21
votes
What’s good?
I’ve been on vacation the past two weeks and now that I’m back and I’ve got internet access I have been reading the news and it has been kind of depressing.
So what’s been good? It can be national, local, personal, or whatever you want to share.
In my years on Tildes, I have posted a considerable amount about how unhappy I’ve been in being a teacher in America. When I joined Tildes I was burning out of the career and, for a period, was genuinely considering leaving the field entirely.
My good is that I no longer feel that way.
This year is the best year of my career, and a lot of the anger and resentment I’ve felt towards my job has softened and has allowed the stuff I love about the job to occupy some space in my brain and in my heart again. This year my job gives me joy and fulfillment every single day. My heart swells when I see my students overcoming challenges and being individual examples of developing awesomeness.
I am so. damn. proud. of my students. All the time.
Kids are awesome, and I finally love working with them again. It has been a long time since I’ve felt that — the feeling that got me into the career in the first place.
What changed? The kids? The parents? You?
I do have a particularly good group of kids and parents this year, which makes a huge difference.
The real reason is more complicated and involves some depressing darkness. In the spirit of keeping the thread positive, I'll give people the option to read it below if they want.
Dark stuff (but with a happy ending!)
The main change is that I spent years with a toxic coworker who was openly abusive to me, other coworkers, and students. They were protected by an administrator and my union. They did not complete their work duties so, in the interest of doing right by the kids, I and others (but honestly, mostly me) picked up their slack. I effectively did two jobs for several years while my concerns for the safety and well-being of myself, my colleagues, and my students went unaddressed or dismissed outright.
After a protracted and very stressful battle, the teacher and administrator who protected them no longer have influence in my life. All of this has been going on in the background for me the entire time I've been on Tildes, but I've never talked about it directly due to legal and ethical concerns. However, now that everything is "resolved" (the outcome wasn't fully what I wanted, but I'm happy with what we got) I'm slightly more comfortable being slightly more forthcoming. I know reading about this stuff in the abstract is super frustrating, but I promise I'm providing as much specificity as I can.
If anyone's curious on the timeline, here's an ultra-vague comment of mine from June 2019 where I mention that I first took formal action (and this was after years of informal actions from both myself and others). Nothing, of course, happened as a result and it would be three years later, with things getting MUCH worse, before the problem was addressed.
Teaching is already difficult enough, but between those years and then the hit the job took from COVID, I was in an especially dark place.
Now, though, those dark clouds have fully parted and I'm under completely clear skies. I adore my current team and my current administrators. I am probably in the 95th percentile for teaching jobs in America terms of quality of life. With the darkness gone, I've been able to finally appreciate that.
I used to lie in bed in the mornings and have to convince myself to get out of bed: "You HAVE to go to work today. You cannot NOT go. That is NOT an option." On drives home I would occasionally cry but usually I was just hollow and vacant -- a shell of a person. I would habitually engage in revenge bedtime procrastination because going to sleep meant that I had to go to work "sooner", but staying up kept returning to work at bay for another hour or two or six.
Now, I'm excited to go to work. I love my students. I love my coworkers. I fall asleep much easier. I love that I get to do something that I consider meaningful and important on a daily basis, and I love that I get to have fun doing it. Yes, some parts of it still suck, but some parts of every job suck. It's a lot easier to put up with that now, however, because I'm finally free to actually love what I love doing, instead of having the love extinguished by cruelty and unfairness.
So yeah, that's the change.
Teaching, and life, is much better for me now.
That is fantastic news, I am so happy for you.
Glad to hear things are in a better place for you now.
I had a dark period of life where I constantly engaged in revenge bedtime procrastination too for the same exact purpose. It's a vicious cycle because it ends up adding sleep deprivation on top of everything else. Thankfully those days are gone! :)
A few weeks ago, I had a discussion with my manager and her manager (General Manager of the company). Long story short, my job is getting busier and more complex as the company grows, so my role has been redefined: more hours per week (I only work part-time), and more pay per hour.
All up, that's about a 40% increase in my pay.
After about a decade of struggling, with the low-point being a countdown to homelessness, and the best time being a hand-to-mouth pay-cheque-to-pay-cheque subsistence, watching every dollar... I finally have more money than I need. I'm nowhere near rich or even comfortable, but I can stop worrying about money.
It has been a long 12 years.
It's nice to finally be able to relax about money. I can save with gusto. I've re-commenced some minor regular charity donations. And I've gone on a short-term shopping spree to celebrate (because I can!).
I can even consider maybe possibly renting a place by myself in a year or two. I have a great housemate, but I prefer living alone.
That is fantastic news.
In late summer I posted on here that I came down with Bell’s palsy, paralyzing the right half of my face. Over the course of many weeks it slowly went away, and I’m beyond thrilled to now have my face completely back to normal.
Oh my gosh, that is fantastic news! I am really glad to hear that!
My 3-year-old has reached the 25% milestone on her way to "1000 Books Before Kindergarten". We haven't been doing much of the celebratory aspects of the milestones, but we did talk to a librarian after book number 100 and got an sticker that now proudly adorns our fridge. Not quite the national-level "good", but still fun for us.
One of the things that give me hope for the future is that children these days seem to learn things so much earlier than I remember them. I remember as a young child I was always frustrated with my peers when it came to reading because they were just so slow. Though as an adult I know that the reason why was because my family invested in teaching me phonics at home while the local public schools were barely starting to implement them in lesson plans.
One thing I haven’t really seen as much (largely because I don’t really have much contact with anyone even adjacent to them) is if older children are learning more advanced topics as a result of this early mastering. Are we seeing more kids taking upper level mathematics and philosophy classes?
Editing to rearrange for positivity and spoiler bummers.
I do love the improvements the local school is building towards for mental health and social skills. They have mental health days for kids, and are really approaching anti-bullying well.
Recess was cut to make way for more classroom time. Playdates have replaced kids exploring their neighborhoods and meeting friends in unstructured ways. (related: I hate all the fenced in yards)
Kindergarden is full day, complete with after school activities. Intramural sports replaced pickup games.
We (as a society) cut civics classes and things like shop and home economics for more math and science.
Kids need between 10 and 12 hours of sleep. My kid goes to bed at 7 PM, wakes at 7 AM to make it to school by 8:15 AM. And this is in elementary. I recall seeing a study that teenagers do better with even more sleep, but we push their school day even longer.
I'd almost rather we go in the opposite direction: Reduce schooling to like half days and eliminate the massive summer break. Give kids more time to play in unstructured ways. A four hour day for elementary: 1.5 hr, 1 hour recess/snack, 1.5 hour. Out before luunchtime. But that doesn't jive well with 'school is daycare' need in a world that pushes dual income households.
I like the progress we've made on bullying and other social skills in schools. But I'm concerned that otherwise we're pushing academics too hard on kids that are too young.
The Elementary school mental health days are great, but one that is kinda a sad symptom of a broken system. They also have weekly active shooter drills.....so not feeling great about that. And that all of these elements are contributing factors to the ever increasing mental health crisis.
C'mon, vord, Akir admitted to feeling a bit depressed and so wanted some positivity to focus on... and then you proceed to directly reply to them with a whole bunch of negative things. I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but that's not what this topic is supposed to be about.
You're right. @Akir I'm sorry about that. I've rearranged to hide the negative stuff a bit.
I’ll be honest, I saw your original response and then decided, “nope, I’m gonna sleep on this one.”
One of the major reasons why I posted this thread was to try to get people to think about positive things. Negativity can be poison. We shouldn’t let it.
That's quite a striking contrast with what's reportedly going on the worst schools, along with reports of how badly kids are doing in many schools due to the pandemic.
My guesses: is the variance higher these days? Or do anecdotal reports not give us the full picture?
Yes variance is higher, at least in the US.
Affluent schools get 3D printers and robotics teams. Advanced science classes in middle schools.
Poor schools have to turn the heat off in the winter, and have high schoolers at a 4th grade reading level.
When my kid was two and a half, we would read mostly the same books each night. I always had a stack of new books from the library, but if both of us didn't like the look of a new book we never cracked it open.
One night, we got to a certain page in Scuffy, and he wanted that one page read again, then again, then again, for 20-25 minutes. I must have read that damn page fifty times that night. Turns out he was memorized the entire page.
Shortly thereafter he surprised me by detecting that I had been ad libbing a line in one of his favorite books. The repetition had allowed him to learn to read.
Hopefully you find a balance between reading a bunch of different books to generate a love for reading, and rereading that favorite book for the thousandth time.
My kid ended up learning to read surprisingly early, then losing interest in reading books a few years later.
A combination of cheap, off-patent old-fashioned drugs was exactly what I needed to get a particularly nasty sort of autoimmune disease (somewhere in the territory of systemic sclerosis, RA, and lupus) under control. In the last month, it feels like I've gotten my life back.
As a bonus, the right anti-inflammatory meds seem to have cleared up a years-long cloud of depression. I'm no longer in pain on a daily basis, can sleep through the night, and move with ease. Additional bonus - minimal side effects so far, though I've got to have blood work every couple of months.
I'm looking forward to being a regular on Tildes again, since that was one of the many things I rarely had spoons for over the last year. I just want to say that for anyone who's been on the verge of giving up hope in any sphere, keep trying!
Also, it's been a glorious Autumn here in the northern Midwest U.S. I haven't seen so much color for so long in years, and got some wonderful hiking and photography in. The farmers and vintners are cackling all the way to the bank after a decent harvest.
The local Braver Angels group is meeting with regularity and some signs that it's turning down the political heat among the attendees, though it's too early to tell if it's having any broader impact.
Vaccine technology is awesome.
Huzzah! All good news.
My cancer is a bit more advanced than we first thought, but a bit less advanced than it could be. It's still pretty survivable. Before treatment I was putting a brave face on things (it's a big surgery that's left me without an arsehole and with a permanent stoma) but actually that went really well, and I've adjusted to the stoma and stoma appliances quickly. This sounds weird, but I prefer life with my stoma appliance than life before. I'm not sure I can explain why though. I've just started 4 rounds of adjuvant chemo and that's going well so far.
Well, Darktide looks like it could be just what I need, assuming that Fatshark manages to pick up the ball on putting out regular updates and keeping us all in the loop. Incidentally, Vermintide 2 is currently free to own if you buy it on Steam within the next few days.
I'm a bit afraid of Darktide, to be honest. I got quite hooked on Vermintide 2 during the spring 2020 lockdowns, spending waaaaay too much time with a game that, on paper, should not really interest me at all.
But the game loop is good, and I have great friends to play with.
I joined the recent Darktide beta half hoping that the darker, more labyrinthine levels and the increased shooting gameplay would be too much for my motion sickness, which generally prevents me playing first person games.
No such luck. It's still a great and very satisfying game experience.
Quite looking forward to it!
All the olives I brined off my mom's trees last year are edible!!! I had hot debate with my partner about whether of not I had botched the process. She was convinced because they looked cloudy and brown that they were inedible. I wasn't convinced but didn't want to give anyone botulism so I just squirreled them away. Fast forward to this weekend, we attended an olive brining class paired with olive picking. I brought a jar of my olives asked the instructor if there was a way to check if they were edible. Without hesitating or asking my process he dove his fingers into the jar, popped one in his mouth, and gave a toothy "good job, they taste great!". Turns out they are all fine!
Well yesterday I got to meet some of the fine folks behind the Film Reroll Podcast while they were at Youmacon, and take them out for a few beers. Which was super fun and was totally worth the convention ticket price even though I'm not all that into anime. It was still a lot of fun to see so many people dressed up and having fun though.
The Eagles are undefeated still, which really bolsters the spirits of people in roughly 100 mile radius of Philadelphia. Even if you don't follow sports much, shouting 'Go Birds' randomly on game days is fun.
Me and my family have been doing a lot of litter pickup walks recently. A great way to stay healthy and help our environment.
The local library had a bake and book sale fund raiser. Got a big sack full of books for $10 and $2 worth of baked goods for $10. Worth every penny.... they're setting up a maker lab in the basement.
My friend recently found out that a girl he was hanging out with has a small crush on me. This is good and weird at the same time. Weird because: a couple of months ago after the only time I met her, she told him that I scared her which I took very seriously. My last ex through several discussions made me really aware how girls and women can sometimes live in a parallel world to men where a lot of harmless behaviour that we take for granted can have unintended consequences for them, and can sometimes be abrasive. So I took it to heart that despite my best efforts, I come across as scary. My self-esteem took a hit.
Well, talk about a turn around. It turned out every time he saw her after that she’d ask him about me until he got her to confess that she’s interested in a date. The whole scary bit was just a front/tease. So that’s good.