Quitting Season: Teaching Thoughts in Late Winter
It’s quitting season in the school building. That might sound strange, but educators know exactly what I mean.
February is a hard time to be a teacher. The shine has been off the school year since about October — “just wait until next year” is as common in school buildings as it is in sports stadiums. We usually get a bump in morale from the holiday break, but January often swallows that good feeling whole. It’s dark. It’s cold. Spring Break is nowhere in sight and everyone is just a little tired of each other.
This is the time when even the most dedicated teacher can dream of other jobs.
Some of us look to other schools, or maybe other districts. Many of us begin to explore what it would be like to get out of the classroom. We search job postings, thinking about a promotion into administration or consulting. Some of us think about getting out of the game altogether. We look to the corporate world and brush up our resumes. This is no easy task — it’s difficult to translate the skill “Designed Seating Charts for 38 Middle Schoolers, Half of Which Have Special Accommodations.” But we do our best.
I feel these doldrums every year right about now. But I’m not working on my resume. Here’s why.
I used to ride my bicycle to work, and in the winter months I would start my day in the cold and the dark. Because I live in Georgia, the weather was never prohibitive, but February was still a difficult month for me to keep cycling. Maybe February is a difficult month for everything.
Once I was flying down a long, straight hill, one that led to a bridge across the Chattahoochee River and a reciprocal climb up the other side. A bit of a river valley, right in the city. Even on clear days I would often go through a small spate of fog here, caused by the relatively warmer river pushing off moisture into the cold air. This particular day, though, was unlike anything I had ever seen.
As I rode down the hill, easily cresting 35 mph, I saw ahead of me a swirling mass of fog that more resembled a cloud than anything you would expect to see on the ground in Atlanta. Before I had time to so much as think, I was in the middle of it, still riding at top speed on tires less than an inch thick. The world went quiet and all I could see was my blinking headlight reflecting off the whorls of white in front of me.
I won’t lie — my first thought was of Dracula.
It might have been stupid, but I didn’t stop moving. The road was straight, and I had ridden it thousands of times before. I could easily imagine the river gliding away beneath me; even though I couldn’t see a thing, I knew exactly where I was. I sped forward just as I did every other morning, propelled into motion by my momentum off the hill.
Just when I might have begun to get scared — thoughts of Dracula overtaking all common sense — I burst out of the fog back into the dawning light.
So it is with working in a school. I’ll teach my way through February not necessarily because I can see where I am going, but because I have taught my way through so many classes before. I might be riding blind, but I will keep pushing one foot over another as I pedal. I will squeeze every ounce of momentum off the hill as I ride through the dark, and I will know that this, too, shall pass.
It’s quitting season, for sure, and I feel that in my bones. But I’m not looking anywhere else. I know that soon I’ll be out of the fog and back into the light.
After all, February is eventually followed by March. And, somewhere off in the distance, by summer. In the end we’ll even get to next year.
Just wait until next year.
