With one year of teaching on my belt, I was ready to tackle a new year. Well, almost ready. The strange thing about a year-round school format is, we end one year in early August and start a new one a few weeks later. The body and spirit do not quite have a true chance to regroup. In my case, there were 2 things happening that set the 2003-04 year on a bad footing.
The first was my apartment having a leaky water heater. It got my floor pretty wet, as well as attracting flies. I'd been there only a year and already there were problems.
The second was a bit bigger. I'd had a sort-of regular thing going with a woman named Treasa for several months. Right before the new year began, she got engaged to another person. Not that I had expected the relationship to get to that point, but it was still a crusher. Timing can really suck!
The result of both those events was my lack of psyched up first-day, actually first week, energy. However, it came back, and I had a pretty good class. The standout student was an energetic little guy named Christian, who happened to be Treasa's nephew. He reminded me a lot of me at that age...therefore he drove me nuts at times.
That year we were finally using a basal reading series and were quite excited over the implementation of it. The 1st grade team was also sent offsite to a literacy training once a week. That was fine, except that if a sub didn't take the class, we were called back to school. Former 3rd grade teacher Heidi had joined our team and was a welcome cheery addition, while Christy moved to Kindergarten. Jennifer P became Jennifer O in September. I attended the wedding with Treasa as my date, but just as friends. Apart from all that, the year went about as usual, which meant utter chaos at all times. I also tutored a couple days a week after school, which brought a little more money.
I kept attending the Friday happy hours, although they came less frequently that year. On one of them I caught sight of 2 co-workers passionately kissing as I headed for my car. 12 years later, it's still an image hard to shake, but those were strange times.
Also in this year, I switched to a new track, which meant different vacay sets. The best one was the first, which lasted pretty much all of November. After another dismal parent conference turnout and another whipped-cream intensive pie-throwing booth, I set out for California. First Santa Rosa, then down to San Diego. I was actually away for most of the break.
It is tough to say what made this year so memorable...probably it was not so much the in-class business as my free time dating. I met several women that year...many of them were 1-time dates, others were a bit longer. One in particular was Gigi, whom I was "steady" with for the first few months of 2004, to use a 50s term. Another briefer one was named Indy in November of 2003. Both of them couldn't quite get why I couldn't get more into the relationships. I was just trying to enjoy life outside of work for a change.
Another distraction was going to the gym a few times a week. Earlier in the year I saw the girth and needed to get it down. I had a trainer and that kept me in check. By Christmas, I was looking pretty good.
However, the myriad of women that I met that year was taking its toll on my sense of self-worth. I was 31 and having much more experience with women than I ever did in Santa Rosa. The time between dates was filled with a lot of lonely evenings at home. A pressure was building by summertime.
The year's end was more positive than the beginning. I was really sad to lose that group, but was even more troubled by another event. Our principal Teddy was making changes here and there and decided to move me from 1st to 5th grade. While I observed a few teachers in 5th, it still didn't prepare me for what was coming.
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