Tuesday, April 21, 2015

The Love Song of Val Near Retirement

Let us go then, you and I,
In the morning when the first shrill bell is nigh
Like a student lulled to sleep upon a desktop;
Let us go, through lunch time's swift-deserted halls,
The caterwauling bawls
Of teachers striving to be heard at all
Ring out for validation from their peers,
In hopes that they can make it 30 years.
Halls that hold us like a warden without guilt,
Which society has built.
No longer the profession that it once was,
Reviled rather than valued,
Another target to be sued.

In the class the children come and go
Talking of hardships, tales of woe.

For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
Have measured out my life, not with coffee spoons;
But with duty days I count each brand new fall
The parking lot, the games, and the lunch room.
My life can now resume.
 
Heh, heh. Wasn't THAT uplifting? It's a parody, people! A parody! But let the record show: 
Mrs.Thevictorian has only five duty days left this year!
 
Sure, there's that pesky next year looming on the horizon. But I'm a short-timer now.
The finish line is in sight.   

9 comments:

  1. Congratulations on a long hard haul, Val. You're a trooper.

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  2. You are the "proofrock" of your community.

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  3. When I'm asked "How it your retirement going?"

    I always say "It's not working."

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  4. Was that J. Alfred that just walked by?

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  5. Just think, on those brutally cold winter days you can snuggle in your chair in your basement lair and remember when. 44 days and Xing off.

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  6. I grow old ... I grow old ...
    I shall wear the bottoms of my sweat pants rolled.

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  7. Catalyst,
    Thank you. The haul wasn't always this hard. It's never been the kids. It's those infernal hoops. My jumping days have passed.

    *****
    Stephen,
    That I am! We get a bum rap. But we're smarter than people give us credit for. Even though some of us may have a penchant for ending sentences with prepositions. It's not that we don't KNOW the proper rules. We choose not to use them. We have precious few choices to flaunt.

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    joeh,
    I see what you did there!

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    Sioux,
    Yes. He was on his way to live on the bottom of the ocean with his pantlegs rolled up. But Val is just so magnetic, he stopped by to take her for a walk.

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    Linda,
    You've got a year on me, but I won't enjoy my eventual escape any less. Besides, I only have 22 days left of this year. So I beat you there.

    *****
    Leenie,
    That's the fashion, I hear, for the for pushing a walker around with tennis balls on the feet, to enter (and leave) a room and talk of Michelangelo. I think you need to carry a Jitterbug, too.

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  8. I am so envious!!! The light at the end of the tunnel. I see it fleetingly from time to time, then I have a nightmare in which I find myself still here, cleaning toilets in my 90's.

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  9. Kathy,
    Don't sweat it. Kick back, put your feet up, and admire your new banana tree.

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