Catching up

How quickly 8 weeks can fly by! So much has happened since I last wrote one of these. I'll just cover the basics of what’s been happening, and this will still be long.

Antoinette and I have broken up again – as of this past Monday. This makes about 40 times in 27 months since we met. I don’t think we’ll get back together this time. Even though we love each other, we’re just too different in some significant values and ways of being in life. We keep clashing over those things. I'm grieving about the loss. I am so grateful and so indebted to her for all she’s done for me, and there were some wonderful parts of our relationship. It just didn’t work for us to be a couple. I'll probably write more about this later in another message.

My job at Los Alamos National Labs that I was so excited about only lasted a couple of days instead of the 6 weeks they promised. They kept having delays because the computers didn’t work and because things didn’t arrive on time. Then, by the time they called me to start working again, I already had something else.

I did a one-evening (and night) temp job in August helping a gallery move artwork out of the Eldorado Hotel and back to the gallery after an auction. I applied for quite a few other jobs and even got interviews for a couple. One of them may still be a possibility as a part-time supplementary job.

But then the school year finally started again, and I took a 2½ week assignment at Capital High School teaching English and Communications. They were in the process of hiring a new teacher, and I was to substitute until they found one. I started that the day before school began (mid-August here in Santa Fe). The day school began I started my first class, and at the end of it another sub came in to talk with me. He said the good news was that I still had a job; the bad news was that they were changing my assignment. He was taking over the classes I thought I was going to teach and applying to be the regular teacher. (He did get the job.)

So, I was switched to another long-term sub job replacing a teacher who would be going on maternity leave about the first of September. We were going to co-teach until then, and I was going to learn what she was doing. She was to be out until the first of December. The classes are freshman AVID/English, sophomore AVID/English, and English 1 (supposedly for freshmen, but there are more juniors in it than freshmen – all kids who have failed English before). The school is on a block schedule, so they only have 4 periods each day, and one of them is my prep period. The important thing I needed to learn about was teaching AVID (more about what that is below). I had never heard of AVID before then.

I like Channell (the regular teacher). She’s a great teacher, even though she’s only 25 and this is only her second or third year of teaching. We got to work together for 3 days, and I was just beginning to pick up how she does things and what AVID is all about. Then on Saturday, August 20th her daughter Nevada decided to be born a couple of weeks early. I showed up the following Monday morning expecting to mostly observe Channell, only to learn that I was on my own. She hadn't taken my phone number home with her because she didn’t expect to have her baby so soon.

And so I’ve been teaching those classes since then and will be until Channell returns about November 20 (earlier than expected because she left earlier than expected). I love it and have been getting great feedback. The principal comes around to all the classes every once in a while and evaluates each of the teachers. On September 7th she observed me and wrote:

“Students engaged – large group reading, discussion with ties to grammar and punctuation. Mr. D – You are doing an awesome job! The students are engaged in the instruction and you’re making it fun. Thanks for your professionalism and follow-through.”

I appreciated that. Then this past Thursday evening we had our annual open house for parents. At the assembly in the auditorium before everyone went to their kids’ classrooms to meet their teachers, she (Darlene, the principal) said that she wanted to specially recognize 2 of the teachers. I was the first one she mentioned. She said that I had stepped in on short notice and that the classes “haven’t skipped a beat.” It feels good to be getting that kind of recognition.

After the open house they had a barbecue. While we were standing in line waiting to get our food, I talked with Darlene for a bit and told her that I'm applying to the alternative teacher training program at Santa Fe Community College to become a regular teacher because I'm so excited about the AVID program and want to continue teaching it. She told me to come to her when I’ve started that, and they’ll give me a job. In NM I can get a provisional teaching license as soon as I’ve started the training program as long as I meet some other requirements. I'm investigating that now.

Briefly, AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) is a college preparatory (and life success) program for kids who want to go to college and don’t really have the background (and in most cases, the grades) for it. Few of them have family members who’ve been to college. Most of them have had fairly mediocre grades up until they join the program. Many of them don’t know much about what possibilities are open for them. And this program takes them and teaches them what it takes to succeed and encourages and pushes them to do it. As the teacher, I'm really a combination teacher, coach, cheerleader, advocate, taskmaster, and surrogate father for the kids. The results from AVID are remarkable. Did anyone see the 60 Minutes segment on AVID? One example from one of my classes: a young man from Mexico (most of my kids are Mexican Americans or some kind of Hispanic ethnically; all but a few of them speak Spanish as their first language) was getting C’s and D’s before AVID. Now he gets A’s and B’s. Nearly all of the kids who go through AVID actually do go to college.

I'll write separate messages about the AVID program and about the schools in Santa Fe because there’s quite a bit more that I have to say about them, and I don’t want this one to go on too much longer.

In early August I had to move out of the apartment I was subletting for the summer from a teacher who was away working on her master’s degree. (She works at Capital High School, too, and now we’re colleagues.) I found an apartment-sharing situation with a guy named Richard. He works as a singer and waiter at La Casa Sena Cantina. Antoinette and I saw him perform last winter when we went there for dinner and the show. I'm crowded into my room and am looking forward to the time when I can comfortably afford to live alone again (or with my romantic partner, which would be even better).

My phone number remains the same, as does my mailing address – the P.O. box. If you know me personally and want either (or both) of those, let me know.

Antoinette and I have both been having dental problems. She had to have a couple of wisdom teeth removed, and because she’s hypersensitive to the anesthetic, they had to put her completely out to do it. Consequently, I took a day off teaching to be with her and take care of her. In November she has to have another dental surgery procedure done. I feel terrible conflict about not being there for her for it because of how she was there so much for me during my major problems last winter.

As for me, I'm having some pain similar to what I had last winter, but not as severe. The dentist doesn’t know why. There’s no apparent reason for it. One possibility is that it’s a nerve problem. Some of you know that I had Bell’s palsy 10 or 12 years ago, and this could be something related to that. We shall see.

I bought a used desktop computer at a great price awhile back. It came totally infected with Trojans, viruses, worms, spyware, and every other kind of malware possible. I'm still working on clearing all of that off of it. Part of the reason I got it is that my tiny hard drive (6 GB) on my laptop is full. The combination of those 2 problems has interfered with my computer activities significantly. Hopefully, I'll be back to something like normal soon.

So, there you have a quick summary of the past 2 months. What’s new with you? Or, as the kids say, “Whassup?”

Michael