Downside

En route to my former home last week, the quintessential city that never sleeps, I decided to ride in style for once...the Amtrak train...so that I could finish reading my book...partake in three cups of tea.

In short, it goes like this: (read this book.) in the rural and remote regions of Pakistan that surround the monumental peak of K2, a humble American man and former mountaineer has been building schools for the uneducated village children since he was my age. The protagonist of the true story of this venture, "Three Cups of Tea", is a character of patience, drive, and true intent. (read this book). His successful building missions allowed many Pakistani girls the opportunity for formal education, many extending beyond grade school, to career training in the larger cities and towns surrounding the mountain region. (read this book). The first girl(s) to achieve this trip downside were awarded a scholarship to study in a prestigious high school in the city. Almost immediately they both began adopting less traditional styles of dress and diet, serving Lipton tea and wearing fancy burkhas...and even embracing the possibilities of starting a hospital downside in the city of Skardu with their newfound education, rather than returning home to the mountain village. It is evident they had become empowered, independent, ambitious.

Having new-found appreciation for the city-life and the opportunities it affords, the young girl recites "I believe every [girl of the Braldu] deserves the opportunity to come downside...at least once"

Of course the downside to going downside; that is, having first-hand knowledge of opportunities the city affords, is trifold:

Initially, once that can of worms has been opened, once the eyes have seen and the ears have heard, it is hard to forget the rush of people, the access to things before unknown, experienced, or seen, or the seemingly endless opportunities lurking around every corner. Having left the great big apple, I often miss the access to things, to everything really, unavailable in my home village.

Consequently, however, time "downside" inevitably costs much much more than the slower life of the home village, both physically and financially. Stress levels increase. Material standards and expectations eat at your psyche. The cost of living is far greater than what was previously customary. (I once heard that living in New York City for an extended period of time can take 10 years off your life. After two years of living there myself, I believe it.)

And finally, returning to the city makes one acutely aware of how living in the village of childhood matures one faster than is desireable. And not in a good way. I'll be turning 28 in less than two weeks, but judging by my recent slump in social interaction, extra-curricular activity, or usual levels of adventurousness you'd think I was turning 58. Not good.

So, that's why its time to abandon my home village once again and head downside...not back to the city that never sleeps, but a whole new one altogether...where I can wander the streets with eyes a-glow hunting down new and plentiful opportunities like the girls of a tiny village called Korphe who went downside and saw their dreams come true.


I'll miss the comforts and familiarity of this tiny village, but its time to ride into the sunset.

Small talk

Art teachers are often the rejects of the teachers' lounge...as in life, many times...but I digress...at school we miss daily drama of constant classroom behavior, rarely dish out homework and thereby suffer no angst over failures on the part of our students to complete, return, or submit their homework, and cycle through a lot more kids in a lot less time; we don't have the benefit (?) of that classroom intimacy found in academics. Consequently, we have little drama to share in the teachers' lounge, at the water cooler, or anywhere else in the work place and probably a lot less interest in hearing it as well. Additionally, I venture to guess most art teachers are far more antisocial than your average educator.
Thus, in substitute teacher land, I really just like to stick to my home base, my "safe zone", the room to which I was directed at the start of the day, and the desk from behind which I monitor monotonous tasks performed by frustrated students all day long.

Unfortunately, one cannot go a whole day without a visit to the restroom.


As soon as I abandon the safety of my sub placement safe zone and go out wandering, hunting a child-free lavatory or trying to locate the "lunchroom" to heat up my highly delicious highly nutritious Campbell's condensed, I am inevitably captured, like the four-legged victim of a deer-spotter's utility light shone from an inappropriately obnoxious utility vehicle, in a moment of smalltalk with a colleague. Said colleague usually initiates our awkward meeting with some benign and unoriginal phrase such as "is everyone eating lunch in their rooms??" while standing before the microwave line awaiting their turn at warm Campbell's and leering over an empty lunch table. Or, "are they giving you too much trouble today??" while passing my quaint and quiet post during planning periods. Or, my personal favorite, flicking their emerald green sub ID and grinning, "who you in for???". Within two words I can tell my converse-er is not a teacher at the school. It's another substitute. The insincerity in their voice is like a lighthouse beacon in the night; imposing, unmistakable. Dawning wide and eager eyes the common substitute, I've learned, throws out one cliché quip after another, evidently seeking some approval, acceptance or other justification. The whole experience is like watching the behavioral instincts of an exotic animal. Here it seems the imposer's target audience is the "in" crowd at school, in substitute-teacher-land this being the real and permanent staff. The actual teachers. Perhaps they think I am...but then my green substitute badge flickers in the overhead fluorescent light...

Their fall-back plan: some underlying drive for substitute bragging rights (sounds like: "...come here often? I sub here every day.") to move oneself, in one's own eyes, up the substitutes' hierarchy. And this is where my conversation heads- ridiculous competition, bad soup, insincerity, evoking faint memories of my high school experience, impending ill-timed introspection ( I hand-wrote this blog on standard lined notebook paper while watching the execution of inane age-appropriate school work at my substitute post) .

As I walked my luke-warm soup back to the safety zone it dawned on me: inevitably, even for the adults in a school, its always a popularity contest.