Hi All!
Well, you all know how I felt about our contract in the Spring. I had resolved to put it behind me when our pre-season started and focus on doing my job and enjoying my kids and our coaches. The first day back to school I learned I was still having my Master's degree prorated. I felt it was totally unfair that my Masters of Education degree was worth $1000 less than a teacher's Masters of Education. It seemed to be the last straw. I was angry and beside myself at being treated unfairly by the people who were supposed to represent me. I felt abused and discriminated against soley because of my job title.
About an hour after I sent a professional "your full of crap and I don't trust you at all. you suck." email to our Union Negotiator, a job opening came across my email. Our head ATC, Bill called and inquired about the job for himself. We had both had it. The biggest problem for Bill is that he has 19 years of h.s. ATC experience and it is difficult to find anywhere that would pay him comparably to what he makes at our place. In essence, he is stuck. After speaking at length to the principal at the job opening school, he encouraged me to apply. I called and had an interview two days later. Three days after that I had a second interview with the Superintendent, which was essentially a negotiating meeting and that ended with a job offer. Two weeks after the first phone call, I have a new job. Not only is my new job on the Teacher's Scale, but the Superintendent offered me all my experience steps. While the significant raise was a factor, so was the fact that right away the Superintendent showed me and my profession respect and value.
I was very sad about the prospect of leaving my kids and our coaches/teachers - so much so when I knew I had to take the job, I cried for hours. It was not made easier by the fact our Principal and our Athletic Director told me how much they would miss me and even tried to negotiate on my behalf to keep me. They are wonderful people and I will miss them terribly. I have since moved past the crying and am starting to look at the positive and look forward to the new people I will meet. Because I am tenured, my current school has the right to keep me 60 days. My Principal and A.D. would both like to move as soon as possible to get settled as we are just starting the school year. We are in limbo for now, but it will all be settled down soon.
Song by The Silhouettes.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Don't Give Up
Reading my friends Meg & Amy’s blogs make me realize how I neglect this site way too often. It often seems like something else I’m too tired to do, instead of the joy I used to get from writing on here and sharing my life with my few faithful readers. The other thing is that I’m boring. I don’t DO fun things. I often THINK about doing fun things, but then this overwhelming tired and loneliness sweeps over me and I find comfort in the usual, boring me. So, as if awakening from a long nap, or shell I shall write about the last year. Not in a “Monday, I went to the grocery” kind of way but more philosophical and deep.
As my birthday came and went, I realized I am incapable of stopping time. I tried. Hard. Just doesn’t happen. I am constantly conflicted in my feelings and I think it’s often what exhausts me. I try to find hope, just to have it dashed. I try to find positive, to be hit with the overwhelming wave of negative. I try to have faith, to find it constantly questioned. I try to balance my head with my heart only to end up in a constant tug-of-war with my emotions. I realize I have a lot of things in my life for which to feel overwhelmingly blessed. I try to feel blessed. I struggle and beg and plead to feel that instead of betrayed, abandoned and ungrateful. I am constantly in awe of the faith of those closest to me, my family and some friends. The unwavering trust and belief. I am not sure I feel that anymore. As I wrote previously our contract this year didn’t go well. I was surprised and bewildered by my reaction to it. It was hard to realize why such an insignificant thing hit me so hard. I think it was the abandoning of hope. Not just in the contract and in my job but in life and the things that mattered deep down to me - That what I want and what will be are two very different things. And the annoyance that just when I am overcome with sadness by my loss of hope in most things a little voice says no, not yet. It would be easier to lose all hope I think, then just most hope because it leaves the door open for the “knock-the-wind-out-of-you, total exhaustion, flood of emotions” to tear you up again later, when you don’t quite expect it. And the older I get, the harder it becomes to go through it over and over again. To resign to the thought of maybe it’s not to be, only to have something hold on that grows with time until the welling up inside bursts and forces you to resign yourself to it all over again. If there is some reason, if there is some point to the constant building of hope where is it? How long should I hold on to year after year be constantly disappointed when it fails to materialize?
I started this blog at work today. On my way home I passed the hardware store down the street that always has funny quotes on it’s message board. It’s done this for years. When I looked up today, the sign said “If all hope isn’t lost, where is it?”. It made me smile. Truer thought had never been written.
-Song by Peter Gabriel
As my birthday came and went, I realized I am incapable of stopping time. I tried. Hard. Just doesn’t happen. I am constantly conflicted in my feelings and I think it’s often what exhausts me. I try to find hope, just to have it dashed. I try to find positive, to be hit with the overwhelming wave of negative. I try to have faith, to find it constantly questioned. I try to balance my head with my heart only to end up in a constant tug-of-war with my emotions. I realize I have a lot of things in my life for which to feel overwhelmingly blessed. I try to feel blessed. I struggle and beg and plead to feel that instead of betrayed, abandoned and ungrateful. I am constantly in awe of the faith of those closest to me, my family and some friends. The unwavering trust and belief. I am not sure I feel that anymore. As I wrote previously our contract this year didn’t go well. I was surprised and bewildered by my reaction to it. It was hard to realize why such an insignificant thing hit me so hard. I think it was the abandoning of hope. Not just in the contract and in my job but in life and the things that mattered deep down to me - That what I want and what will be are two very different things. And the annoyance that just when I am overcome with sadness by my loss of hope in most things a little voice says no, not yet. It would be easier to lose all hope I think, then just most hope because it leaves the door open for the “knock-the-wind-out-of-you, total exhaustion, flood of emotions” to tear you up again later, when you don’t quite expect it. And the older I get, the harder it becomes to go through it over and over again. To resign to the thought of maybe it’s not to be, only to have something hold on that grows with time until the welling up inside bursts and forces you to resign yourself to it all over again. If there is some reason, if there is some point to the constant building of hope where is it? How long should I hold on to year after year be constantly disappointed when it fails to materialize?
I started this blog at work today. On my way home I passed the hardware store down the street that always has funny quotes on it’s message board. It’s done this for years. When I looked up today, the sign said “If all hope isn’t lost, where is it?”. It made me smile. Truer thought had never been written.
-Song by Peter Gabriel
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