Of course, last week also had two huge emotional punches to the gut -- I did my car driving parade for my class and we went up to my student in foster care's home that's 30 minutes away now, only to find that she wasn't there, and the other girls who were hanging out the window said "her CPS worker picked her up" which didn't fully compute for me until the next day when her guardian called me and let me know that she no longer lived there and was in a new placement. Again. So I drove up there to pick up the end-of-year swag we'd dropped off and today I got the info for her new foster parent so hopefully I can see her to wish her good luck and see you later (I am trying to set up a mentorship type relationship there).
Second punch -- I'd been trying to get in touch with another student to give him his end-of-year swag, as well as his locker materials, gym locker materials, pick up the district laptop, and give him his book that I inscribed for him... and it just kept getting pushed back via text until finally, on Friday he said "you can come by around 6." Well, that was an education on the completely demoralizing low-income-housing complex he lives in -- I'd been there before (it's literally set up like pods, it's DOWN IN A VALLEY so you literally "look down" at it, and all my students who've lived there absolutely hate it) but I did not realize they had living spaces that were so devoid of light and humanity. I ended up leaving the stuff outside the door as no one answered but I could hear someone through the peephole, and I did text if he wanted to come down so I could see him, but he asked for me to drop the stuff at the door and to have a great summer and I cried the entire way home at the injustice of it all.
But, new week, first week of summer, and everyone I talk to says, "So what are you doing this summer?"
And I really want to say, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. Can I just do absolutely nothing? Can I lie in a puddle with a book and my cat and reconstitute myself from this year? Do I have to be ambitious right out the gate?
But then, to be fair, I do have a lot of stuff that has piled onto my plate in just the last few days:
- two tutoring clients, to do online
- facilitating at the Leadership Retreat for administrators on topics of race, equity, and privilege
- possible curriculum writing
- A reading list to help me better understand how to be antiracist and understand the state of systemic racism in the United States
- White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Race by Robin Diangelo
- Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor by Layla F. Saad
- Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations About Race by Beverly Daniel Tatum, PhD
- Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi
- How to Be An Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
- So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
- The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
Plus other reading, gardening, GETTING BACK TO REGULAR BLOGGING, and writing. And planning for next year, whatever that looks like.
So, uh, right now my answer to "What are you doing this summer?" is nothing, but I guess that's not strictly true. Seeing it all out in a list like that makes me feel a little overwhelmed, but the important thing is that most of the things on this list are a) on my own time, b) of my own choosing, c) things that I will enjoy, even the work related stuff.
What are you doing this summer?
Want to read some #Microblog Mondays that are actually micro? Go here and enjoy!
Good grief, I'm exhausted to read your summer to-do list! lol OF COURSE you can do nothing. And frankly, aside from all that, I would think that this year, 2020, of ALL years, the right thing to do, perhaps the moral thing to do, is to do nothing, or particularly, to go nowhere? (As our COVID campaign said here, "Stay home. Save Lives.") Or is that old school thinking in the US now? (My niece has flown to Texas from CA, and I'm appalled.)
ReplyDeletePerhaps your answer should be "relax and enjoy myself" which still allows you to do all those other things too. But I would think that the most important thing you can do for yourself, and your students in the Fall (note I didn't say autumn? lol), is to rest and recharge.
Enjoy your summer, Jess!
Oh the end of the school year and particularly this school year... Total physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion. I was only capable of doing absolutely nothing for a solid week once school ended last month. Then I went back to work at the hospital but only for a couple days a week. Now, a month later, I'm feeling recovered from the end of school, which is good because my plans this summer are to move. Again. Sigh... But like you, it's on my own schedule and it is because of my choosing. I really do want to live where I'm going. I just look forward to the move being over with. I also want to read a textbook that will help me prepare for my new job in August. And of course there's always sewing. I'm still obsessed with quilts but I also just sewed my first skirt!
ReplyDeleteSo happy summer to you! Enjoy resting and reading and gardening! The tutoring and planning will be cool too. And of course I'm happy to read that you will continue blogging. <3
Boy, do I remember the exhaustion of crawling toward the end of the teaching year, bleeding all the way. You deserve every bit of your summer, and all the cat-and-book time you want. Enjoy it!
ReplyDeleteCan I just say how proud I am of your work with educating educators on racial injustice? I can’t think of a better person to fight that fight. Institutional racism is so embedded in our public schools, and there are many who talk the talk but don’t walk the walk. I salute you, Jess.