Mere

"Meredith rode the bus"...

Being at the big school has brought many changes to my way of teaching. At alternative school, I was the department for middle school for my subject. Party of one. Rolling one deep. Uno. Me, myself, and I.
This year, I have a teaching partner. We've split 6th grade and we plan together all the fun things we'll torture our students with.

Maybe I'm just saying this because Meredith (Mere as I call her just to myself...weird?...Sorry Mere) is the bomb.com, but having a teaching buddy is fun! Aside from not feeling lonely, she is also responsible for reigning in my crazy. Sometimes when planning, I fly by the seat of my pants and hope things fall into place. Having a partner holds me accountable to actually planning appropriately and ensuring that I do not go overboard (or underboard?) on anything.

She is also an Aggie and she is way younger and cooler than me. I look to her for fashion trends, current pop culture subjects and the lingo. I've transitioned into that group of teachers that you can tell used to be young not so long ago, but have clearly started morphing into the lady who shakes a rake at kids on her lawn.

I met Mere during our summer training academy. It was two weeks of various offered sessions we could choose from to get our professional development. I was excited to meet her, but worried because I'm sort of an awkward boundary stepper. I'll go out strong...nervously divulging too many personal details, but then turn total recluse. It's weird and confusing.
I had planned to ask Meredith if she wanted to "grab lunch" ("get lunch?" "grab a bite", "get some food" and various other rehearsed options). Then there was the awkwardness of do I offer her a ride in the stinky toddler mobile that could smell a million different odors of ewww at any given time? Or do I invite her to drive me?

It turns out Meredith had taken the bus.

They offered a shuttle from one of the local middle schools to the site of the training (at one of the high schools) because they anticipated overflow in the parking lots. They sent out emails warning everyone of this potentially spectacular turn out and encouraged use of the shuttle. Since Meredith is new to our district this year, of course she believed that every teacher in the district would faithfully show up ready to prepare for the upcoming year. Then she found herself alone...on a school bus...being shuttled to high school. I drove us to lunch and then drove her back to her car at the end of the afternoon, so she wouldn't have to wait alone to be picked up by the bus as everyone left.

Today we had a faculty meeting with our superintendent. The topic of our meeting was "meaningful professional development." We were to give feedback about the summer sessions....what we liked, what we didn't like. As everyone was appropriately answering, I drew the picture above. As I was drawing, I knew it was inappropriate because it would cause laughter beyond control in a setting where that would be unprofessional. But I kept drawing. Then right before I showed Meredith, I heard the voice tell me not to do it. But then I did it anyway and sure enough, we became 6th grade. I had to bite my tongue and dig my nails into my hand to create pain so that I would stop laughing.

I am a bad influence.
We are the perfect team.