Outside the world had the slate grey blue hue of an impending snow. Inside the school it was a week to winter break. There were multiple reminders to affirm this all around the building. Bulletin boards with tear away pages that counted down and whiteboards with hazy smudges of dates erased each day. May announced it every morning over the PA and it would bring students chiming back with the number.
"We have five school days until winter break."
And the hallways would chime with people yelling back "Five days!"
Everywhere there were lights and Isabela stretched the limit of her abilities by bending and shaping the flickers of the Christmas lights strung over boards. Ever since the chat with May she had relegated this back to being a novelty. Just like in her dorm in Athens sitting on a fleece sheet and gritting through the icy bite of it through her hands. She would make the digital display of a clock wobble. It no longer hurt, albeit it could be tiring when she made a huge or new thing. Drew had convinced her to try to run "active camouflage" and bend the light around her to reflect back and make her invisible. She had tried, standing in her apartment and focusing on the shapes around her. It left her exhausted, like having run up four flights of stairs after two hours of sleep.
This last week was a gimme. There were gentle reminders from the management company and Rose to keep engaged.
- Try to limit watching movies until Friday.
- Coloring sheets are not lesson plans.
- Class parties on Friday, if you are having one
- Caroling class to class is not curriculum unless you are music and its pre-approved
- 6th, 7th, 8th grade team-Sending students to help in the office or help the custodian is not curriculum
But, they were all ignored. Sometimes politely and sometimes aggressively with secret text chains or someone bold enough to speak too candidly in a meeting.
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Real talk author's note: I began writing this and visibly cringed. If you have read this blog (even the banner mentions it) then this super heroine (teacher by day and nascent hero by night!) is a running motif. There are posts going back to 2018 that note it nut there are more recent ones It was trying to put together these varying scenes onto the page. Everything I write; I never feel it is as good as I imagine. Every post, every poem, every essay, even every work memo, is something that felt and looked much stronger in my mind. Then out comes the, to quote Mean Girls, "word vomit." These scenes are always set to music. I have a penchant for drum and bass and orchestral scores with side dishes of emo and bubblegum pop. How do I put into words the scene set to the last minute of Across the Spiderverse (Start a Band) where Arclight crashes through a ceiling and saves the class field trip form the people trying to rob the Cleveland Museum of Art? I don't feel confident enough that I can. Or, that I should.
These repeating daydreams come from childhood where I eagerly ate up any anime and action carton that the folks at Toonami threw at us. I blame the hype videos they played before each show which distilled the heart and saga of random Japanese imports and American re-treads (I think Reboot was a Toonami show also?) into synthesized sizzle. It then was a late adolescence and early adult hood where comic book movies were at their zenith. This blog began after being inspired by the defunct Dave's Long Box blog and Sean Baby articles. Reading them I laughed and comics and superheroes felt accessible yet expansive. Finally, it comes from an adult hood where I do want to be the hero, but also help the amazing people I put on pedestals. The Arclight character is based on a few amazing teachers I got to work with and the idea that one could do caping in their spare time was not much of a stretch. This is America, where we drill schools on what to do in case of violence and ask teachers and staff to do more and more with the same year to year. I want to help! But, I am too fat, or old, or comfortable. I also think this is a characteristic of men who grew up with out fathers. Some guy's daddy issues make them into self pitying angry incels where their hero tells others how to act. And, others, realize the silent labor of their peers and hope to help.
Just like we will keep listening to the same music we did as adolescents, I will never give up on these daydreams. I'll still think how the crew at the Arclight school would handle this or what Isabela or Drew would say (Note: These are placeholder names as the legacy names either are repeated in other stories or would be pretty easy tells for anyone who 1) Reads this blog and 2) Has met me in real life). It will be fun things to imagine when I'm on my walks or trying to wrestle through a few spreadsheets.
That all said, I will still scribble on the blog. Any long form narrative, I hope to polish and try to actually publish. I know, that is a big word. In light of the 2024 US election, I reached out to many old friends and colleagues to check in on them. Are you ok? Are you scared or worried? And, one mentioned who they remembered I wrote and how it was always so lovely. That made my day and inspired me to write but what was in my head was the swashbuckling, curriculum juggling, making hard light blades world of my superheroine. There is a reason you see this in comics or movies. A much better medium for this.
I just hope, if you read this blog, you enjoy the bad poetry.
