I used to wonder why principals and retired teachers seemed to lose sight of being in the classroom. 

Principals would make some decision, usually about discipline, that I thought was outlandish. A dear friend who had retired would come in to visit and we would end up feeling bad because heck, we were too busy to visit.

I used to think “Have they forgotten the classroom and what this job entails?”

I can tell you that I still remember how precious time was in the classroom, and so I have purposely not visited my old school yet. I am waiting for an opportune time to briefly visit and not interrupt anything.  

So, I still remember that.

But I do understand how one can forget things, especially when you don’t live that life anymore. I was around a group of littles the other day (in the church nursery), and I thought they were so darn cute, but they got on my dang nerves. I had fun to an extent, but  there was no order and everything was a crazy bunch of chaos. I wanted to switch off the lights or write their names on the board or make them have a time out in the back of the classroom for a minute.

So, I am wondering if our patience for being around large groups of unruly kids finally expires.  

One thing that has changed totally for me are snow days. The anticipation, the pre-planning, and the actual snow day doesn’t feel like it used to.  

In anticipation for snow days, most of us teachers would take extra work home with us. A snow day afforded us more time to grade, plan, enter grades, and so on. A snow day usually meant a day to get extra work done and get ahead – which is what we were always doing anyway.  

That’s what we did during those “summers off” too, in case you were wondering.  

By the way, I haven’t forgotten the imbeciles who said things like that and I’d still go toe-to-toe with anyone who claims a teacher’s life is easy. I don’t think I will ever forget that aspect of the job.

And now back to snow days.

When I was a teacher in Columbia, in the early days, we would wake up at the crack of dawn to a phone call telling us school was canceled. Then, we’d call the next person.  

Later, as technology improved, there’d be a robocall, often the night before, which was lovely.  The gradual and increasing “freak out factor” of predicted winter disasters often worked in the favor of the overworked teacher.  Now people start having conniptions as soon as a flake is predicted.

Back then, we’d watch the scrolling at the bottom of the TV newscast. If Waterloo schools showed up, we knew it was almost a given that Columbia would call off. 

I remember a few times that Waterloo called off but we did not, and boy were we hopping mad.

Now, snow days don’t hold the same amount of excitement. Sure, there is still the luxury of possibly working my part-time job from home, or not having to haul my butt out of bed to take my daughter to school, but the magic is somewhat gone.

Just for nostalgia, I watched the snow days scrolling, just to see who was calling off.  There were still the old standbys, the schools you always knew would call off and the ones who were closed a few days after the others opened back up. But again, it wasn’t the same.

So, to all you teachers, I hope you all enjoy your snow day season. I wish you enough snow days for adequate rest, but I also wish you early outs in the spring.

We could never usually have both, but one can dream.