The Day Before

Yesterday was the day before the last day of school.  

It was hot.......... so hot the vets were on the radio warning folks not to walk their dogs on the pavement because they might burn their paws.....so hot the weather people and doctors and all manner of health officials were warning people to stay inside and drink lots of water.....so hot that the minute you stepped outside your clothes stuck to you like they had been vacuumed bagged on .......... so hot that the 6 ice cubes I put in my glass of water melted - completely and totally - before I finished downing the water..... so hot you could see and feel the heat rising off the ground ..........so hot you didn't want to even move ......

It was that hot! 

Heat has a way - this much heat anyway - of bringing out the worst in people.  I watched a mother and son get into a fight on the street corner - it came on sudden like - and escalated into a whole lot of arm waving and stamping of feet and mouths flapping....  I had a mother at school call me the "wicked witch of the west" (where the hell did THAT come from!)  I watched kids snap at each other and staff barely be civil with each other.......... it felt as though i was watching the world slowly melt into a puddle of anger and frustration and emotions before my very eyes.


And in the midst of all this emotional melt down - two of my staff called my office phone and asked me to come outside to them.  Were their brains fried?? come OUTSIDE ???
But I did............ and they stood there like two proud kids grinning at me... and they thrust a HUGE gift package at me ........ there in the middle of the parking lot - heat rising off the pavement and bouncing off the walls of the school.......... and like the dummy I am I stood there in the glaring sunlight and opened it.. balancing it precariously on the trunk of my car (cause of course I hadn't brought my car keys) and they were chattering about how they wanted to give me something to thank me for a wonderful year.. how it was a themed gift... and because I guess I was all thumbs and going too slow - they both started helping me pull gifts out of the gift bag............. 


The first gift was a white porcelain picture frame - and I was told  to put a picture of "our" new home in it......... to remind me next year what I am working towards....... 

And then they pulled out a piggy bank .. a big polka dotted porcelain piggy bank - they said it was for my retirement fund...... 

And they pulled out a room diffuser to help keep the house smelling sweet........... 


And I cried.


They blindsided me ........... after a year of staff back stabbing and running to the Union and doing everything in their power to drive me crazy - these two quiet women - showed me that there are some that appreciate what I try to do........ some who support me.. some who genuinely care........... 


I hardly noticed the heat - life suddenly looked a whole lot brighter - on the Day before the Last day of School