Hope Springs Eternal (for Fall)

Yesterday, I had an incredible moment. The day had been exhausting. In fact, I was spent before I taught my first class of the day. Yet, I somehow found a tremendous reserve at the end of the day. I attended a meeting with other teachers of our grade nine interdisciplinary course. Beyond English, Religion and Social Studies, the course is tasked with introducing technology skills and concepts to our first year students. As technology has shifted, our skills list has not. The technology department wants to update the skills, but wanted to hear from the teachers what was currently being done and what different teams might want to do in the future. For me the technology component was only a portion of my enthusiasm. I taught a section of the course for three years, but that ended two years ago. Starting next fall, I will be working with two amazing teachers. I honestly can't wait for the course to start. My anticipation was the driving force behind the surge.

What stunned me about the entire meeting is that I could feel my energy growing. I have realized in the past month that my extroverted nature has always been one of my best "medications" for narcolepsy. I have even recognized how my current teaching load, and its lack of interactive moments, has been a portion of my struggle this past year. But, I should never have felt the rush that I did yesterday. I had nothing when I entered the meeting. I was so wired by the end that one of my team members, the two technology department members and I spent another 45 minutes talking about further ideas. Of course, the downside was that my energy crashed as I was driving home. I was a tad worried, but made it home safely. I even rallied to head out again for a set of errands. That hasn't happened for months. More than anything, it has given me hope.

I know that my current course load has been dragging me down, but I don't think I fully realized it until yesterday. Many things will go wrong next year. Plenty of stresses will arise. The technology elements we discussed yesterday will certainly create a slew of headaches at times. I have no delusions that my next school year will be paradise, yet I feel giddy whenever I think about it. My week has been crazy and stressful, but I awoke today a little lighter. I had more verve throughout the day. While nothing is ever easy with narcolepsy, I firmly believe that my life will get better next year. I will still be tired every moment of the day, but the chance to interact with my team teachers and my students every day will help counteract my excessive daytime sleepiness. It won't "cure" me, but it will be much more fun to be a teacher.

The two other lessons from yesterday are also vitally important to me. I must remember how important it is for me to reach out to others. I gain strength from engaging, not retreating. At the same time, I do need to recognize that constantly throwing myself into the fray will lead to me crashing so hard that I will endanger myself and others. I was caught off guard by my burst of energy and let it explode. As a result, I was caught off guard by the tremendous crash that followed and put myself at risk. Balance remains the key. I will find more life in my teaching next year, but I must still be wise enough to limit my output, particularly when I am feeling great. I desperately want summer to arrive, but I have never been more excited for the fall to start. As I have said before, no word fits life better than paradox!