Sunglasses Always Fit

Just three more sleeps until I’m home. Three more sleeps until Christmas break. Kids are FERAL this time of year, and we’ve had a doozy leading up to it – Friday the 13th, a full moon, parent-teacher conferences, report cards, the Christmas musical. If I don’t drop an eff-bomb in class before the end of Thursday it will be a Christmas miracle, indeed. 

The irony is that I fundraised a ton of money to get them presents, and created this “behavior advent calendar” so that they could “earn” the things I’d already bought them, most of which are actually for my own benefit – supplying them all with pencils, erasers, markers, colors, highlighters, and water bottles. And so they are going to get the gifts – great gifts! It’s guaranteed! We have donors to thank! 

But can my kids behave?! No. Cannot. Not if their lives depended on it. They’re scratching epithets into the bathroom walls, throwing rocks at each other, stealing homework, talking back to me. I was “gifted” the toughest class in the school “because we wanted someone with the most experience, yadda yadda,” which is like, a backhanded compliment. And I love them, I love them, I do! But they are testing me, oh Lord. And so close to Your birthday, too! Anyway.

Deep breaths, three more sleeps until puppies, mom bringing me morning coffee, walks on the trail, and sisters and cousins and aunts and grandmas. Three more sleeps until sitting in a car again, nightime zzzs without firecrackers at all hours, days without having to speak in Spanish. Three sleeps until I can drink tap water, have hot showers, and flush toilet paper.

The conferences were exhausting, but nice – I like meeting the reasons behind all the quirks I can see in my students. It’s a bit like meeting your SO’s parents. Big “ah-haaaaa” moments. And I smashed them. I had to do all but one in Spanish, but had a translator for the three toughest just to help me collect my thoughts and be specific with my recommendations. Other stats include – four parents in tears, for various reasons, one time – locked myself out of classroom, one time – accidentally handed playdough to a younger sibling I didn’t realize was blind and would put anything in his mouth. Nearly killed him.

So all in all, a win. I love sharing how *good* some of these kids are, how hard they are working to deserve their scholarships. I love hearing the emotion in their parents’ voices when I point out gains. I loved when one mother-son duo starting talking sh*t about each other and throwing chanclas over spelling quizzes. 

The best thing any parent can say in a conference is “I will talk to ____ about this – I totally support you.” Too often parents side with their kids about something, as if I have the time and energy to lie about your ten year old. Trust me – they aren’t doing homework! They talk back in class! They rolled their eyes at me and I want to roll them out the door! I can’t count how many times parents have argued about behaviours, only to have to eat their words later. My dude in Christ – I am not telling you this to amuse myself and create more paperwork. I have no vendetta against your student. Please, just chat with your child. 

I started my career in junior high, and used to have to do 140 conferences over a two day period. Teaching middle school was HARD (even split between parents/admin/cultish church I was teaching at – kids were a JOY) but I did realise I was good at/loved teaching language to junior highers, or as I like to call them, “sarcastic challenges”, so I’ve tried to stay middle-school adjacent. 

Besides one ill-fated year spent in first grade, trying to emulate my grandma Susi who did 30+ years in title I schools, I’ve stuck to ages 9+ and known this is my jam. I do have a comfy lap and as all students have ever said, I do somehow always smell like cake, but ages 9-13 is really my sweet spot. Which should make me indispensable as an educator, because even parents of kids that age don’t want to hang out with them. They are objectively awful.

It’s the hormones. Or so we say, to rationalize their behavior and make it easier to not want to kick them out a window.

To make this month even more fun for me, because of these hormones and the mandated curriculum I must abide by, I decided to start our Health unit on puberty! Yes, capital P Puberty. The collective pain of the world.  You might not even want children in the future, but your body is still going to, at any time over a 10-15 year range, go through f*ck#g heck to become fertile (the definition educators must give kids about puberty). I’ve known from a pretty young age I never wanted kids, yet every 30 days, like clockwork, my body revolts against me. Can’t turn it off, can’t opt out. Dumb. Unfair. Terrible reward system for not bringing unwanted children into the world.

We started the lesson out okay. Some nervous giggles. Some whisperings. All the “pictures” are just clipart, so nothing graphic, but then we hit the slide about hair growing – leg hair, armpit, upper lip, sideburns, etc. They FREAKED out. And I have to keep silent and stoic at the front, role-modeling how very natural and scientific this dialogue is. Meanwhile my tummy is shaking with laughter.

 When we got to the slide about deodorant, I spent some time. As their teacher, dude, I know how much some of them need this lesson. Surprisingly, one of them brought up that he loves Old Spice, which I consider very American, and reminds me of my dad and grandpa and aftershave in the early years of “hooking up” culture in my life. 

My favorite part came at the end, when I told them all I would be contacting their parents to make sure the topic was discussed in detail at home. “AH NO, MISS, PLEASE! PLEASE NO!” They were shrieking and writhing in their chairs like slugs with salt. I cackled in delight.

Second favorite – when I said they could anonymously write any question they had on a slip of paper for me to think about addressing later. One wrote “why do only girls have tetas?” (boy) One wrote “if I ever see a hair on my leg I’m shaving it off immediately.” (boy) “when will the puberty happen to me?” (girl) “Dear Santa, I want a baby brother or sister” (they turned in the wrong paper slip for this exercise). 

In January I have the pleasure of only teaching the girls about the wonders/horrors of menstruation, somehow navigating serious cultural norms and a second and third language for them. Wish me luck. The boys will have a male teacher from our staff. Thank God. I looked ahead at the slides and when it said “nocturnal emissions” I was like “Oh, I am out. There is no way.”**

But all that is a future Raquel problem. For now, I just have to get through two days of wrangling the sugared-up and feral creatures formally known as my students into a three minute choreographed line dance to “You’re a Mean One, Mr Grinch,” (it’s adorably awful) and pack up life, prep for cockroaches and ants and mold and dust in my absence, drive four hours on a windy road, wait at the airport for six hours, fly through el Salvador, and land at SFO at 11pm, where I’m manifesting my mom waiting with in-n-out or Los Panchos. 

Present Raquel is going to hit “publish” on this blog, fix second-dinners of nachos like a Mexican hobbit, and then watch TikToks with the hashtag wedon’tdeservedogs until her brain turns to mush, and try to hit “snooze” less than the four times she did this morning. Wish her luck.

**big thank you to donors, who allowed me the funds to purchased a pre-planned curriculum, sparing me the trauma of creating it myself. may your eyebrows be thick, may your crops grow.