Saturday, May 28, 2005

I'm Back, It's Over and Now...Back to Work

I survived the West Texas field trip (and the 7 hour drive each way) and I can actually say I had fun. The kids were great. I managed to get out of taking my 6th graders on a hike Wednesday morning since we had enough chaperones and so I stayed behind and wrote six pages on the end of the book. That night we had a campfire which scared the hell out of most of the kids and some of the adults! Then the kids in my room (egged on by the other teacher in the room) decided to scare some of the boys. It was beautiful!

So, yesterday was our last day of school, which was a half-day field day. Then the teachers got together for a happy hour (or in our case, a happy few hours!) and then we had our last middle school dance. At the end of the night, I was exhausted and emotional. Some of the kids have been with our school since we opened 4 years ago. I decided that I don't like change unless I'm the one instituting it. Who gave these kids the right to grow up in front of my eyes, lodge themselves in my heart and then rip it out when they have to move to a new school?! But alas, what doesn't kill me makes me stronger, right?

Speaking of killing me...during our field day I decided to forget my age and weight and I joined a bunch of kids inside the moonwalk. Quickly I fell down and in such a way that almost pulled the whole structure down. It was not pretty. I banged my knee. Even after ice and asprin, it is swollen, all sorts of colors and stiff. At the time, I was more humiliated than hurt...until I actually got up to walk away. But, the cute thing? A bunch of 1st and 2nd grade boys were grabbing my hands and arms trying to pull me up. It was so sweet! As I sat in the boss's office with my ice pack, I told her I just couldn't let the year end without some more drama. (Those of you who know me or have been reading this blog for a while will remember the broken finger incident.)

I guess, in the end, the injury doesn't really matter because it's the perfect reason for me to stay seated at the computer working on the last 60 pages of my rough draft of the manuscript FROM HELL! (I mean that in the most loving way a writer can mean it when speaking of a manuscript with a story I love and characters who have become like my best friends.) My goal is still to have this puppy done before I go home to RI for my vacation. So, I'll close now and get back to work so I can make that happen.

4 comments:

Elisabeth Naughton said...

Popping in from the RWANational Loop. Nice blog. And being a former middle-school teacher, I applaud you in making it through a year of raging hormones.

I'm also here to tell you you've been tagged in a fun and stupid blog game.

Go to my blog, answer the questions, post them on your blog, and tag 5 people.

(And I'll see you in Reno!)

Lexi said...

Thanks, Elisabeth! Although, it might take me a while to put it up since most of the bloggers I know have already received this tag. Thanks for visiting my blog!

Elisabeth Naughton said...

LOL, Christine.

This is my attempt at avoiding my WIP. I *should* be writing, but instead I'm perusing blogs and websites.

My poor characters are in serious sexual tension and I'm just leaving them hanging. *sigh*

Lexi said...

Yeah, blogs are a great procrastination tool! I've done that a million times, especially with this manuscript it seems. Feel free to stop by & procrastinate anytime, but only for a while! Those characters have a story to tell and you have a job to do!