Spellman Ch. 19

"A little bit," I admitted. "Fifth grade is very different than high school. I hope I'm up to it."

"I'm sure you'll be great. The kids will love you."

"We'll see."

I had been worried that I might feel awkward around Cece after what had happened with Melissa last night, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that everything felt...fine. Nothing had to be too complicated right now.

Another surprise was that Cece slipped her arm through mine as we walked from the parking lot to the gym. I don't know if she had just decided to play up the fake-boyfriend thing for the sake of the other dudes at the gym, but whatever the reason I enjoyed having her close to me.

Paul was curious about any fallout from my conversation with Riley, so I told him what had happened yesterday. It was clear that Jackie wasn't Thomas' biggest fan, so she wanted to know if Riley had kicked him to the curb. I didn't have any information to give him on that front, though. The three of us went through our workouts, as usual.

When I came out of the locker room dressed for work, I found Cece waiting for me in the lobby. "Well if it isn't the most handsome fifth grade teacher in all of San Diego," she said.

"That means a lot coming from a gorgeous girl like you."

"Stop it," she said, blushing.

On the drive back to her house she asked if I had any specific goals for the year.

"Not really, but that's not a bad idea. Right now I'm just worried about making it through the year without screwing anything up. I've always known in my head that teaching fifth graders is very different than teaching high schoolers, but I'm really starting to feel it in my gut now. Obviously I want to make sure they learn everything they need to be prepared to move on to middle school next year. Hopefully I can help really spark something in at least one of them."

"I'm excited for you," Cece said. "I think you'll be great."

"Thank you. I hope so."

We pulled up to her house, and she leaned over to give me a kiss. "Good luck today. Let me know how it goes," she said.

"I will. Thanks for the pep talk. I'll talk to you later."

I allowed myself to enjoy the view of her walking away for as long as possible before she disappeared inside. Great way to start the day.

The parking lot at Spellman was an absolute zoo. Busses, cars, herds of children and parents being directed this way and that. The school day started with all of the kids out in the fields and on the playgrounds. Once the first bell rang, they'd line up in their classes to be picked up by their teachers and taken to their classrooms.

I made it through the churning sea of bodies to my classroom so I could drop my bag off. Someone had made a sign that read "5th Grade: Mr. Dillon", taped it to a yardstick, and left it on my desk. Probably to help with wrangling all of the kids into the right lines for the first few mornings until they all knew where they were supposed to be.

The first morning bell would be ringing shortly, so I grabbed my sign and headed outside. The fifth grade classes would be lining up on the basketball courts. I found Riley standing beside one of the hoops, watching a group of boys play a game of HORSE.

"Hey there, Miss Jackson," I said, walking up to her. "How are you?"

She gave me a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. "I'm...fine. Or I will be," she said.

"Obviously now's not a good time, but if you ever want to talk about it...well, you know where to find me."

"Maybe. I'm not sure. Still working through a lot of stuff."

"Yeah, I bet."

"I just-" she was interrupted by the morning bell. The yells, laughs, screams, and shouts of children rang out all over the playground in response as they scrambled to end their games and find their classes. "Thanks for telling me. I really do appreciate it," Riley said a few seconds later, once things had calmed down a bit.

"No problem. I hope you'd do the same for me."

The playgrounds and fields were a chaotic scramble of kids. I raised my sign up high and yelled in as commanding a teacher voice I could muster, "Fifth grade! Over here! Fifth graders on the basketball court. Mr. Dillon's class, line up in front of me!"

That seemed to help, at least a little bit. Elijah was the first of my students to line up, followed soon after by Angie and Manny. Melissa arrived to wrangle her own class, and I gave her a wave. She smiled and winked at me.

"Good morning Elijah, Angie, Manny," I said to my students, glad that I remembered all of their names.

"Good morning, Mr. Dillon!" they answered. They all looked so cute, with their backpacks almost as big as they were.

It took a few minutes for everyone else to assemble, but eventually I had my full dozen of Dillon's Desperados lined up and ready to start the day.

Mrs. Mitchell's voice rang out over the PA system. "Good morning, Spellman Elementary School Seagulls, and welcome to the first day of a new year! I know it's going to be a wonderful one. I don't have any announcements today besides this—let's start this year off right! Go Seagulls!"

The classes were dismissed by grade, starting with the first graders—the kindergarteners had a separate area all to themselves. When it was time for the fifth grade to be dismissed, Becca took the lead with her class, followed by Melissa, then Riley, and finally me and my class. The kids followed along behind me like little ducklings all in a row.

When we made it to the classroom, I directed them to look at the far wall with the job board to find their table number and their class job for the week. It took a few minutes, but eventually everyone worked out their assigned seats and settled down at their desks.

"Good morning, everyone!" I said, taking my position at the front of the classroom next to the whiteboard.

"Good morning, Mr. Dillon!" was their surprisingly enthusiastic reply. I was already noticing one major difference between fifth graders and high schoolers—fifth graders were still pretty excited to be at school. I'm not sure exactly what year it was that most kids lost that, but it was definitely gone for almost all of them by the time they got to high school. Probably because middle school was the nightmare combination of more difficult classes and puberty. I was glad to be avoiding that, at least.

We started out the day with that classic first day of school assignment: "What I Did During Summer Break." Table leaders retrieved their supply caddies from the cabinet and the kids got to work writing the tales of their past few months away from school. The assignment was a classic for a reason—kids were almost always excited to talk about their summer, it helped me to get to know them better both as people and to assess their writing levels, and it allowed the kids to get to know each other better, as well.

When everyone was done writing, I had them each come up one by one to read their paper to the class. Once again, most fifth graders seemed to lack the fear of public speaking that plagued older students. Another thing they probably developed in middle school, when they started to struggle with all of the awkward self-esteem and social standing issues that came with getting older and caring too much about what other people thought of you.

That wasn't to say that no one was a little shy, because some were. Rosemary Carlson—Ms. Carrington's daughter—was definitely one of them. I had to ask her to speak louder a few times, but she made it through. She had done the most traveling by far, and wrote about getting to see the Louvre and the Eifel Tower in Paris. The other kids thought that was very cool. Hell, I thought it was very cool, too. I had certainly never been to Paris.

The other kids had summers that were much more typical for this area, the sort of things that I had done as a kid. Lots of time spent at the pool or the beach, visits to the (World-Famous) San Diego Zoo or Wild Animal Park or Sea World, trips up to Disneyland or Knott's Berry Farm or Six Flags, vacations to visit grandparents or cousins, summer camps for art or science or sports, and so on.

When all of the kids were done, I told them my own, highly-edited story of my summer. I mostly focused on moving down from the Bay Area, meeting new friends, and going to see the Padres play baseball.

"Does anyone have any questions?" I asked. Dean Newman raised his hand. "Yes, Dean?"

"Mr. Dillon, do you have a girlfriend?" Dean asked. The class broke out into giggles and ooooohs.

I laughed. "No, I don't have a girlfriend. Why do you ask?"

"My mom was talking about it with her friend."

Great. Not that I needed it either way, but hopefully she was curious for her friend's sake and not her own.

"Any other questions?"

Inez Green raised her hand and I called on her. "What day do we have computer lab?"

"Great question. Let's go over our related arts schedule now," I said. I walked over to the back wall, where I had a big weekly calendar set up. "Our class is going to be doing Art on Mondays, Library on Tuesdays, P.E. on Wednesdays, Computer Lab on Thursdays, and Music on Fridays. We won't be going to the library today because it's the first day of school, but we'll start next week."

Manny asked about the bathroom pass, which gave me the opportunity to explain our bathroom policy before handing Manny the pass and letting him go.

Cindy wanted to know what field trips we would be going on this year. I let the class know that we hadn't finalized the fifth grade field trips yet, but would soon.

The questions dried up after that. I quickly transitioned them into a math lesson, reviewing some of the standards from fourth grade to make sure they had learned what they were supposed to and see how much they had retained over the summer.

After morning math was social studies, and then finally at 11:30 it was time for lunch. The class lined up at the door, with our week's line leader Joshua at the front. I led my class to the cafeteria and dropped them off before returning to my classroom to get my own lunch—leftover fried rice from last night. Grabbing my cooler, I headed to the teacher's lounge to use the microwave. The room was fairly crowded, but I was able to get my food heated up without too much issue. Thirty minutes wasn't a ton of time for lunch, especially with the minutes at the front and back end where I had to be dropping off and picking up my kids.

When I returned to my classroom—hot lunch in hand—I found Tori, Melissa, and Emma there waiting for me. "I guess my classroom is the hangout spot?" I said.

"Sure is," Tori replied. The girls all had salads of various kinds and were sitting on top of the desks. I settled into my own, adult-sized desk chair.

"How's everyone's morning been?" I asked.

I received positive responses from Emma and Melissa, but Tori groaned. "Oh man, I've got one kid I can already tell is going to be a handful. He just cannot sit still or stay quiet."

We shared the highlights of our morning and before long it was time for us to go pick up our classes.

"I've got lunch duty tomorrow and Friday," Emma said, "so I won't be here, but otherwise I'm happy to have lunch with y'all."

"Sounds good to me," Melissa said.

"Same here," Tori added.

"I guess I'm okay with three beautiful ladies joining me for lunches," I said.

The bell rang to signal the end of the lunch period, so we all left to go pick up our classes. I retrieved my kids without issue and we returned to the classroom, everyone happy for having eaten and getting some playtime outside.

After lunch we had some guided reading time followed by a discussion, then silent reading time, then some writing based on what they had read.

To close out the day I took them outside for our final lesson, a science scavenger hunt. I led them around the school as they tried to identify as many different materials and organisms as possible.

Before I knew it, the day was just about done. We returned to the classroom and the students gathered their things together. When the final bell of the day rang, they lined up at the door once more. First I dropped off the students who were taking the bus home at their appropriate lines, then the kids staying for afterschool programs at the multipurpose room, and finally led the rest to the car pickup line. I had pickup duty every afternoon, so I took up my assigned spot and helped kids make it into the right cards in a timely and orderly manner.

Pickup went by fairly quickly, if a bit chaotic, but it was the first day of school. Things would become smoother over time. By 3:30 all of the waiting students had been picked up and I was free to go. I swung by my classroom one last time to grab my bag before hitting the road. Melissa and Tori were already gone, as was Riley.

First day in the bag. I threw my stuff in my car then drove home with the windows down, enjoying the breeze.

When I got home I immediately shed my stuffy work clothes and changed into a much more comfortable t-shirt and shorts before flopping onto the couch. I pulled out my phone and texted Cece.

How's it going, gorgeous?

It didn't take her long to reply.

It's been a long day. How about you? How was the first day of school?!?

It was really good. My kids are great. I think we're going to have a fun year.

That's so awesome. I knew you'd be great.

Thanks. It's nice to get the first day jitters out of the way. I'm excited for tomorrow.

Glad to hear it. I'm excited for Friday.

Oh yeah? I am too. I've got some ideas.

You going to tell me those ideas?

No, I think I'd rather surprise you.

Hmmm. Okay. But they better be good.

I think they are. Only one way to find out, though.

Will you at least tell me what I need to wear?

Nothing too fancy. Nice dinner and then something afterwards, if you can still stand to be around me by then.

Fine, be unhelpful.

Sorry. I'm sure you'll look great no matter what.

Flatterer. Hey, do you play Words With Friends?

I used to play with Amanda and a few of our friends a lot, but had fallen off it when we broke up.

Not too much anymore, but I have. Why?

I play with my family a lot. Do you want to play with me?

Sure, that sounds fun.

She sent me an invitation and we started a game. She was pretty good, but in the end I triumphed, carried by my 56-point 'quixotic' on a double word score.

Dang! You're good! she texted when we finished.

So are you. That was fun. It's nice to have a game to play with you.

I won't bug you about it too much, but it's a nice way to stay connected. The chat during games is probably the way I talk to my siblings the most these days.

That's cool. Rematch?

Rematch.

We ended up playing two more before dinner. I won the second game as well, but she came out on top in the third.

Victory! Finally! Thanks for playing with me. I've gotta go make dinner for Dad. See you tomorrow?

Of course. Shoot me another game whenever.

Will do. Talk to you later.

Later, Cece.

I made my own dinner, just a grilled ham and cheese sandwich with some chips. The day had drained me, so I was ready to crash early. I grabbed a book off my poetry shelf and settled into bed to read for a bit.

I read for maybe an hour before I started to drift off. The last thing I remembered was reading a poem from Emily Bronte. I only made it a couple stanzas before my eyes felt too heavy to continue.

A little while, a little while,

The weary task is put away,

And I can sing and I can smile,

Alike, while I have holiday.

Why wilt thou go, my harassed heart,

What thought, what scene invites thee now?

What spot, or near or far,

Has rest for thee, my weary brow?