After rising at dawn to dig a hole in raw sewage, I went to teach at a local community center. It was the first day of class–which is always, always insane. I had 8 kids, my maximum. While making the tough transition from classroom to the drama room a mother tried to intervene and stick a 9th kid (her son) in the class. I explained that I couldn’t accommodate her child, that I was maxed out, and that, if she wanted to avoid breaking her kid’s heart she needed to remove him immediately from the scene. Too late…the boy was already taking off his shoes and trying to join in.

8 kids feels like a lot when you’re alone, you remove a few from each class, and then you take all of them into the bathroom, wait for them to go, navigate through several winding halls, line them up outside the room, have them all take off their backpacks, coats, shoes, then get them all together so we can enter the classroom in a nice, relaxed fashion. Breaking the heart of a child whose mother made a very bad assumption (that her kid could take the class unannounced, unregistered, and without checking) was not on my list of things to do today.

Her kid lost his shit. I tried desperately to reign my 8 students in, ushering them into the classroom and firmly closing the door. The boy outside screamed, wailed, hollered, and began throwing his body against the door. I could hear his mother saying, “Do you want some Skittles?” My students looked at me horrified, several of them gulping back panicky tears. “Why is that little boy crying?” they whispered to me, the monster. I spoke in a hushed voice, I gave them reassuring touches, smiles, and we sang songs loudly over the sounds of screaming. After what felt like days the screaming stopped. We managed to hold it together through class, out the door, shoes back on, and then while hauling half of them back to their classrooms THERE IS THE MOTHER AND HER SON. The mother gives me a look of Pure Death. What am I suppose to do? I have children wiggling down the hall; I put my head down and chase after them.

After my students are back in their respective classrooms, I peek out in the hall and there is the mother…lingering around the front desk. She hates me, I think. She blames me for heartlessly not letting her kid take my class. I put her in a terrible position. She’s going to chew me out, not listen, despise me. So I hide. I find myself in the children’s reading nook, flipping through a coloring book entitled something like, “Josiah and the Lord’s Snake.” I realize that I’m not reading at all, but listening to my heart pound. I go round and round in my head…how am I going to approach this angry mother? Stick to my guns? Lay out the facts? Apologize and murmur, “Yes, yes, it was hard on us all.” All of above, I suppose, with a smile.

I get up and find that the mother is gone. The tension has left the air. I make my way down the maze of hallways to the room, gather up all my teaching stuff, and practically run out of the facility. When I get home I learn that it will cost a minimum of $2,000 to fix our sewer problem. There goes my savings, frivolities, and any hope of future travel. I go to the cupboard, pull down the vodka, and pour myself a shot.