Welcome, parents. I am excited to lead your children through second grade, and I look forward to discussing all the progress they will make.
Simultaneously, Back-to-School Night is traditionally a time to meet the teacher and learn about their life. If we linger on that, the discussion will not be fun. I predict that outside the classroom, my life will continue to resemble the B-plot in a near-future dystopian series on the CW.
Each day, I will rise in my studio apartment, which I share with Charles. Charles recently lost his electrician’s license due to the misuse of multimeters. I will shower and dress, eating a small amount of toothpaste, trying to balance my need for the trace calories found in toothpaste against the danger of fluoride poisoning. Charles and I will bid each other a formal goodbye. He will, without rising from the couch, tip his ball cap, and I will, in turn, awkwardly hold up my shoulder bag in nonsensical reciprocation. Charles and I are roommates only, hardly more than passing acquaintances. His friends call him Chuck. I do not.
I will then travel to school on foot, walking 2.4 miles along the frontage road. There is no sidewalk.
I can see you shifting uncomfortably in those very small chairs I asked you to sit down in—I understand my reality is uncomfortable for you to consider. The story here at school is a happier one: I will teach your children for the entire day. We will have a great time. I will do a great job. Your children will learn a great deal about both themselves and the world. They will master math facts. Each of them will come to understand what it means both to be a friend and to have a friend. We will all wash our hands at least twice a day.
But even here in the place I’m happiest, in the classroom I share with your children, you must understand that my personal reality cohabitates. After lunch each day, I will help your children dispose of what they do not eat. I will look for unopened packages of perishables, like a hummus cup or a Kinder Egg. I will ask your children if I can have these for my own, carefully modeling the right way to ask so as not to create a sense of obligation in the askee. Your children will, by and large, happily give me their scraps. I will squirrel them away into a foam cooler that I found in the parking lot after Back-to-School Night 2019, which I fill each day with nonedible ice from the cafeteria.
These leftovers stored away, I will put sustenance out of my mind. We will do our afternoon lessons. At 1:55 p.m., “Specials” will occur. Our class will alternate between Fitness, Spanish, Library, and Computer Lab. During these periods, your child will leave this classroom, and I will be left behind. Sitting in this silent room, I will ponder this barbarous cycle of departure and stasis, me forever anchored here, your small ones moving away from me, first for short periods and then forever.
I am the center of the carousel, the undecorated pole. I admire your wooden ponies, which you have painted so nicely, but I cannot become them. I am eternally moving but making no forward progress. I am unnoticed, mechanical, and emit groaning noises.
After I’ve sat in that quiet contemplation, I will do some small personal task. I might text my manager at Cold Stone Creamery and see if I can pick up an additional weekend shift. Or perhaps I will check my student loan balance and throw up.
After a brief reconvening in this room, I will help your children to carpool. The carpool procedures have been emailed to you, and I also have copies here. These procedures are inflexible, and Principal Brandt will be furious if you violate them. Do not do so.
Finally, I will walk home, 2.4 miles, the reverse of my morning journey. I will silently calculate the odds that a car hits a pedestrian on the frontage road. Once home, I will have dinner—maybe a packet of ranch and an organic beef stick. I will eat these and allow my heart to fill with equal parts gratitude to your children for sharing and anger toward the bend of human history that led me here. I will drink the water that used to be nonedible ice. I know I shouldn’t, but I will.
Finally, Charles will come home. He may have news about his license revocation appeal proceeding, or perhaps we’ll simply sit and watch Pluto, which is a free, ad-supported streaming source that I pray your children will never have cause to learn about. I will sleep and return here the next day.
I am happy to go further into any of the above, or we can move on and have a great time talking through the SuperKids reading curriculum.
