Down With Summer!

You know, I might as well admit that I am not that fond of summer vacations. There, I said it. Teachers all across America are lighting their torches, getting in their cars, and coming to kill me for saying such a blasphemous thing. How could I, Jim Baker, a 27-year veteran teacher, break the rules and say that I don't like the part of the teaching job that everyone else loves the most. Well, I have my reasons, and you know good and well, I'm going to give them to you now.

My biggest problem with summer breaks is a personal identity issue that won't make a lick of sense to anyone but me. I don't mind that. A bee that stings only me, still stings me. I identify myself as a teacher. I know some of my coworkers will argue that I am not a teacher but a campus instructional technologist. They reserve the term teacher for those poor souls who are assigned to a classroom and stay with that group of kids all day. I haven't always been a CIT, and, as a CIT, I do teach. So, as I was saying, I identify myself as a teacher. That's what I am for eight hours a day, five days a week, and thirty-six weeks out of every year. Locking me out of the schoolhouse for ten weeks in the summer is a lot like sending a nun to live at the Bunny Ranch in Nevada for ten weeks.

Another major reason for not loving summers is financial. Unless you've lived your life under a rock on Bouvet Island, you should have heard that teachers aren't the highest paid people in the country. That means we don't have a lot of money. That, in turn, means most of us can't afford to actually “vacation” for ten weeks. We usually get our two weeks in then sit around the house broke for the other eight weeks. Having teenage boys in the house all day, instead of at school where they belong, practically doubles our usual grocery bill. Believe me, even if they work summer jobs, that cash doesn't reach the household.

My butt is a HUGE reason to wish school never was out. At the end of the school year I always have these grandiose plans for using my summer off as an opportunity to get in shape. I plan to go on daily walks, hit the gym and workout, and eat salads and other light summer fair. That would be wonderful, if it ever happened. Instead, I decide it's too damned hot to do anything and find myself either laying in bed reading or laying on the couch watching television shows I'm not even interested in. Then, as the start of a new school year approaches, I start beating myself up for getting fat and lazy. I hate that I always start each year bigger and fatter than I ended the last one. So, I make a last ditch effort to get under control. Does it happen? Not even!

I can't get my schedule under control either. The first few weeks, I wake up early in the morning by habit. But, as the summer progresses, I start going to bed later and later, until, eventually, I find it hard to get up in the morning at all. My usual routine disintegrates. I eat off schedule, I bathe off schedule, and my body functions forget what a schedule is. When school starts back up, mornings come like a sledge hammer for the first couple of weeks until my body gets back into the routine of school days.

This year, I have two new reasons to hate summer. The first is the fact that my summer break is actually a countdown to Josh's going off to college. When summer ends, his status as a full time resident in my home ends with it. I know he'll come home and all that, but it'll never be the same. My mother once told me that, when Patti and I moved out of the house, her perception of family totally changed. Even if we stayed with her for a month, we were visiting, and visits end. She said there was a sadness there all the time, even when we were enjoying our time together. Mom, herself, is the biggest reason for me hating this summer in particular. As you know, she died exactly ten months ago today. I'm beginning to realize that I didn't get through the grieving process. Instead, I kept myself busy and tried not to think much about it. Now, however, my days are free. Everything I do, read, or see digs up some memory of Mom that cuts me like a knife. Josh going to orientation brought back the day Mom and Dad took me to mine. Planning for the upcoming cruise brought back the memories of Dad's accident in the Cayman Islands and all the time Mom and I spent hanging out together while we were there. My friend Dana's trip to the beach this weekend brought back the trip I took to Port Aransas with Mom, Dad, and Patti. I could go on listing these things, but I won't. I can't. It'll just drag me back into the awful place I've spent enough time in already.

I guess it's time to put on my Pollyanna ponytail wig and find some things to like about summer. There are a few. I like watering my flowers every evening just before the sun sets. I like catching up on all the books I put off until summer. I like that we tend to get the house cleaned up more in the summer. I like that we can go to movies in the daytime and pay cheaper ticket prices. I like that we can go for late lunches and not fight the crowds. I like that, when things get to be too much for me, I can hop back into bed for a nice refreshing nap. I like having time to get on a city bus to just see where it goes. I like having a beer at Hills and Dales in the middle of the day with my buddies before the smokers get there. I like that I only have to wear long pants to church on Sundays. I like that sometimes in the summer, Rachel is willing to miss church every once in awhile. I like that summer is the time we usually get to see my mother-in-law, Jane. Finally, I'm going to like the heck out of being on a cruise with my big sister and my daddy during my last week of this summer!