The Lost Returned

Oh man, where have I been? Apparently time really does speed up as you get older, because I feel like I'm using most of my time productively these days, and yet getting less done. It's like time is in some kind of cosmic wormhole, out of which there is no escape.

No, that's not quite true. I'm getting a lot done, actually, just not in all the areas I want to get things done.

It's been an interesting year at school thus far. I don't know what happens when the kids become seniors, but it's like a whole new set of kids--both those I teach and those I don't--have inhabited the high school halls this year. These personality shifts culminated in a sticky mess involving plagiarism and a student I had really enjoyed teaching for several years. Sad way to close out a high school career.

Still, the student's life will go on, and I hope it will go on with some important lessons and self-reflection under the belt. Sometimes getting called out can be a great course correction. I hope so anyway.

We had field day on Friday, which, as one of the student council advisers, I had a hand in preparing. The field day has usually ended in a food fight, which the administration has been trying to curtail because of concerns of bullying and hazing, but this year it didn't. It was really fun to see how this thing that had previously just ended in chaos and a wasted day this time ended up as a positive and bonding experience for everyone who stayed. The last event, the obstacle course, was a joke last year--not even finished. But this year all the times were sitting around cheering their representatives, and the whole thing had a good spirit of competition. Something that had been so negative for a lot of people turned into something positive.

Maybe that's the theme of this post: good coming out of bad. Maybe my multi-week blog silence will result in a boon of creativity and comedy in May.

Either that, or everything will go silent again. We'll see.