Author: Pavowski

I am a teacher, runner, father, and husband. I am an author-in-progress. I'm bad at jiu-jitsu. I know just enough about a lot of things to get me into a lot of trouble.

Milestones, or Reflections on Staying Up Past Bedtime On A School Night

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Milestones.

Milestones to the left of me, milestones to the right of me, milestones keep falling on my head.

Shall I count the ways?

The novel is at almost 80%, which means it’s time to start wrapping this thing up like a bad christmas present.  I think the pieces are in place, and despite the twists and turns this thing has taken me on, I can still have the ending that I pictured when I set out on the journey, which is a pretty cool feeling.  Like leaving on a road trip that ends in Seattle and traveling through Arizona instead of Wyoming, but that means I got to see the Grand Canyon along the way, which is something I’ve always wanted to see, so there’s that.  So a pinpoint of light is stabbing through the veil, and like a cartographer’s compass, it’s guiding me home.  A tractor beam pulling me in.  A magnet drawing me toward the finish, as Andre Agassi put it.

One day left in my first year as a high school teacher.  Teaching is a journey in its own right, but considering this is where I saw myself when I started down this road, it’s quite a feeling being here.  Don’t get me wrong, my time in middle school was instructive, but kids at that age are just not a good match for me; I swear I felt myself regressing every day, and I think if I’d spent a few more years teaching at that level, my voice would have undropped and I would have entered reverse puberty, which is totally a real thing that I absolutely did not just this minute invent for the sake of a stupid joke.  Totally.  In seriousness, seeing the seniors I taught this year graduate was a sobering moment that really brings some sense of accomplishment and fulfillment to my career, and the fact that I can even call my job a career is a testament to my wife who pushed me onto this road in the first place.  So, thanks, honey.

Also, one day left in my life as a parent of one.  It’s a rather metropolitan scenario, scheduling the birth of your child, but science does what science must do, and for reasons that probably don’t concern anybody who doesn’t know my wife and I personally, we had a c-section last time and thus must have a c-section this time, and that means we get to pick the day on which Sprout the Second is born.  Assuming she makes it that far, which, as long as she makes it through tomorrow, she has.  I never thought I would be ready to be a father of one, but it turns out not to be nearly so bad as I feared, so the fact that I feel completely unprepared to be a father of two does not daunt me nearly so much.  That said, I know full well that thinking I’m in any way ready for what’s to come is an error of hubristic proportions (yeah, hubristic is a word I just made up, I consider myself a writer now, deal with it).  Sidenote: my writing is going to be completely blown up for likely the rest of the week, if not the rest of my life.  My apologies in advance.

One hundred follows.  If trends continue, I should meet and pass that before the week is out, assuming all my writing doesn’t go over the cliff (which it may well do).  This baffles and astonishes me, because while I like to pretend that I have things to say and an interesting way in which to say them, actually having proof that there are folks out there willing to read my brain droppings (thanks George Carlin) on a regular basis is still a bit of a shock to the system.  I owe a lot of those follows to Chuck Wendig’s Flash Fiction challenges, but I know that some of you out there have discovered me through my unprompted posts about the bizarre and wonderful act of writing, the bizarre and wonderful act of running, and the bizarre and wonderful act of parenting.  However you ended up with your eyeballs processing my wordy bits, thanks for taking the time out.  Knowing I have an audience, no matter how big or small, is a tremendous motivator on those days when I feel like I can’t possibly complete this thing I’ve now nearly finished doing.  However, for the record, you’ll have nobody to blame but yourselves if and when I actually publish this thing.

What else can I say?  It’s way past my bedtime and it’s a rather big day ahead, my last day as a teacher this (academic) year, and my wife will be getting a healthy dose of poking and prodding in preparation for the Lexi landing on Thursday.  That calls for a drink.

Just kidding, I already had a drink, as my punctuation and rambling in this post will attest.  Happy Tuesday.

 

Why Servers Hate Me (Even Though I’m Not a Jerk)

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I get it.

If you live long enough, things start to repeat.  The soundtrack loops, the plotlines and scandals in your life and the lives of those around you begin to sound disconcertingly familiar, and from one moment to the next you find yourself in situations saying, “Oh, sharknado, THAT’S what was going on.”

Having kids is like that, only doubled and viewed through a magnifying glass.

I used to be so judgmental of people with kids.  Oh, how I hated them.  Inconsiderate, self-absorbed people, hauling their litter of rugrats around to make noise and throw tantrums and stomp and throw trash and toys and food while the rest of us are, I dunno, shopping, or trying to enjoy a meal, or generally to partake in any activity that adults partake in without the involvement of toddlers.Read More »

Shorn

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If my typical weekend short story is Flash Fiction, you could call this one Lightning Fiction.  Chuck’s latest challenge is the 100 Word Story.  If you read this site at all, you know that I have a tendency not to scrimp on my words, so saying a lot with a little is a stretch for me.   (For comparison, my introduction is longer than the story itself, at about 180 words).  Nonetheless, I like what I’ve come up with.

Maybe I’ve got hair on the brain.  Mine is fleeing my face as fast as its follicles will carry it; my wife just got hers cut.  Add to that the (unrelated) fact that with our first child we went through a lengthy hospital stay and our second will be arriving any day here… I couldn’t shake off these things clinging to my brain.  If you’re curious, this is not autobiographical, though my wife and I were certainly adjacent to a lot of stories like this one.

At any rate, here are 100 words exactly, title not included.  Don’t read them all in one place.

 

Shorn

Mackenzie disappeared into the treatment wing, escorted by a perky nurse whose name Eloise had immediately forgotten.  Philip offered all the support he could: a sympathetic grimace and a dutiful squeeze of her hand.  She made for the parking lot, not bothering to wipe the tears from her eyes.

**

In the salon, Eloise sat down in the chair and told her stylist what she wanted.

“You’re sure?”

All Eloise could think of were Mackenzie’s frightened eyes, her sobs as the clumps of hair had fallen out.  She bit her lip, nodded, and smiled as the clippers buzzed to life.

My Actual Message to Actual Graduates: Be Good

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Now that I cleared my pipes yesterday with the vent against students who give teachers everywhere heartburn, I can speak with lowered blood pressure and say something perhaps a bit more productive, a bit less offensive, something that might uplift rather than tear down.

This being my first year teaching seniors, in other words my first time being a teacher at the moment when these future humans leave primary schooling behind and go on to do and be whatever they are going to do and be, the gravity of my profession feels a little bit heavier.  I see now in a much more inescapable way just what sort of effect teachers can have on students and, by the same token, what effects students can have on their teachers.  Let’s get one thing clear: I’m not that teacher that’s going to bust a tear at his students’ graduation.  Those teachers are out there, but that ain’t me, and I’m not apologizing for it.  No, even though I will miss <em>some</em> of my students, I am happy to see <em>all</em> of them go, because for some of them they’re past ready to leave the foolishness of high school behind, and for others, high school is past ready for them to move on.  One of my colleagues has a fantastic poster in her room which sums it up nicely: “All students in this class bring happiness.  Some by arriving, others by leaving.”

So you’re graduating.  That’s fantastic.  The parade of seniors past my door the past week or so has felt neverending, and to be honest, I wasn’t (and still am not) sure I’m the kind of teacher who would make an impact in the lives of my students.  Nevertheless, I’ve had several students tell me they loved my class, and even had more than a handful who’ve told me I was their favorite teacher.  Some of that may just be the emotions talking, the great fear bursting from their chests as they roll toward the abyss separating high school from the real world, but it feels good regardless.  While I’ve tried to have some words for each student individually to send them on their way, I’ve said the same two words to every student, and I want to share my reasons for doing so.

“Be good.”

It’s not exactly poetry, and it’s not exactly profound.  But it is something universal that I want for all of my students; yes, even the one I addressed yesterday.

“Be good.”  It’s a funny thing for me to say, because in my classes, I discourage the use of “good” as a modifier.  I don’t accept “It was good” or “he was good” or any other variant because it tells you nothing.  The word “good” is like premixed cement: it’s got the basics of something but by itself it’s effectively worthless.  There are near countless gradations of meaning in the word good, and hundreds of different ways to say what you mean which tell your audience more than the word “good.”

But.  (There is always a but.)  It’s that premixed meaning I’m after, here.  My students — the class of 2014 — are going off into more fields and into more futures than I can conceive of.  College, military, dad’s business, setting off across the country with no safety net — they are doing it all.  And I hope that they do it well.  They don’t have to be the best.  There is no “best.”  But there is always “good,” and I hope that they will strive for it, whatever it means in whatever path they’ve chosen.

There’s also the moral significance of the word: “good” in contrast, of course, to “evil.”  Like light and darkness, as part of the solution or part of the problem, there is a “good”ness or a “bad”ness in everything we do.  And in that sense, I hope my students are good as well; I hope that they are forces for good in the world and that they don’t contribute to the evil in the world any more than they absolutely must.

Finally, of course there’s that verb, “Be”, present tense, imperative.  It’s a command, but more than that, it’s a wish and a hope, for now and for the future.  To be something is not to pretend, to consider, to dream about some far off goal.  It means becoming it, right now, this instant.

So, to the future humans, the graduating class of 2014:

Be Good.

Matriculate This

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Here we are, the last day of school.

Not for all of you, I understand.  Many of you no doubt left school behind many years ago and never looked back.  Me, I got sucked back in and am now helping (?) today’s students to leave school in their rear view mirrors.  High school at least.

It’s a weird feeling.  I’ve been a teacher for three years before this year, but this is my first time teaching students who are actually graduating and actually leaving conventional schooling behind.  But don’t worry, I’m not going to wax rhapsodic or philosophic or catatonic about the joys and mysteries of teaching.

Rather, inspired by a colleague of mine, I’m going to share a letter I’m writing to a student.  Not a specific student.  But rather, I’m writing to that student.  That student that every teacher knows, that student who, in fact, everybody in the building knows, and whom we are not allowed to tell what we actually think of him (or her).

Again, I don’t feel this way for 99% of my students. This one is special.

Buckle up.

Psst.  Hey.  You.  Yeah, you.  I need to tell you something.

You’re graduating today, and that’s fantastic.  Really, I’m happy for you, and that’s not facetiery.  Yes, I just made that word up.  If you can’t figure out what it means, maybe you need to take my class again.  Anyway, hand to my heart, I’m happy for you.  But not for the reason you think.

No, I’m happy because it means I’m done with you.  I know, I know.  You’re done with me, too, and you’re done with all of your teachers and blah, blah, blah.  But I just want you to understand the depths of my feelings on the matter.  See, you think you know about hating somebody.  You’re, what, eighteen years old?  And you think you hate this teacher or that ex-friend or whoever for something they “did” to you.  But you don’t know what that word means.  I’m over thirty.  I’ve lived through enough situations to know the many subtle levels, the onion-peels of unpleasantry that can stink up a relationship between two people.  I know about dislike, about frustration, about disappointment, about mistrust, I know about shock and betrayal, I know about that thing you get with people where you can’t quite put your finger on it but man, does that person grate your nerves, and what I feel for you is none of those things.  Or, maybe to be more fair, it’s all of those things, and the English language just sadly does not have the proper Word for all of that yet.

What I have for you is an adult hatred, and I’m a little embarrassed to say that, because it feels like a failing on my part.  I shouldn’t feel this way about a young person.  I shouldn’t let the actions of somebody with enough experience to fill a teacup get the better of my emotions, but you’ve done it, and for that I suppose you deserve some sort of commendation.

You’ve lied.  I know it and you know it.  You’ve lied to me, to your parents, to your other teachers, probably to the administrators too, about matters great and small, significant and shallow, for ends as lofty as getting extra time on an assignment and as pitiful as running to the restroom.

You’ve cheated.  I know it and you know it.  You’re not as smart as the grade you’ve earned, and I know that you have no idea what half of the words on that last Macbeth quiz even meant, but somehow you aced it and I just can’t prove otherwise.

You’ve manipulated.  I know it and you know it.  All the people you lied to, you lied to manipulate.  Whether to gain some bizarre psychological advantage or whether to just make yourself feel fancy, you managed to convince me to do something I didn’t want to do, whether it was letting you out of class or turning in an assignment late. 

You’ve disappointed me.  You had (have) so much potential, but it’s wasted in you right now, it really is.  You’ve had so many opportunities to do the right thing and chosen the other way, had so many chances to redeem yourself with me and let me down.  I just can’t take it anymore.

You’ve betrayed me.  Thanks to your lies, there was a time when I had your back and you didn’t know it.  A time when I put myself out there for you and stuck up for you, and you made me feel like a fool for it.

All of that’s bad enough, but you know what the worst part is?  The fact that you think it’s cool.  Even today, you came up to me and talked to me like we were old pals, you had the nerve to ask me a favor.  Pardon me for laughing in your face.  I just couldn’t help myself.

But all of that Sharknado between you and me?  It’s okay.  I’m angry with you, I’m furious with myself for letting you get the better of me, but it’s okay, because it’s passing.  Like a kidney stone, I’m pissing you out to flush you.  And when you cross that stage, we are done.

All of it means nothing.  The lies you told, the disappointments, the betrayals of trust, it’s all like so many mosquitoes trapped in amber.  Because you’re going into the real world now.  And when you try that Sharknado in the real world, it’s going to rebound on you harder than you can ever imagine.  You’re going to say the wrong thing to the wrong guy and get your asgard punched through a wall.  You’ll try to manipulate your boss at work and you’ll get fired in a heartbeat.  You’ll cheat your boss or you’ll cheat your wife or your friend and you’ll lose your job or your relationship or your last friend.  The world is not high school, and it’s going to be a rude awakening for you.

If I could torpedo one kid, if I could wave a wand and stop you from graduating, if I could blow up your life and your plans, I would do it.  I’d stand with my finger over the button, watching you squirm, beg, and plead, and I’d push it with relish and gusto.  But I can’t and I won’t.  Not for the reasons you think; not because I’m afraid of losing my job, not because I don’t have the authority.  It’s because I have integrity.  I know that’s another word you don’t understand because you don’t have it and can’t even conceive of it.  But it means I have a sense of personal responsibility, I have a sense of right and wrong, I have care and concern for the way my actions affect the world around me.  By whatever crooked means, by whatever disingenuous contrivance, you have earned your graduation and I wouldn’t stand in its way.  I can watch you go, safe in the knowledge that even though you won this round, your comeuppance is not far off.  Don’t know that word either?  Yeah, I thought not.

But there’s one last thing I want you to know.  As you look around yourself on this day, you’ll notice a lot of your classmates smiling, laughing, crying.  You might smile and laugh too, but not for the same reasons.  See, this has all been one big joke for you, and now it’s over, and the crowd is going home and going on with their lives, and you’ll have nobody left to tell your jokes to.  But if you look my way, you might just see me smile back for you one last time.  And that smile will be genuine.  Because this is the last time I have to see you.  And that fills me with a buoyant, radiant joy.

Have a nice life.

I feel better. Happier programming will return tomorrow. And in all seriousness, congrats to the class of 2014. I’ll miss most of you.