see u next year :0

fifth graders pregame the day with red 40 and sugar.

recess is at 8am for some reason.

the idea, i guess, is that parents will be incentivized to drop their kids off on time.

bad idea.

the pregame consists of family sized bags of flavor blasted takis and ring pops. their tongues are stained red, mustaches of sugar.

they sow metaphysical and real physical chaos and destruction unto one another at recess and afterwards, panting and seething, hormones and sugar and chemicals surging through their veins, they are herded into math class.

an hour of math and the sugar high is wearing off. big emotions are spilling over from unresolved conflict during recess. newly formed, easily bruised egos have been shattered.

i marvel at them, these alien creatures. they have only one decade and some change of life under their belts. i don’t envy them.

both of us think the other is strange and bizarre.

i eat strange foods. like beans, all kinds of beans. i eat black beans, white beans, butter beans, great northern beans, garbanzo beans, lentils. i eat beans because i refuse to go grocery shopping until i have used up every single ingredient that i have and i always have beans.

fifth graders love to blame their shortcomings on autism and adhd.

i tell them everyone has autism and adhd. i tell them to lay off the red 40. i like to be blunt with them.

we speak candidly about death. they don’t want to die. i say no one wants to but it is a part of life. they want to die of old age. they know nothing of old age. neither do i.

sometimes i am surprised when fifth graders, with their strange alien digital brains, struggle to use the computer.

i forget that they are only ten. by the time they are my age, they will be capable of accessing esoteric digital realities that will not concern me in the slightest.

fifth graders want to look out the window. they want to go outside. so do i.

i like to go hunting for owls in the park. i am not killing them, i am stalking the owls while they stalk their prey.

the owls are the gods of the park. i address them as such. i am reverent.

turns out you have to look to see. this is true of most things. i follow the sounds until i see the owls. they are on a higher plan physically and spiritually. there is no anxiety or hestitation when they fly. they are flying because it is part of the greater purpose. the rhythm of life tells them to fly and so they fly.

i talk to the owls in my lushious massacr voice. i imagine the two owls talking to each other in a lushious massacr voice. they talk to each other, perched on different trees, and then one owl will fly to the other owl so they can hang out and stalk prey together.

i ask the owls, gods of the park for wisdom and courage. they swivel their heads 270 degrees, turning their backs on me. the struggle isn’t real.

no toys allowed in math class, meaning i get to confiscate all the dollar store fidget toys and play with them.

my favorite fidget is called piggy.

piggy is an iridescent pink pig filled with bursting beads. sometimes she makes squelching noises when you squeeze her.

pretty sure i got mkultrad as a child in my school’s gifted program which gave me adhd and autism,

everytime i sit down to write, my brain freezes up.

my fingers move across the trackpad on autopilot. i travel from screen to screen in a fugue state. from app to app, my eyes and neurons process the same, dull information in same preordained patterns.

i do this dance every day and nothing comes of it except the same feelings of numbness and disappointment. i am trapped and cannot write.

reading anna karenina in an attempt to jailbreak my brain. found an old copy on a bookshelf in my parent’s house. the print is so small and the book is so fat i can barely crack it open and i really have to squint to read each tiny word.

it is quite a promethean feat, reading anna karenina. it is going to solve all my problems.

must try to adopt and embody a tolstoyian consciousness. which dworkin would argue is impossible to do, because he’s a man, but the impenetrable unknowability of a woman viewed by a man runs parallel to woman’s own contemplation of the void.

setting my alarm for 555, for new rebirth inside. snoozing the alarm for 45 minutes, late to work. there is no point in setting my alarm for 555 just to ignore it. i am turning away from new rebirth inside, each time i do this dance. i am trapped and cannot be reborn.

reading the beans at the bottom of my bean soup bowl like they are tea leaves. there are three beans, butter beans, one on top of the other, the third displaced. not getting a clear read from the beans. i cannot see the future. it’s ok though because the struggle isn’t real.

last day of school for the year. there are winter festivities. pizza and candy and chips. more red dye and sugar. i macrodose alongside the fifth graders until everyone has a stomach ache and it is the hour of parting. we set the wild animals free.

i tell the wild animals i’ll see u next year. they take the joke in stride. not a touch of irony.