I don't remember the time when I decided I would teach after college. I don't remember the logic behind it or why exactly I chose it, except it seemed to make sense in comparison to sitting at some desk, working for a cause, because how would that actually connect me with the cause and make me feel as if I was making some difference? If anything, that's what I remember most about the decision I made to teach, not wanting to sit at a desk and hope and wish but rather, see things change on the ground and have the chance to witness at least a couple kids' growth over the course of a year.
I've come a long way from that now and mired down in the self-pity and almost despair that comes from being a first-year teacher. Confused, arrogant and helpless at the same time I flounder trying to find ways to make my life easier and seeming to just waste more time. I wonder how my kids would do if they had a different, more experienced teacher. When I get evaluations that aren't good I question myself and my entire ability to perform in the teaching profession. I've never thought about leaving but I know at once that I need a firmer grip hold to grasp, knowing where I'm going next FROM where I've been. And I don't know if I know where I've been. I've been floundering, I've been wishing, I've been doing the same things in an attempt to achieve different results, and I'm afraid of trying new methods now because I know they might fail and they might now work. But if I don't have faith in them, how will my kids? I expect them to believe in something that I don't even believe in?


 My classroom has to be a place of dreams. It has to be, because I am a dreamer. However practical and pragmatic I've grown to be, I'm still a dreamer at heart and always will be. And it has to reflect that and encourage that in a practical way. It's all really a game of attachment, I think. I'm scared of saying, "I am this, I am a teacher," and then failing at that because what does that mean? Who really wants to let anybody down? The real reason I became a teacher was because of how I felt when I was in school. I didn't like it and I didn't feel like many people understood me. Yet when I was able to succeed, when I was able to love certain subjects or certain things, I started to fly and from then on out achieved success. I know I have to be more patient with myself in terms of giving it time to become better. I cannot become a master teacher overnight. I have to release the pressure. It's hard not to want to be better though. Understanding, what's at stake....it's deep man. It goes really deep.