19 Jobs

Children today will have an average of 19 jobs before they are 38. I've had nine, and I'm only twenty-two.

I've had good jobs---reading tutor with AmeriCorps, and English teacher to refugees and immigrants in Minnesota. I've also had some crazy jobs: English teacher with a European Academy in Guatemala, where my boss paid off the gangs to keep the teachers from being kidnapped, and selling plasma. Nothing too entirely special jobs were working in the college dining service, and acting as a custodial trainer.

Somehow ordinary jobs just can't be normal for me, though. Even working as a custodial trainer, I managed to discover that my coworker was a drug dealer and get hit on by a retired monk. Average? Hardly.

Nothing beats my job in a little, out of the way Spanish academy in Xela, Guatemala, where I fended off the advances of my three bosses while trying to get my full paycheck. It was always a negotiation. "Will you take half your wages? We're a non-profit!" Me: "No. I need to make rent this month." Them: "I don't have change." Me: "I do." Erg!

That job had a rather interesting ending: I was forced to quit after my student proposed to me, and my bosses refused to do anything about it.

At least life is never dull!

Heartbroken

I feel heartbroken. What can you do when a little girl in obvious need of some love and attention asks you to take her home with you, but you can't? Her mother often has wild parties, and is too hungover to get her child up for school in the morning. The little girl hasn't had a bath in who knows how many days, and her clothes aren't washed. She's just eight years old.

My heart breaks for her, and there is nothing I would like more than to get her somewhere safe where she would have the chance to be a child. I can't give that to her. The most I can do is bring the issue up with her teacher, or file a mandated report. It doesn't stop me from worrying about her, and it hasn't made her any safer.

I worry about what happens when her mother can't watch her during her parties. When you gather a crowd of inebriated adults together, things that normally wouldn't occur can happen. The potential for abuse scares me. She's just a little kid, and I've heard more than enough stories at the school of children her age and younger being abused.

She is the sweetest little girl, only eight years old. There has to be something more I can do, but what?

Hauling Wood and Tornado Drills

I just got back in from hauling more firewood. We heat our house with wood, so we get a lot of exercise. First you have to stack the wood once it's delivered, then you need to haul it into your basement. Finally, you need to stack it again. It's a constant cycle, but the fresh fire smell is unbeatable.

Today we had a tornado drill at school---even with constant reassurances, my one little first grader was terrified. She huddled up by me, and held my hand the entire time. Poor kid!

I have just one more day left in my internship. I'm going to miss the kids so much! There are a couple little ones that I absolutely adore. There is one little boy who is just so creative. This doesn't come out in the classroom. He gets overwhelmed so easily, and he just shuts down. When I work with him one on one, though, he flourishes. He has written several short stories on whatever subject we studied that day (he's a second grader). He loves working the copier, and has a good grasp of the mechanics of the machine. I'm going to miss him.

Worrying for the Little Ones

Sigh. I love the kids at my elementary school, I really do, but sometimes I worry for them. When they come in with dried blood on their noses, wearing torn and dirty clothes, I wonder who takes care of them. When I see little seven year olds hoard their snacks because it is the end of the month, and their family's food stamps have run out, I wonder what happened to all of that food. When a little boy comes to school with bloody, wind-blistered hands, I wonder who watches over him, and makes him put on his gloves. I wonder. And I worry.

Eventually, you just have to give up the worry. That doesn't mean that you don't give out extra snacks on Fridays, so that the little kids will have a little more food over the weekend, or that you don't hit up Goodwill and clearance sales for spare gloves and coats. It means that you realize that worrying won't solve any problems. There's prayer, and referrals to food banks. There are mandated reports over suspected cases of abuse and neglect (no, not every time---kids can be boisterous and fall and wreck their clothing and get plenty of bumps and bruises. It's only when it happens day after day and week after week. It's only when their excuses don't make any sense, and there's a new boyfriend at home, or their mother runs out food stamps way too early in the month for it really to have been spent on food and not traded for alcohol or drugs).

If you just keep worrying, you'll go crazy, and everyone knows that a crazy teacher is no good for the kids. Sometimes it's just time to remember that you're doing all you can, and pray for the rest of it. Send some prayers this way.

Crazy Times in Education

Life at my internship is never dull. Whether it's being hit on by eighth-grade boys, dealing with a sprained ankle, or having a second-grader jump over his desk to threaten to punch the boy who I told I'd sit by, life is interesting. I wonder if I'm getting a skewed view of the educational system. I went to a choir concert last night in a town less than an hour away, and the kids all looked so much younger. They didn't look as world-weary as my internship kids. The kids in my town are more sheltered---they're actually allowed to be children. I wish my kids had that.

On a completely unrelated note, my college just overcharged me by $7,000. This has got to be a joke, but I'm not laughing. Somehow the part-time credit load did not compute. I met with three different people at the beginning of the semester to explain how I was only taking six credits, and completing the others elsewhere. They cut my scholarship in half. I can understand this (maybe). Yet I have to ask: do they have liability insurance, in case they give an overworked student a heart attack? I can deal with one $6,500 bill a semester, but two? I wish for once they would undercharge me.

It's time to have some fun with the Financial Aid Office!