It was a long and hectic summer. Parts of it were wonderful, parts of it were frustrating and stressful, and parts of it were bittersweet. In reflecting back on what I did and how I’ve grown in the past two months, I find it somewhat hard to believe that it’s still the same year, and that I’m still the same person. That is one of the lovelier, and also more mind-boggling parts about working at a summer camp: each day is about two years long because you’re working from dawn to well past dusk, and at the end you and your colleagues turn to each other and say, “was that all?”
I ended my summer not in the sleepy and wedding-focused haze of friends and art projects I had planned, but in a marathon attempt to learn everything I could about being an elementary school teacher (on top of applying makeup, driving all over town, and anstoßing my newlywed friends). Tomorrow I will stand in a classroom full of bright-eyed eight-year-olds, which I carefully arranged and decorated this past week, and hopefully inspire them to like learning and school. I have no idea if I am capable of doing this, as eight-year-olds are not my area of expertise when it comes to teaching (give me a room full of teenage history nerds any day), but sometimes I guess you just have to try something out to know how you’ll like it.
I have the feeling that I should be more scared or stressed, but I’ve also learned the hard way that more anxiety doesn’t usually yield better results, only less sleep. This summer especially showed me that as long as you have enough people on your team, everyone does better. I feel so grateful not only to have a pretty good “school team”, but an extraordinary “home team” as well. Wish me luck!
weary traveler 