The office aide
My new part-time job: secretary in the English and Social Studies depts at a local high school. (Afternoons, I continue tutoring at IUSB.) On my first workday, my new bosses didn’t have time to show me what to do, so they were like, “Just roam the halls and get acquainted with the school.” So I did that for four hours. (A security guard took pity on me and gave me a tour; later, a teacher gave me pretty much the same tour.)
Since then, I’ve been kept busier. They’ve trained me to use the photocopier, and they’ve told me which books to shelve and which books to put into boxes. I’ve spent many hours doing those things. We had a “lockdown” drill on Wednesday: it was my favorite part of the week. I had to sit for thirty minutes alone with the English dept chair, in her classroom; she kept trying to get rid of me, but whenever she’d open the door to let me out she’d see the principal or the police dogs and get nervous and close the door. After a while she let me just sit on her couch and read her Harold Bloom Shakespeare book.
Since then, I’ve been kept busier. They’ve trained me to use the photocopier, and they’ve told me which books to shelve and which books to put into boxes. I’ve spent many hours doing those things. We had a “lockdown” drill on Wednesday: it was my favorite part of the week. I had to sit for thirty minutes alone with the English dept chair, in her classroom; she kept trying to get rid of me, but whenever she’d open the door to let me out she’d see the principal or the police dogs and get nervous and close the door. After a while she let me just sit on her couch and read her Harold Bloom Shakespeare book.
Though I’m happy at my new workplace, I can’t help but dwell on its absurdities …
like, how mice scurry across the classroom floors;
like, how the guards are always having to round up the stray student-zombies who wander through the halls;
like, how already I’ve been asked to guest-lecture on philosophy (there’s an International Baccalaureate philosophy class, “Theory of Knowledge”);
like, how I have power over all the teachers because I control the photocopier staples (some aspects of this job are going to my head).
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
Melanie Griffith, Tippi Hedren, and a lion: they remind me of a different family and their cat.
like, how the guards are always having to round up the stray student-zombies who wander through the halls;
like, how already I’ve been asked to guest-lecture on philosophy (there’s an International Baccalaureate philosophy class, “Theory of Knowledge”);
like, how I have power over all the teachers because I control the photocopier staples (some aspects of this job are going to my head).
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
Melanie Griffith, Tippi Hedren, and a lion: they remind me of a different family and their cat.