Goldfish

Yesterday with fourth hour actually went quite well, but today was rough once again. My energy yesterday was great, even though my voice was shot. I put forth energy and they gave it right back.

Today, apparently my energy said, "We have to get through this, kill me now."

I felt absolutely terrible after fourth hour, like Lizzy was just super disappointed in me, like I was ruining their chances at festival, just awful. I was a mess until partway through fifth hour, when I really was able to think back to yesterday meeting with my therapist.

"Make yourself thankful for the ridiculous circumstances that don't happen," was along the lines of what she said. Essentially, the students aren't dead, so it's a success. And middle schoolers have 30-second memories, so by tomorrow they won't care what I did today.

"They're basically goldfish," I decided, and really decided to make that my frame of mind if I completely crash and burn. "They've got 30-second memories, and by the end of the day it's a miracle that they're even alive."

It's been a really rough week in general, just seeing the messed up administration, and dealing with criticism. For me, it's hard to remember that I am still just a student, that it's okay for me to not be perfect and to make mistakes. It's especially difficult to be okay with that when we've got festival coming up, so I'm glad Lizzy and I were able to talk about that today.

My mom had lunch with her art teacher friend from one of her former schools. When my mom told her about my rough week and how personally I've been taking these struggles, she said, "Someone really needs to tell her that student teaching is awful and she can't base her decision to teach on that. You need to teach at least two years before you can decide that."

It's a tremendous weight off my shoulders to hear that. I heaved a sigh of relief when I knew that it is actually okay to really struggle during student teaching. So many people have gone through awful student teaching experiences and come out fine on the other end, so I think it's going to be okay.

So on my last day of classes before our week-long mid-winter break, I just need to remember that they are goldfish, and it will be a success if they are still alive at the end of the day. Here we go.