This week, I’ve begun moving into my new classroom in my new school. After eighteen years in the same school and seventeen years in the same classroom, I’ve not had a substantial change in my teaching environment in almost twenty years. Had you asked me some years ago when I was still comfortable and content teaching eighth-grade English in Hughes whether or not I’d be comfortable changing absolutely everything about my physical environment with only ten days or so until the first day of school, I would have responded calmly that I’d rather not, but inside I’d be in a mild panic at first. New understanding points out we’re all on the autism spectrum to some degree or another, and my absolute avoidance of change is definitely my spectrum element. However, I sit writing about this with the full understanding that my room is not even close to ready with a certain calm I would not have expected.

My calmness likely comes from the peace I’ve made with the change I’m embarking on. When I first tendered my resignation and began really thinking about what I’d done, I couldn’t accept it in some ways. “I’m leaving Hughes,” I’d mutter to myself while walking the dog when my thoughts circled back around as they always did. “After eighteen years, I’m leaving Hughes.” Unfathomable. A month in Europe with almost all thoughts of school banished my mind and I’m approaching it differently as I knew I would. Excitement isn’t quite the word, but I certainly feel an anticipation that I haven’t experienced in a few years. 

This time last year, just days before returning to school, all I felt was dread. What new assessments are we going to have to do? How acceptable (notice -- I didn’t think how good but how acceptable) would the new textbooks be, and just how closely would we be expected to follow them? How much new “analysis” would we have to do on the district-obsessed “data” would we have to do? (I put those in quotes, though I am loath to do so, because all the data collection and analysis we had to do seemed just to be going through the motions to produce numbers for those making six-figure salaries at the district office to justify their jobs.) What changes will we implement to behavior management in the school? How much new paperwork will I have to complete? What new requirements will we have to meet with our lesson plans? These were the thoughts that made me dread going back to school, not the thought of actually working with the kids. 

Looking at the new school year with a calm anticipation I’ve not felt in years is recursive: the fact that I’m so calm, in turn, calms me more. So today, I was able simply to drop off a few things in my classroom and head back out. Gone is the bookshelf that sat in the middle of our finished basement all summer, prompting K to ask sweetly, “When do you think you might be able to take that out of here?” Gone are some of the boxes of books stacked in the storage room. Because gone is any anxiety about the new school year.