Last Day

It's my last day of teaching summer school at my current site. I wake up at four and finish grading persuasive essays. I tried to finish them the night before, but I was too intoxicated after another night at the dive bar with the fellow English teachers. Considering I can be persuaded to poop on a roof when I'm drunk, I didn't want to have my opinion swayed by a nonsensical argument.

I stop for a greeting card to give to my master teacher. None of the cards express what I need to say aside from generic "Thank you"s, so I choose the "I'm in Love with You" card because it amused me. My friends think that was "inappropriate" and "unprofessional," but I'm going to go with "awkward" and "hilarious." Unfortunately, ey never opens it up for me to see eir reaction. Oh well.

For whatever reason, today is my most comfortable day of teaching. Everyone has a positive attitude, and everything feel so right. Because the students are terrified of presenting in front of class, I made them give impromptu presentations on their independent reading books, Reading Rainbow style. The second student presents on Catcher in the Rye and says that ey likes it. When ey goes to sit down, I ask, "What did you think of the risque parts?" "It was interesting." All of the other students want to know about the risque parts. "There was a prostitute," ey says. "Right," I say. "Let's make a rule - if you have a prostitute in your book, mention it." Surprisingly, that rule does not apply for the next book presented, The Diary of Anne Frank.

I am completely in the zone as I speak about Animal Farm, to the point where I don't even realize I am playing with a stapler as I gesture and, mid-sentence, I manage to staple my finger. Immediately, I look at it. The staple is firmly in my finger, and blood is gushing. If you're familiar with me at even a basic level, you probably know that I freak out at the sight of blood, but I can't do that in front of a classroom. "I stapled my finger," I have to admit to my students. There is a mixture of laughter and concern, but I'm sure everyone is thinking what a clumsy dumbass I was to staple my finger in the middle of teaching. Quickly, I grabbed my staple by my teeth and yanked it out, only releasing more blood. Huge drops are plunking to the floor and I just shove my finger in my mouth to try to contain the dripping. A minute later when I have it under control, I wrap it with a tissue and make reference to the Dracula presentation a student did moments before to try to play everything off as being cool. As you know, there is nothing cooler than a teacher who staples eir finger while leading a lesson. Nothing.