The Kids Won't Like Me

I've been re-reading the memoirs of a bunch of 6th graders lately. Sometimes I forget that they're "little" people and have had life experiences. I know by the time I was 14, I wasn't writing about funerals and loss, I was writing about boyfriends and girls I hated because of boys that I wanted to be my boyfriend. Looking back, none of it really mattered. The boys I dated at 13/14 years old have become not much more than a distant memory. But at least they're remembered, right? The ones since have mostly been willingly forgotten. That's not the point. What is my point?...

Either way, I've spent the last 7 years of my life trying to achieve something, regardless of boys. Something to make me better... successful... happy. I can't tell you the exact moment that I decided to become a teacher. I can't tell you that it was my whole life's goal since I was a child, because like most, I had other dreams. But now that I'm here, and this is my life, I should say that I in NO WAY feel that I am settling.

Every semester before classes start, since I was a young child, I have gotten nervous the night before the first day. I can never sleep well... I'm afraid the kids won't like me. And it's funny because I'm 25 and tomorrow I start my new job as a teacher. And I'm nervous... and I doubt I'll sleep, and I'm afraid the kids won't like me...

First day of a new chapter. First day of forever.