This fall has been crazy. I’ve been meaning to look back at past Septembers here on the blog to see if the first month of school always feels this nuts. But even if school always feels really overwhelming, what is going on outside of school is what is making things feel untenable. We just have way too much going on. And right now we’re in the thick of it.
Last weekend was the camping trip. The weekend actually went well, only because I took Friday off. That gave me the margins I needed to enjoy Friday night camping and Saturday at home with the girls. Only sleeping in a tent one night also helped. The air quality got so much better by Sunday that I was able to run and that felt great. It was actually a pretty good weekend.
But this week is pretty nuts. My husband just left for a music festival in Memphis. His plane from DFW to Memphis was decommissioned, but they did eventually find them another plane. Then he got to his AirBnB after midnight only to find the key is not in the box. It’s 1:15am there now and he still doesn’t have a place to sleep. He’s trying not to feel like it’s all a sign that he shouldn’t have gone.
Work is crazy because conferences are next week and all my classes are taking assessments, and then starting projects that will take them through next week. We’re trying a new kind of student led conferences (again!) and many of the steps this week are unfamiliar and require more time than they should. Luckily our admin listened when we assured them the way they were trying to do conferences would not have worked. This way is new to us, but ultimately not that difficult. I’m so glad we’re not trying to make their original proposal work.
I got two new students on Monday and am getting three new students tomorrow. I do NOT do well with new additions so late in the year. At least now I have a full 32 kids in every one of my 7th/8th grade classes (and 35 in my 8th grade class!) so they actually cannot give me any more new students.
With my husband gone I’ll be getting to work a lot later tomorrow and Friday. It will be rough to lose that morning prep time, especially tomorrow when I have four block periods and no prep. But my in-laws are actually taking my son to school for me. If it weren’t for them, I’d have to take time off and get someone to cover my first classes. I’m very grateful for their help.
This weekend my daughter has her first swim meet. I swam competitively for much of middle and high school so it will be fun to see her dive in for her first race. It’s already a trip to be the parent, and not the swimmer. I keep asking my parents how I was registered for meets and other stuff for swimming, and of course it wasn’t online because online wasn’t a think in the 90s! It’s crazy to think how different basically everything was back then. And I’m only 43!
Next week is conferences, which will be exhausting. I’m also teaching Basics at the dojo on Monday. Plus I have to pack us all up because on Saturday we drive to Southern California to take the kids to Universal Studios for our son’s 10th birthday. He turns 10 later in the month, but Indigenous People’s Day is the observed by both our districts on the 9th so we’re taking advantage of the long weekend to take them down. Having three crazy weekends in a row (camping, solo parenting, Universal Studios) is a little more than I can manage, but I guess I have to do just that.
Oh, and high school tours open Sunday morning and later this month is the enrollment fair. There are few things I hate more about living in San Francisco that navigating SFUSD’s lottery, so I’m sure to handle all the uncertainty of which high school my daughter will go to next year with patience and grace.
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BWAHAHA. Just writing that made me spit laugh all over my screen.
And now it’s 11:25pm, so I need to get myself to bed. I’m sorry my posts have been so sporadic lately. I’ll try to post more frequently.
You know me, girl, I am all about the travel and events with friends, but I do think it’s interesting how often you bend over backwards to accommodate your husband’s trips (both for work and fun), even when you seem to be at your own breaking point of juggling responsibilities… but how rarely that seems to happen in the other direction. Has DH’s mental status gotten any better? Is he taking any steps to improve the way he handles things and helps out in the parenting/house realm?
Sheesh, sorry, maybe I’m just projecting my own frustrations that surfaced when I read this post. I hope you actually end up enjoying the weekend alone with the kids, sometimes I love that too (not juggling my husband’s emotions and needs as well as my kids’).
Of course you feel crazed. Shows you are still a normal person. That is a GIANT amount to do!!!!! And not enough support for you.
Will be VERY interested in what you CAN say about SF high school situation. Is anything other than public a possibility? When does one know (and how) when all the high school stuff about lottery is going to happen? And HOW do you really have any sense of what is going on at the different ones around the city? Then there is the entire transportation issue to be dealt with re how would one get a student to some of the locations given the school may well not be within any reasonable distance of the students home? It feels like a nightmare of stress and anxiety and completely out of control.
Sending much support and sympathy!!! Glad you can run again! Best wishes.
Gosh, I want to give you a hug. You have A LOT going on, and reading your post gave me some anxiety. You work really, really hard, you take care of your students, husband and kids. Many, many warm hugs to you.