What Teachers Dream...

I have very vivid dreams.

When Robb and I were engaged, I had dreams of weddings gone bad, one of which included me snagging my train on the way down the aisle, my dress tearing off mid-thigh and fluffing up like an umbrella around my waist, all while I dodged the food from a food fight happening between the guests seated on either side of the aisle.

When I was pregnant, I had dreams of all kinds of inappropriate labors and deliveries, not the least of which was my cousin Buddy delivering the baby while my brother tried to peek underneath the sheets to see what was happening. That one was weird.

So, almost every night I have some kind of dream that leaves me wondering where my psyche has been throughout the night. The topic and setting only varies by my season of life.

Last night, I had a teacher nightmare. I woke up, startled and sweating, realizing I had not taught any math lessons all year long. I was teaching third grade (which I have not done in FIVE YEARS), and we had gotten long into the school year without me giving any attention to the mathematical needs of my students.

For you fellow instructors out there, you'll understand this: it was revealed that I was only on Lesson #6 in the Saxon Math curriculum.

Suddenly, in my half-awake state, I was scrambling to think how I could teach them the basics of long division, in time for state testing and third grade graduation. I thought through the months of the year, trying to determine how much time I had left and how many basic skills I could cram in before anyone realized my incompetency in managing a curriculum calendar. I was horrified to learn that June is nearly over, and my time was up. I wondered how I would possibly keep my job, after neglecting an entire subject for an entire community of eight-year-olds.

And then I realized that none of this had really happened. Not only is it not a concern for my present life, but I have also been out of the field of fulltime teaching for more than three years. And when I was teaching fulltime, I managed the curriculum just fine, thank you.

So what on earth is making me dream such things??

It's possible that my subconscious mind fears that Tucker's speech delay is causing other delays in his learning, and that I, his teacher, am very behind other teachers in this stay-at-home classroom.

But that's not as much fun to think about.

Regardless, my dreams are worth noting, mostly for their absurdity, and sometimes for their magnifiying properties of what I am really worried about.