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(c)2016 Douglas W Davis
The Exhausted Educator's Summer Homework
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During the school year my alarm wakes me up at 5:15 each
school morning in order for me to be up, dressed, and ready to head off to school.
Teachers at my school are required to be at the school no later than 7:15
most days, and 7:00 on the days we have morning duty.
To be completely honest, I hit the snooze bar a couple of times
and don’t actually drag myself out of bed until 5:30, sometimes 5:35. My
wife also has to get up at that time of the morning in order to complete her
morning routine, which includes walking her dog around the neighborhood. She
also has a much longer commute than I do.
My drive to work, now that the by-pass is completed, is about 10
to 12 minutes, if traffic is normal for that time of the morning. I usually have
plenty of time to stop at the fast-food place closest to the school for a
breakfast sandwich and a second cup of coffee. I drink the first on the way
there.
But now it is summer. While I still have teaching related work
to do, I have no set time by which I have to start. If I decide not to do
any of it one day or another, I leave it for the next day, or the next.
Procrastinating is a bad habit that comes very easily to this teacher in the
early days of summer break.
Our alarm still goes off every morning at 5:15 because my wife
still has to get up and go to work. For the first few days of summer I get up
when she does because it is ingrained in me to be up then, too. By the third
week of summer break I have broken this good habit and with each passing day find
myself better able to ignore the alarm and stay asleep. First it will be an
extra hour, then two, and this morning, GASP, I slept in until 8:30 in the
morning. Sleeping late is another of the bad habits teachers can fall into over
the summer.
During the school year I make an effort to get to bed between
10:00 and 10:30 at night. Doing so allows me about seven hours of sleep before the
alarm goes off the next morning and means I’ll be awake and reasonably well
rested for teaching the next day. By the third week of summer break I find
myself staying up much later and the next thing I know I’m not quietly getting
into bed next to my slumbering wife until past midnight. Staying up late is yet
another bad habit teachers can fall into over the summer.
My staying up late is usually productive. At night after my wife
goes to bed is when I do most of my work on my latest book-in-progress. If the
writing is going well, I lose all track of time. I don’t see this as a bad
habit at all.
Another thing teachers learn over the summer is that we aren’t
missing a thing by not being able to watch daytime television. I took our car
in for service the other morning and in the waiting room they had one of the
morning talk shows on. As I watched I had to wonder who in the world tunes into
this stuff every day. It was some of the most mind numbing, intelligence void, Pablum
for the masses nonsense I’ve ever seen. The female co-host spent ten
minutes talking about how much she liked touching the male co-host’s hair,
all the while stroking the back of his head. I tuned it out as best I could and
concentrated on writing a new scene for my next book on my laplet (a Lenovo
Yoga 11” laptop that can double as a tablet). It goes with me nearly everywhere
I go.
Summer break does allow me to do one special thing I enjoy that
I cannot do during the school year, attend the weekly lunch meetings of my
Lions Club. I will be joining them for lunch later today. And with that said, I
need to go get ready.
As always, I remain,
The Exhausted Educator
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