Raechell Bunnell is my former AP US History teacher, and a great companion to stay in touch with.
Its weird being in a career where I’m always on display. You’d be surprised at how much of my day is worrying about lame stuff. It is said that a teacher makes 1500 decisions a day, more than a brain surgeon. Teachers are great multi-taskers. But I seem to spend a surprising amount of my day trying to make sure my shoes don’t make fart sounds. I wake up and I’m like, “Have I worn these pants in the last two weeks?” Life is theater, we all play a part every day, but my part is trying not to be a beacon of embarrassment. I’m fine with this. Its not hard to not wear fart shoes. I had a teacher who was amazing. To this day she is my inspiration as a history teacher-but she is also the teacher who wore a purple dress three times a week. I’m pretty cool with being embarrassed in my regular life. I’m in an improv group that performs regularly. So I’m regularly put on the spot, and frequently embarrassed. I’ll do whatever to get a laugh or help a cast mate get a laugh. But I think in the classroom I just don’t want to be a distraction. Kids are always doing whatever they can to get me off topic, start talking about myself. They love it. It means a few minutes of the day they don’t have to write anything down or solve any problems. I get it. I was a kid once. We’d do anything to get the US history teacher to talk about her crappy ex-husband, or get the math teacher to talk about anything other than math. At the same time, I don’t remember one thing my 10th grade English teacher taught-only her coffee breath. And I completely admit I’m an evil person for not valuing her for her hard work and integrity, but I don’t remember any of that. Only her love of not using breath mints. So I won’t be the teacher that everyone thinks is a farter, or that I only have one pair of pants. Thats just a part of the job. That way I can focus on things that really matter. Like how can I snag an extra donut on donut Thursday. You know, the big things in life.
