Melissa Wantz: Notes from West Egg

I will have to explain thoughtfully to my husband why I chose to spend six hours working in my classroom today, on this, the fourth day of summer vacation. Some teachers get it; others don’t. The staff parking lot at school had at least a half dozen teacher vehicles in it, so I’m not the only one taking advantage of the left-over energy and dissonance of this just-finished year to plan for next year. I know that all too soon I will have slipped fully into summer mode and thoughts of the classroom will settle and fade, as they should. But this week is a time to see the year ahead from its widest perspective, make some adjustments in planning, tighten up the integration between my subject area and World History and send some projects off to publications so they are waiting for me in August. I’m still in work mode, and the unmopped wood floor and god-awful stove are not calling to me in the right way yet. Without the pressure of students — without real names and faces to sidetrack my vision, for that matter — planning curriculum takes on a gauzy, idealistic quality that I happen to love. At the beginning of summer, everything is possible for fall.