For years I slept fitfully because I had sleep apnea and was too proud to get it treated. About 15 years ago - when I retired from teaching and moved to Tallahassee - I had a sleep study done - and was treated for apnea. What a life changing moment. Now it is not unusual to get 8 to 10 hours every night of deep sleep. When I say deep sleep - I mean out like a light - not moving - and relatively dreamless.
But last night I had a dream or nightmare depending on your perspective. I usually do not remember the details - but this one was so real it frightened me.
It was 15 years ago that I retired from teaching on my 55th birthday. Pennsylvania had a retirement plan that gave you full pension - medical insurance for Lulu and I until we were 65 - and a $15K bonus - if you left then. They figured they could pay two rookies for the cost of my salary. As I left - school computers and testing were in their infancy. Teachers were pretty much on their own on what they could teach and how they did it. Hindsight is always romantic - but surprisingly - I never wished that I were back in the classroom - nor did I dream about it like Daisy Werthan in Driving Miss Daisy.
Today on Ground Hog Day morning - I had my first dream about being back in the classroom - at least it is the first one I can remember.
In the dream - I am not sure why - but I was back at the Panther Valley Middle School as a substitute teacher. Leave it to me to dream about substitutes being paid more than regular teachers because we were the most experienced. When I was there in 1970 to 2003 - they paid subs ⅓ what they paid regular teachers.
In the dream - I was teaching and using all of the latest technology we have today. Unfortunately - the other teachers were stuck in the time warp of 2003. They still had paper grade books - lesson plans - movie projectors - black boards - and textbooks. Nothing had changed. I on the other hand had all my lessons on my iPhone. I would project everything onto a white screen in broad daylight - no need to darken the room. We turned in our lessons - grades - attendance over the Net.
My world was in my iPhone. I could use it as a laser pointer while teaching my lessons. It was my life. I taught from wikipedia - read the newspaper - read textbooks - and I never had a pile of papers to grade.
As the dream moved on - it started turning into the movie Ground Hog Day. I would be back in my hometown - near Punxatawny Pennsylvania - and every day I would wake up to my smashed iPhone on the table next to my bed. I would be panicking everyday wondering how I could survive without my little info holy grail. My day would always start with my searching for something to build a lesson around. I was an earth science teacher - and I always came up with something. How about a story about a full moon - or a blue moon - or a super moon - or a blood red super blue moon. In the dream - sometimes I resorted to just making up a lesson out of nothing. That could never happen in real life.
In Ground Hog Day - one of my all time favorite movies - the newsman played by Bill Murray - woke up to an old digital clock with the flipping numbers. In my Ground Hog Day - I would wake up to my iPhone with a screen pulverized by a hammer. The rest of my life was to be condemned to going into the same classroom - with the same smashed cellphone - and trying to come up with a lesson plan to entertain the kids.
I liked being a teacher. I never loved my job. My working class upbringing told me that everyone had to have a job. Spending it in a school with 700 kids from 8 to 3 for 180 days a year filled that commitment. It was a job - sometimes a very enjoyable job - that paid the bills so that I could enjoy a better life with my family. The summers off to travel were a bonus. I learned later that the medical insurance was the cherry on top of the sundae. Of course these things mattered after world peace and the kids getting a wonderful education.
This morning when I got up on Groundhog Day - it was 6:02 AM - it was still dark outside. I reached for my iPhone on the table and the screen was not broken. I went to Apple Music and put on "I Got You Babe." It was 2018 - my iPhone was working - Lulu was still sleeping - and retirement goes on.
I really can't imagine how hard it is for teachers today. They must contend with overstimulated kids - so many outside distractions - parents on the treadmill of success or not - and just the condition of the world.
If Punxatawny Phil were in Tallahassee - he would not have seen his shadow today because it was cloudy - and spring would start today. Life goes on. It's on to the next adventure with my unbroken iPhone in my pocket.
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