Let's Get Personal.

Salvete,

Something one hears about work is: Keep your personal life and your work life separate.

I have always prided myself on being one of those teachers who never takes work home. I tell my students, "Work is work, and home is home." Some teachers grade at home over a glass of wine--or something stronger--and I have always imagined that if I did that, by the end of the evening, everyone would have A's. In your dreams, students.

On the other side of leaving papers at work to be graded, I also try to leave emotions at home to be forgotten until I walk back in the door to my charming abode around 4 o'clock each day. In my last post, I discussed being ON at work, so that one wears one's teacher hat around the kids. My particular metaphorical teacher hat looks something like a fedora--very cool--with some weird feathers and maybe a music box attached. The aura I try to portray around the children is quirky, organized, and interested in them. Quirky I am. Organized I also am. Whether or not I am interested in them is less certain. Either way, they generally see me as a personable and forgiving adult who will never rage at them. I may get serious for a few minutes while I discuss their bad behavior, but I immedately snap back into happy-go-lucky Magistra as soon as the berating is over.

Such snappage leads to one or more students a year suggesting I become a professional actress. In my more desperate moments, I entertain the notion, but then remember how actresses do not really get summer/winter vacations unless they are very good at what they do, or insanely hot, and I do not imagine myself to be either to the necessary degree.

Digression ended.

All this to say, lately I have been having a problem keeping the two separate. I feel that I am coping with the seepage in an unhealthy way. Some stuff is going on in my non-work-life, and has quietly leaked into my work-life thoughts. How do I deal? I put all of my ON energy into my kids during passing period or direct instruction at the start of class. Then, I launch them into whatever activity I have engineered for them that day. Do not misunderstand me here. The activities that I make require cooperation, critical thinking, sufficient homework, and plenty of reading and writing. However, once they have embarked on their activity, I sit at my desk and do a whole lot of nothing.

Papers get graded, things get done, but I feel that I am using work as a time to process all of the non-work things.

It is wearing me out. Before, I had work wearing me out at work, and home wearing me out at home. Now, I have work and home wearing me out at work. There, I compensate by ignoring my kids for the majority of the class period, which in turn makes me feel guilty. At home, I also compensate by systematically using every dish and leaving them all dirty, in addition to refusing to fold my clothes. Problem? I think so.

Anyone who knows me well knows that when I let things get messy, it is time to worry.

Solution? Quit work or quit life. Priorities! Just kidding. But I will figure something out. Until then, thank God my kids are really well behaved.

Valete,
Magistra