Paychecks and Kids Don’t Mix

Recently, I reconnected with an old friend of mine.  She is a school teacher.  “You could get a masters in education by going through a program where they will pay a huge portion of your tuition,” she told me.  That is how she got through school, and she’s doing well these days.  When I told her about my current job situation, she became concerned for my future.  “You are too smart to work doing that!  You’re almost 50 years old!  You’ve got to think about a career,” she told me. 

Believe me, I’ve thought about a career.  I’ve considered a few of them.  I finally finished my bachelor’s degree twelve years ago in the hopes of finally getting a career.  After graduation, I quickly discovered that college degrees don’t always deliver what they promise.   Maybe I don’t really know what I want in a career.  I do know I don’t want one that involves working with or around kids.

My paternal grandmother would go around telling people that I was going to be a teacher.  She claimed that I walked like one, whatever that meant.  Grandma would have been tickled to learn that I toiled as a substitute teacher. In an earlier post, I described some of the annoyances I encountered when I was a sub. Grandma would have been disappointed in the fact that I took my brief educational career no further than that. 

I told my friend about my lack of enthusiasm while I was a sub.  She agreed that older kids, especially high school students, are major problems in a classroom.  She does not work with that population.  “You have to specialize.  Just stick with Kindergarten, first, second or third grades,” she suggested. 

But that still involves dealing with kids, anywhere from 15 to 30 of them during the day, depending on the school and the class.  I had problems on job where kids were nearby but I didn’t have to directly deal with them.  I can imagine the headaches I’d have if I had a hands-on job with them.