Stick in the Eye

When I was a student, I was a good one. I handed in my work ahead of time, always did the extra-credit projects, and generally expected others to do their best. As you can imagine, I was sorely disappointed on a regular basis.

The summer between my junior and senior years of high school, I attended the Summer Institute for a few weeks at a college campus hours from my hometown. I was one of those students who opted to spend my summer break learning more and spending time with like-minded, self-proclaimed geniuses.

The focus of my intensive classes was creative writing. For this small town, conservative girl, it meant spending time with kids who flippantly used colorful language (in the name of creativity) and had more "worldly" knowledge than I cared to explore. But their writing was amazing. Maybe even because of these things their writing was amazing.

My roommate was another conservative, small town girl from a different area of the state. Her focus was biology. She is a nurse now so I guess we're both using our experiences properly. She was upbeat, beautiful, and painfully optimistic, even for me. She used this phrase that is maybe more common than I give it credit:

It's better than a sharp stick in the eye.

Those words rang in my ears today as I did school with Number 2 looking out a window of yet more falling snow.

Well, it's better than a sharp stick in the eye.

Number 2 is a bare minimum type of kid who just wants to pass. He's always asking to opt out of certain lessons or somehow simplify the process. I admit I have given in on more than one occasion and it may be biting me in the rear. The lessons today were physically painful.

A couple years ago my hubby and I were desperate to expand our income. I mean, really low. He had been laid off for several months and the credit cards were maxed out. Just then a plasma donation center opened up a reasonable drive from our house. So we both donated plasma to make $50-$100 a week.

Did I mention that I'm anemic, have a really super-fast heartbeat, bruise easily, and generally don't like giving away parts or my anatomy? Well I'm mentioning it now. All this to explain that today, I would have run into a chair to let a nurse stick me with a needle just to escape the responsibility of educating my offspring. If teachers around the globe ever feel this way, we should require goggles just in case anybody wants to test the sharp stick in the eye theory. I have my doubts.

Maybe I'm upset that a security guard doing rounds yesterday wrote me up for leaving my trash on the front porch for ten minutes. Maybe I am in some serious need of a Spring Break. Maybe I can expel some of my frustration by making lovely greeting cards and drinking Mai-tais by the fireside tonight. Yeah. That should do it.

There's one other phrase I never could figure out. "It ain't no thang but a chicken wang" Maybe I'll use that one tomorrow during school. Or maybe there'll be a snow day and we'll cancel altogether. Maybe that's where it's better than a sharp stick in the eye.