I am very tired.

Please tell me what to do with my life.

I do this thing wherein I get all excited about molding young minds…about helping uninspired souls find their song…about having a steady job…and I decide I need to be a teacher. A few weeks/months in, I remember that I’m not, indeed, Mr. Holland, and they don’t even want me to be. Nor does the school system.

It’s just not a matter of walking in and rhapsodizing about my favorite poetry. It is a matter of walking into the classroom and ignoring:

• the paper wads on the floor and in the air
• the cuss words being thrown around/about me
• the aroma of bad hygiene and Axe
• the fact that the decorations I spent my own money on are, once again, ripped or missing
• the migraine-inducing level of noise

in order to then:

• ask several times that they remain in their seats while I take roll and make sure I get it in by ten minutes past the bell because that’s all it’s going to take to solve the problem of truancy in Metro schools
• beg, stoically, for silence–or just a dull roar–while I explain the first concept or activity
• repeat said explanation. Several times.
• be interrupted during said repetitions, necessitating more repetitions, so that students can borrow pens (also bought with my own money) and/or paper (ditto).
• call security to come remove a student who has just stabbed another student in the arm with a pencil (yup–happened yesterday).

I could go on.

I’m not trying to create some sort of martyrdom for myself. Honestly? I’m not that great of a teacher. A lot of my classroom problems are my own fault–my lack of a “presence,” organization, consistency, etc. The enthusiasm for words and ideas you see here on the blog? It doesn’t often make it into the classroom as I either struggle to get the words out in the first place or eventually just assign something and tune them out.

I just want to teach.

And, frankly, I don’t really want to do that anymore. I’m just tired of it. I’m just tired, period. I want to come home from work and not have to turn down dinner invitations–or feel guilty when I’d rather just sit on the couch and watch “House” instead of grading or planning.

I believe–so very genuinely–in teaching in theory. Just not in practice. For me. I’m over it. I know I keep doing this–quitting teaching, then missing it, then going back to it–but this will be the last time.

What do I mean by “this”? Dunno. I am NOT quitting my job again, at least not anytime soon. I’m just realizing that there is more I want to do with my life and limited skill set, and I’d like to figure out what that is. I just know I don’t want to teach for much longer, and that the next time I leave the profession, I don’t plan on returning to it on a full-time basis ever again. The dream, of course, is the coffee shop, but that’s at least a few years away, if not a retirement dream. The fond hope is marriage and babies and cool SAHMship. That’s far–if not never–away. And I still haven’t figured out how to be a homemaker without a husband. Because that would rock.

I learned on my job search a couple of years ago that I am simply not marketable. It was a time of doubt that I still haven’t completely risen above. Besides the wonderful inspiring reasons (which are valid and I stand behind on some levels still, so help me), it is that doubt in my ability to do anything else that partially drove me back into the classroom.

Things I can do: write (prose-type stuff–I’m not too hot with the creative writing), copyedit/proofread, type pretty fast, and make AMAZING steamed milk foam for cappuccinos. Degrees I have: B.A. and M.A. in English, teaching certification for the state of TN; let’s not go into the degrees I’ve started but not finished (and no, I don’t have it in me to go back to school in addition to teaching, at least not right now).

What can I do with that? Every job interview, if I got a call back, always resulted in “you’re overqualified and underexperienced.” I want to use my abilities on my job and feel at least a meager percentage of fulfillment and purpose; I’d also like to think I could grow and evolve. Right now, though? I’d be happy to just clock out of a job and REALLY clock out.

(And to actually be able to afford the Wii I just put on the credit card–but that’s another blog post.)

Well anyway, underlying all my whining is still a gratitude that I have a job. I am thankful, literally every day, that when I step out my door in the morning it’s Nashville that I greet and that I have actual friends and family just a drive across town away. I haven’t forgotten what last year’s sojourn in The Wasteland cost me, and how glad I am to be back in civilization. It’s SO good to be here…I just can’t help but think of things I’d rather be doing here.