GENESIS 1:1

Wow. This is kinda surreal. I’m writing this at 1:44 PM – right about when I’d normally be [sullenly] gathering my things to go upstairs to the gym to conduct afternoon Band. I’d be faced with 50+ unruly pre-teens, all blowing sour notes and talking incessantly. I’d roll my eyes, count to ten and try desperately to get through the next 42 minutes without committing murder.

Honestly though? I kinda wish I were back there right now.

The morning was busy. I got here around 9 and sat and brainstormed with Nick (my boss) about what I’d work on this summer. Since I don’t yet have an office of my own, I have taken up residence at his conference table. The problem is, he is quite possibly the most ADHD human being on the planet. He talks a mile a minute and his thoughts don’t seem to flow in any logical order. Speaking with him is both exciting and exhausting.

Around 11:45 I asked him when I am supposed to go to lunch. He replied, “whenever you’re hungry” a response – to most normal people – which makes sense. But having spent the past eight years being governed by a bell, this is a foreign concept. So at 11:50 (my lunch time at school) I drove to the health food store and bought a sandwich.

When I got back here, Nick was gone and well – I wasn’t sure where to go or what to do. So I wandered around and poked my head into different areas of the shop. I went up to the lesson studio and talked to the lady whose job I will be incorporating into my own. She scared me a little.

I wandered over to the vending machine. I ate a bag of chocolate-covered pretzels. Then I ate a bag of Famous Amos oatmeal cookies. If this is the way things continue, I’ll be 900 lbs. by the time the summer ends. Now I am back in Nick’s office and I have decided to blog… keep you all on top of my new and exciting life.

Maybe I need not to stress out about it yet. After all, it is only my first day. It’s just strange not having a routine yet. As a teacher, the whole job is a routine. Every day had its order, every month, every year. It ended in June and started up in September. It was both painfully mundane and mindlessly comforting.

But maybe as the days unfold, a routine will reveal itself. That’s human nature after all, right? Systemizing? It’s what we do. It just seems like it might be a little more vague here than it was at school. No one handed me a class schedule this morning that told me what I was teaching, who’d be in the classroom and when I’d be able to have 5 minutes free to take a poop.

Ah well. A change is what I wanted and a change is what I most definitely have gotten. I’ll take it as it comes and see just where it goes. And along the way, I’ll savor being able to eat and poop on MY terms.