On Losing My Marbles

God, it's been awhile since I posted. I think I've just been so busy these past few weeks. I moved in Girton, and have absolutely loved it. I think it was the best decision I've made since being in the country. My flatmates are great; super friendly and easy to get along with. My room, though smaller, is so much cozier and accommodating to me. I have a desk to do my work at now, which I was lacking before. I also have a television and DVD player in my room, so I can just chill in my room with a glass of wine and a DVD and not disrupt anyone but myself. But the icing on the cake is the bathroom.

I'm not sure if I'd ever bitched about this before, but in my old place the shower was non-existent. What they'd done, to make up for this lack of shower, was get some crappy device that you attach to the bath faucet. It was essentially a hose, and you had to hold it over you while you showered. It was pathetic. The pressure was shit, and it kind of defeated the purpose of a relaxing shower in the morning, because you had to do all the work of moving the water over your body manually. It was a total pain. Plus the temperature was impossible to get right, since the faucet had TWO taps; one for hot and one for cold. I don't know who invented that system, but it is total crap.

Being able to stand in a HIGH POWERED, WARM shower in the morning is something I will never take for granted again. Not having to hold the hose over my head is so liberating. I can stand there, my face turned into the stream, and just bask in the silky wet warmth as it cascades down my body. Ahhhhh.

Personally, my life is looking good. Things are going really well. I am really happy about where things are at...or at least happy with where they could be. I'm working on it.

Professionally, things could be better. I think can safely say I've just had the worst day in my entire (short) teaching career. I've written about some pretty terrible days before, but this one takes the cake.

I give you three guesses on which year group it was that gave me hassle too, and the first two don't count.

Year 9.

Last period of the day.

Thursday.

It's a recipe for disaster on a GOOD day.

I woke up this morning in such an amazing mood. I was genuinely content with life, and felt like I could tackle the day. We started the morning with an assembly; a bunch of students had spent the last month and a half rehearsing ABBA tribute performances, and today we got to see them. It was outstanding, I was clapping and laughing the entire time. Starting the day that way only aided my fabulous mood, and I went into my first three lessons feeling chipper and at peace. The lessons went really well too. I think the kids were feeding off my mood.

Fourth period had a few wobbly bits, but again it was pretty good. Going into lunch I was feeling good. One more period to go, and then my hated Thursday would be over. I also had a pretty fun activity planned for my 9s, and I was really apprehensive about their enjoying it. I entertained ideas of them really taking off with the idea, and producing some amazing creative work.

I pitched the idea to them, and instantly regretted it. I had assigned random groups, because I didn't want to have two or three strong performances and then two or three crap ones; I figured if I randomly mixed up groups I'd stand a better chance of the kids pulling together to pull off something decent.

Anyways, I assigned their groups, and told them to move themselves to be in a position to work out a script (the task was to take Edgar Allen Poe's poem 'The Raven' and produce a 3-5 minute performance from it). Two groups got right down to business, as I'd kind of expected; even with random assignment, it somehow worked that the stronger students were together.

I had to fight to get kids to move into their groups; there was a lot of resistance to the idea of randomized groups. One girl sat at her desk and refused to move.

"I'm not working with anyone but ***," she said, folding her arms over her chest and pulling on a pout. She refused to look at me.

"That's really not your decision. You either get to work with the group I assigned you, or you can be sent out of lesson. It's your call," I said, frustrated. This is a girl who constantly tries to be a 'madam' with me. She's a right twat.

She ignored me. Frustrated, I decided to let her sit there. I didn't have time for her dramatics.

That was when I noticed something big and red go sailing past my head. It turned out that it was one of those gigantic novelty erasers (the HUGE brick sized red ones. Very large. Very heavy). I turned to see what it was, and saw a male student (another prat) pick it up off the desk. He instantly turned and hurled it across the room at another student. It hit him square on the side of the face, on his cheek just by his ear. He was caught completely off guard, as was I.

Now, you should know that this student, the one who was hit, has a history of aggression and anger problems. He is a delightful student in my lesson, because we get on really well (we butted heads at the start of the year, but for some unknown reason he came around), but in other lessons I know he's a major problem. He's big for his age, having matured (physically) before a lot of the other boys. I think this has given him a bit of the alpha male syndrome, which explains the anger. Anyways, suffice it to say, he's not the kind of kid you want to piss off.

He turned to face the direction of the first boy, his face going red with anger.

"You little fucking asshole!" he bellows, "What the fuck is wrong with you?! Why did you do that?!"

"You threw it at me first!" the first kid shouted, backing away in defense.

I ran to where they were, putting myself between the two boys. The look on the second boys face signalled danger to me. He was going to murder the first boy. His fists were clenched and his eyes were wild.

"Hey, just let it go, and I will deal with it," I said, putting my hands up between the boys.

"NO! What a fucking asshole, I will tear you APART!" the second boy screamed. He frantically searched about him with his hands, looking for an object to hurl at the first boy. I felt myself panicking, not sure what to do.

Suddenly, he grabbed a chair, and before I could do anything he'd lifted it up and hurled it at the first boy. Since I was standing between them, the chair grazed my arm before it hit the first boy clear in the stomach.

He doubled over, yelping. Everyone else in the room screamed. It was pure chaos.

"OKAY!!!! **** GET in that other room NOW!" I screamed, my mind racing over what to do. The first boy sulked into the room, like a dog with his tail between his legs.

I turned to the second boy, and very calmly asked him to follow me outside.

He protested, but I reassured him in a soft voice that I wasn't mad. He followed me out, his eyes wide.

I shut the door behind us, knowing full well that the chaos in my room was only going to increase now that I'd left the room.

"Look," I said to the boy. "Was throwing the chair an appropriate reaction?"

"He threw that eraser at me first!" he said, his voice high pitched with anger.

"I know he did. Do you not think that the best thing to do, at that point, would have been to let me take care of it? Let me see your face"

He turned his head to the side, and I was able to examine where the eraser had hit him. It was scarlet red, and was starting to raise already. A nice welt would no doubt be there.

"Okay. You've got a welt on your face. Are you alright? Does it hurt?" I asked.

He nodded, fingering it gently.

"Okay. He was totally in the wrong to throw it at you. Don't think for a second that he's blameless. However, your reaction was 100% inappropriate. You should NOT have thrown that chair at him. Now you're going to be in just as much, if not more, trouble than him. If you'd have let it go, I would have sent him out and you would have been totally blameless."

He nodded at me. "I know miss, I shouldn't have thrown the chair, but honestly....it hurt. Who does that?!"

I nodded, and gave him a sympathetic look. "Trust me, I'd have been furious too, if he had thrown it at me. He's a little prat, and you know it. But you should have been the bigger man..."

He nodded at me. I then went on to explain that I would have no choice but to take the matter higher, and that he would likely face pretty stiff punishment. He said he understood. I then asked if he would be alright to continue in the lesson. I didn't want to have to send him out. He seemed calm, and said he would be fine.

I then went to talk to the other boy. He started crying the minute I went into the room. I wasn't buying it though, and didn't take it easy on him. I told him his behaviour was pathetic, and that he had better understand that punishment would be coming hard and fast. I think told him to cool himself down, and re-enter the lesson when he was ready.

As I re-entered the class, I surveyed the damage that had accumulated in my absence. The kids were going ape shit. One group was over by the windows, doing God knows what. I strolled over, and suddenly the group let loose a loud cheer. Then a girl screamed.

"MY SHOE! MY SHOE! HE THREW MY SHOE OUT THE WINDOW!" she screamed. She wasn't upset though; she was just being a little madam. This is the type of girl who just enjoys the attention. She's 13 years old, and cakes makeup on her face as if she were 21; she wears more than I do. Her entire existence centers around how desirable she is to boys, and it is pathetic. She spends all of my lesson mucking about, doing fuck all besides flirting with boys and giving me sass. I knew she was just being dramatic to cause a scene and be a thorn in my side.

I glared at her, but before I could say anything she ran from the room, screeching about getting her shoe. Everyone in the room ran to the window to watch her retrieve it. I spent the entire time trying to get them away from the window and back to their seats, but it was like talking to a brick wall. Instead, I gave up and simply watched them.

When she returned, I asked her to come see me for a minute.

The entire class hushed up. I tried to speak quietly, so they wouldn't hear, but it was pretty pointless.

"****, if I bent down now and tried to take your shoe off your foot, would I be successful?" I asked her.

"No," she said, giving me the 'are you an idiot' look.

"Then why exactly did you let *** take your shoe off you, and then watch him chuck it out the window?" I asked.

"We swapped shoes," she said. She flashed me a look of triumph, thinking she had outsmarted me.

"Why do you feel it is appropriate, in my lesson, to swap shoes with a boy? You were asking for him to do stupid shit with it," I said.

"No I wasn't. I didn't ask him to throw it out the window!" she said, defensively.

"Oh come on, cut the crap. You didn't do anything to stop it," I said.

She scowled at me, and tried to give me attitude, but I was having none of it.

"Shut it, I don't want to hear it. Keep your shoes on your feet, or else get out of my lesson. I've had it with you mucking about my lesson, thinking you can do whatever the hell you want," I said.

She scowled at me some more, but I turned away from her and walked the other way.

That was when the banging started.

The one student who constantly gives me grief, the student who did the shoe swapping and then chucked it out the window, had decided that that wasn't enough. He had to do more to disrupt my lesson. It couldn't just stop at that.

So he started pounding on the wall at the back of the room.

"STOP doing that," I said. "You do realize that wall is a shared wall with Ms Daniel's room...do you really think that's going to be appreciated by her?"

He flashed his cocky grin at me and said, "Sorry, miss."

I turned away from him, clearly starting to get rattled, and went to talk to a group that was actually getting on with the lesson. The minute I turned my back the banging started again.

I wheeled around to face him, but it was too late. The connecting door between my class and the department head's was thrown open. She came in, full steam, and locked onto the boy. He instantly looked the other way, knowing what was coming.

She lit right into him, telling him off for disrupting her lesson. I stood there the entire time, feeling like a total asshole; if I were any sort of teacher, I should have stopped him myself. Instead, she had to stop her lesson, and thus disrupt the learning of a whole group, to come tell my students off. I've never felt so useless in my entire life. She left without saying a word to me. The door slammed behind her, and the echo of it seemed to fill my very soul.

The students instantly started to laugh and joke with the kid who she had lit into. He seemed to be gloating again, now that she was gone.

At this point, I disconnected from myself. All I could think about was how the entire lesson had been one disaster after another. I hadn't had room to breath since it had began. I felt like I was being bombarded from all sides; as if the room were slowly filling up with water, and I was slowly drowning in it. I walked aimlessly down the aisle and over to my desk. I turned to face the room, taking in the scene. Students were standing all about the room, talking, laughing, laying on the desks, over by the windows. Only two groups seemed to be actually focused on work. I stood this way, not moving, for about two minutes. I just stared. My brain was not functioning. All I could feel was the frustration, the embarrassment, the total feeling of helplessness and the lack of control fill me. I felt behind me, without looking, for my chair. My fingers found the arm of it, and I wheeled it under my bottom, sinking into it slowly.

Spinning it around, I faced the door and stared at it a moment. I wasn't even able to process anything. The kids carried on doing whatever the hell they were doing, and I didn't care. I just sat. And then I felt my eyes water, and before I could stop it I was sitting there weeping. It started as a silent stream of tears, but my whole body started so shake, and soon it was coming out of me. I wept and wept, gasping for air.

All the girls rushed over to my desk, circling around me. I think one or two of them wanted to hug me, but they were too afraid of breaking that boundary to do it. They started cooing at me, making sweet speeches about what an amazing teacher I am, and that they love being in my lesson. They all said that it was this one boy. They all said I should have him removed. They all said that without him, the lesson would be 100% better. It was unanimous.

I heard everything they were saying, but I couldn't stop crying. I cried, and I cried. For ten minutes I cried, and for ten minutes they sat huddled around me, their soft words streaming down around me. It felt almost surreal; students comforting the teacher. Speaking to me as if I were the child, and they the adult. I didn't mind though. I let it come, and slowly their words ebbed my tears. I wiped my face, and looked around at them.

The expressions on their faces, on all their faces, was that of genuine concern and support. I forced a frail smile and in an extremely shaky voice I thanked them all. I looked past them for the boy, and did not see him. I think he had slipped out. Good thing, I think. I think the others had made him leave.

The bell rang, and they didn't move. They kept saying really sweet things to me, and I thanked them again and again for their support. The one thing they kept reiterating was that the problem was not me. It was him. They told me what I had to do, and I agreed. I had to do it. I had to refuse to let this kid back in.

The girls slowly filtered out. A crowd was growing outside my door though, and a bunch of heads, of students I don't teach, popped in.

"They are just bullies, miss," they said, "Don't let them get to you. We can't believe they made you cry. They won't live this down..."

I had to laugh at this, weakly, and thanked this random group of students.

It was kind of nice, to get supported by students that I don't even know. It made me feel somewhat vindicated, in that it's not wholly about my being total shit.

I still feel like shit now though. I think it's really hard to bounce back after something like that. I've never in my life lost it like that. I mean, I can't really even describe what happened to me. I wasn't me. I wasn't even a part of me. I feel like the rational part of my brain separated from my body, and I let the raw emotion take control. The tears...I've never cried like that before. It was a soul shattering feeling, to have such a raw cry.

I feel drained even know, hours later.

I should go make something to eat. I am starving.

I'm also going to have a large glass of wine.

Cheers for now.