I've spent the past 10 minutes staring into space, waiting for the day to come to an end, trying to collect myself, breathe, something.

It was one boy's first day back from suspension. He had two suspensions in a row. He wasn't cooperating with me at all. I asked him if he wanted to be written up and suspsended again. "Yeah." "You do?" "Yeah. I don't care."

Then, two boys were throwing a ball of paper. When they saw I spotted them, about three or four of them starting shifting the blame, trying to convince me of who started it and who didn't throw it at all. I told them I didn't care, I just wanted it to stop. Then I asked one boy to pick it up and throw it away for me. He said "No way!" and told me to shut up. "Excuse me?" He repeated himself and added some profanity. I stayed calm, somehow, and said, "Ok, slow down and think about this. You can either pick up the piece of paper and throw it away for me, or get in a lot more trouble than it's worth." He finally got up, and I thought it was over. Just as I began to teach again, he said, "Fine! But if you ever tell me to pick up some paper again, I'll slap you in the head! I will." With that, the asst. principal was called.

Then there's another kid (same class) who moved himself right next to the teacher's desk in the back of the room yesterday. He was acting extremely shady, looking at her desk, throwing things behind it and disappearing for a while, and so on. I calmly told him that if the teacher tells me anything is missing from her desk, I will assume he is at fault. I was only trying to teach the kid some above-reproach common sense. "Are you calling me a thief?!?" Now, for the past two days, he has spent each period pouting, giving me death stares, and complaining to everyone about how I called him a thief (loud enough for me to hear, of course), and about how his mom will mess me up (and I've met her, she could.)

After all this happened, I had to write a pass for someone. I was shaking so bad I could hardly write. The "thief" told me that I looked like I was about to cry. And I was.

It turns out the kid that wants to be suspended again showed up 20 minutes late to his 8th period class. When the teacher called the asst. principal to see what he should do with him, the kid dropped his things and ran out of the room.

This is just three boys in one class. We aren't even counting the incessant talking, refusal to work, requests for pencils, bathrooms, drinks, nurses, A's, free-time, "something that isn't boring," and the many other problems.

Then, I just got a phone call that one of my homeroom students was five steps away from the top of his staircase, and he threw his laptop (yes, in my school, each student has their own laptop, which is a brilliant plan, as this story illustrates.) the rest of the way to the top of the stairs. A teacher saw him and confiscated it.

All this and it's only the 2nd day back.

I've been wondering lately if I haven't been clear enough in telling people about my job. My old roommate Kyle came to visit Erica and I the week before Christmas. It was great to see him. I was talking about my job and he asked, "So, do you enjoy it?" I thought about it for a minute and said, "No. Not really." He said, "Well, like, I enjoyed my studies at college, but there were definitely plenty of times I didn't enjoy it throughout my four years. Is it like that?" Without thinking this time, I said, "No. It's more that I am completely miserable and wonder what in the world I am doing, but then some days I see the value of it and every once in a while I enjoy myself and there are times where I like these kids. But on the whole, I pretty much hate it." He looked stunned.

I guess when I'm asked about it and, I simply reply as I usually do, "Well, it's been a challenge," it doesn't very well communicate what's really going on.

I have to wonder if people really want to know what's going on. The times when I am brutally honest, I get some pretty surprised looks, as if they were just asking to make small talk, expecting me to say "fine" and continue with "how's work for you?" or "beautiful weather we're having today, isn't it?"

And there are always some kids that give you a small sense of hope, like one boy who just stopped by to see how he could bring up his grade. (Everyone says they're coming by after school. Few actually do. They all wait until the last day of the marking period and then come protesting and begging.) I gave him a quiz that he missed and he politely asked me to grade it for him right away. I did. I asked him what he thought of class this afternoon (he's in the same class as these other guys.) He said, "It was ok." I said, "But how do you think it went?" He said, "Bad for you." I agreed. I asked him for suggestions. "It's not your fault. It's the class. They just won't stop talking when you're trying to teach." I love this kid because he always pauses and then asks thoughtful, personal "when-you-were-my-age" questions. Those are good questions to ask. And that's what he did: "Mister...When you you were young, like my age, did you always think that you wanted to be a teacher?" "Yes, actually, I always wanted to be a teacher." "Did you think it was going to be hard or easy? Like, watching your teachers teach, what did you think?" "I thought it would be easy, at least easier than this." He nodded his head thoughtfully then said goodbye. I thanked him for taking the time to come in.