Found it!

My debit card, that is. I had a recollection of taking it from Laurel and putting it somewhere safe, but for the life of me could not remember. The gas tank is getting veeeerrry empty but I hate canceling my cards when I know they are (probably) somewhere. Unfortunately I did not find the missing piece of M's lunchbox that I lost a few months back.

There are 41 days of school left. The kids are counting, not me. They wrote themselves a big note on the front marker board. It means very little to me. I have to somehow write and conduct 26 IEP meetings over the next two months, in addition to all the regular teaching duties. Plus half of the kids on my caseload suddenly have urgent problems to be addressed, which means even more meetings. More subs in the classroom. Less time to dig in deep and ask students to think Why and Why Not about inequalities and interest rates and geometry. More worksheets, out of pure necessity and because (and this really outrages me) when subs show up to cover my class some of them say they don't "do math". In any case, I know that a few blinks-of-an-eye and it will be June. Summer vacation.

It's been a very sad few weeks at my job. I can't really say much about it due to confidentiality, but I have pretty much had enough of the world dishing out terrible circumstances to kids. Not fair.

I complain a lot about my life, because it's not very satisfying right now. I don't like the pace or the quantity or the endless list of tasks that send alarm bells to my cell phone all day and night. I remember when M and I first got outdoorsy and we did a lot of day hiking out in Arizona. Arizona has endless acres of national forest and BLM land to explore, some of which is not terribly well mapped. Sometimes we would set out on a circuit hike and it would turn out to be more difficult or longer than we anticipated. Sometimes the trail was nothing more than faint cattle prints across a dusty desert floor. Once we got deep into a patch of cat's claw. Anyway, there were many times when I felt like we got in over our head. I didn't want to keep walking, but frankly, when you are out in some desolate patch of desert, you have no choice but to keep going. And if you can let go of how angry you are that you planned poorly or didn't bring enough food or are running of out water, then you might just be able to look around you and realize how beautiful the desert is. Blue sky. Streaks of color across distant canyon walls. A lone flower on a saguaro.

So, life is good. I'm swamped at work, I lose everything, my daughter has a constant runny nose and a nagging cough that I pray will clear up on its own because I'm out of sick days. But I really just need to keep marching for the next two months and then stop and reassess, and get a better trail map and decide on my next move. And in the meantime we have a roof over our head and food to eat and I found my missing debit card.

However, even better things have happened this week then finding the missing debit card. I was supposed to watch Kai last night so Jeremy and Sarah could go to the hockey game. But Jeremy got sick. So he stayed home with Kai and Sarah invited me to the game! Best babysitting swap ever! The Pens won, there were several very exciting goals, and it was the last home game of the regular season. Plus the games always sell out, so there was a lot of exciting energy. And I love watching hockey in person.

We're hoping to head out to the airstream this weekend, and at least marvel at her shiny awesome-ness, if we don't actually have a camp-out.