To Everything There is a Season

Here's the good news: 1. I am an English teacher! I'm going to be teaching 6th and 7th grade starting August 22nd! 2. Mikayla and her best friend Gabby have been accepted to Providence Hall! (It's a charter school, so it can be tricky to get in.) 3. I won't be teaching Mikayla. It hurts Mikayla's feelings that I'm not fond of the idea of being her teacher. This is the scenario I see in my head: ME (acknowledging her raised hand): Yes, Mikayla? KAYLA: Hi, Mom/Janae. Should we tell everyone about the time you dated the guy who...(fill in the blank) or Remember when you... (insert another anecdote in which I did something weird.) ME: Go in the hall, Kayla. (Kayla stomps out.) 4. I have finally finished my scoping course! For those of you who, like me, have lived your lives not knowing what scoping is, it is a job where an individual takes the steno from a court reporter, translates it into English and corrects the punctuation and such before returning it and getting paid. Sure, it took longer than I was hoping and sure, I haven't made a red cent from it yet, but I HAVE FINISHED IT. Now to market myself. How can I say that without sounding like a hooker, I wonder? 5. I managed to go on a 5.2 mile hike without seriously injuring myself or the poor man who asked me to go with him. It's like this: I feel like I should have a dog. I feel like it's what happy, well-rounded people do. The only problem is, once I get a dog, I realize how happy I had been without one. That's what camping/hiking is like for me. I want to like camping. I want to have a closer relationship with nature, but then when I get out there, I realize how happy I had been keeping the relationship professional. 6. My children are healthy and happy. They fight. They seem to fight a lot. I'm counting down the days to when school starts again; however, I am assured by exhausted veterans who have been through this that it is normal and I will have retained a reasonable amount of my sanity by the time they are adults. 7. I am starting to feel like I am not riding the roller coaster from hell anymore. This is good. I'm not a fan.