is everyone staring at me as though I'm supposed to perform? What am I supposed to do with this? Hey! This is kinda yummy!). He was such a good little boy and he even allowed Mommy to put away food before he nursed for his nap, and slept until 5:30! Goodness he was worn out!

I like this one, if only because you can FINALLY see his top tooth! We waited 4 months for this one!

Sydney enjoys a pre-party lunch.

Pretty flame! What's this all about?

You want me to do what?

Sydney decides the cake is, after all, worth digging in to!

Sydney decided that playing with the shiny noisemaker would be more fun than opening presents!

On another note, teaching has taken on a whole new challenge. I made a promise within the first month of starting this blog where I promised to try to remain panglossian. So, I will not vent here. But suffice it to say that my co-workers and I are under increasing pressure. So much so that I wondered how long I would stay in this profession.

Allow me to say that that thought saddened me a great deal. There's a reason why I teach, and rather than repeat a phrase that is becoming cliche, I'll leave it at that. I enjoy passing on my passion for literature, for writing, for learning too much to joke about this. And usually, I start to wonder how much longer I can stand to bring home my job every night...every weekend by about March. Preparing for the first round of SOLs will do it to ya. But the truth is, I DO get 2 months during the summer to recuperate. And who else can say that? I was able to spend that time with my son this summer, and it was glorious.

But then something happened the very next day at school that forced to accept the fact that I will keep pushing myself to accomplish everything the state, the school board, the school administration, and my department chair asks of me...all without sacrificing my instruction to my students. My juniors were giving group presentations on ballads, teaching their classmates in the process. Some students included the actual tunes of their chosen ballads so their classmates could hear them. A few students elected to sing their ballad. One group, in my 5th block, had the ballad 'Clementine,' and they were playing the music and singing. It is a well-known ballad, so I started to sing along. Jokingly, I waved the class on in time for the refrain and wonder of wonders, THE ENTIRE CLASS SANG THE SONG! It was so surprising...I was caught completely off guard. It was fun, refreshing, and I came away from that class knowing I would be a teacher for a long, long time.