School's Out, Really Out

 I have always liked the cyclical nature of a school year: the excitement of the beginning, the drag of mid-year, the sweetness of the year coming to a close.  It feels very normal and I know what to expect and that each school year I will start off tanned and happy and relaxed and end each year tired and kind of fluffy and ready for a break.  Sometimes, though, there are surprises within the cycles. Things like global pandemics, or new leadership, or district initiatives.  Sometimes, I am more excited for the end of the year than the beginning or more sad at the end than I anticipated.  There is a constant amidst the change and it is comforting.  This year, though, I am throwing a real wrench into the works; I am saying goodbye to a job I love, with colleagues I think of as family, and I am leaving.

Oh, I must have a new job, you are thinking. Well.  Not yet.  But I will.  Am I crazy, you are asking?  Maybe.  I have never left a job without having another job lined up, mostly in place, and ready to go.  Would I be shocked, horrified, and completely anxiety-ridden if one of my own kids did this?  Yes. 100%.  But I am not a kid.  I am an adult and there are very good reasons for leaving, even if it is hard to leave.

I have applied to over 100 jobs on LinkedIn and various sites trying to reinvent myself as a designer, a trainer, an HR professional in some capacity.  I was hoping for a remote job with lots of money.  About rejection 85, I started to remember, and was reminded by sweet students sad about the year being up, what a good teacher I am.  That what I am doing is important, that the connections I make with kids help them and fuel me.  All of the jobs I looked at had some sort of teaching aspect to them; it is what I am drawn to. I can think about other jobs and I can wish that I made more money. I know what I do best is teach.  I feel pretty confident that I will be able to get a new teaching job and start the cycle of the school year again, just in a new place.

My person, who I have mentioned before but not often because he is a private person, has moved and I am going to move too.  And we are going to live together and teach wherever and have a life together outside of Chicago in Naperville, IL.  When we left to drive him up there last week, we laughed and laughed about how neither of us had a job or even a confirmed place to live.  We firmed up the apartment when we got there and the jobs will come too.  The important part is that we laughed on a long road trip with a howling cat.  We laugh a lot.  He is very funny, I am hilarious, and we find humor in the weirdest things.  He is so many things and my best friend and yes, of course, I am going to move to a very cold place with bad traffic and some very bland food if it means we are together.

There are worse places to move.

It is hard to leave my kids, even though they are up in Dallas and will be for the foreseeable future.  Mom-guilt is real but I remind myself that they are 22 and 20 and they are about to start their own lives too.  And that I am still their mom no matter where I live.  It is also hard to leave the school I have been at for eleven years.  Walking out of my classroom felt surreal.  I left a lot of things on the walls because it made me too sad to take them down. Sorry to the next teacher who moves in there.  I love a lot of the people I worked with, liked most of the rest, and compiled  a few into my nemeses pile.  They watched my meteoric rise from library to teacher to coach and accepted me in every new position.  They helped me get my own kids through high school there.  

So while I will not be having my usual summer adventure based on trips to CO, I will have an even bigger adventure getting ready to move. I have lived in Texas longer than I lived in Buffalo.  No, I am not ready for a Chicago winter.  It was 65 and rainy when I left there yesterday and I thought “Brr!”  I am nervous, I do wish I already had a job lined up, or that I could tuck my giant, grown kids up under one arm and make them go too, but mostly, I am excited!  I am ready to start the school-year cycle at a new school. I am ready for a real fall with crisp air and leaves that change color.  And I am really ready to be there with my person as we acclimate to living up north and laughing together while we do.