Wind In My Head: Hazards of the Profession
Wind In My Head
Friday, June 10, 2005
Hazards of the Profession
Let me state from the outset, I'm not setting foot on another ferry/vessel for a long while. We're just back from Bintan after our fishing expedition last weekend and the ferry back this time round could rival the tossing and roiling that we experienced on the fishing trip. Sufficed to say, there were many churny tummies and inevitably, throw up from Beth(the god-daughter aka the niece) who couldn't keep her ice cream down, try as she may.It was an eventful four days in Bintan, plagued with illness. Dan woke up Monday morning with gastric flu. So he spent most of the ferry ride, bus ride and the rest of Monday comatosed. Tuesday, he's up and about, breathing in Bintan air and with that, Bintan dust. We were in one of those nice bungalows with beautiful drapes and curtains that probably hadn't been cleaned since the resort opened. So, his asthma strikes and strikes so hard we call in the on call physician at 4 am. She comes complete with a nurse and an oxygen tank that reminds me of geriatrics in retirement homes who wheel it around. By Wednesday morning, he's fine but you know that saying, I can't quite remember it but it goes along the lines of one getting better because whatever's bad been passed on? Well, yup. He's good because I have the cramping, not so nauseous version of his gastric flu. And Thursday, we go home and Beth gets sea sick on the boat.
But whatever it is holidays are always good. It would be better if we had holidays when the kids were at school. Seeing that we are the main instruments of their formal education, that is physically impossible. This is usually just inconvenient because it means that air fares are more expensive and where ever we go, there are kids.
Bintan was no different. Except this time, it was a kid I knew and had taught before. And she wasn't with her parents, but with a boy obviously not of college age. At first, I thought maybe she was with her brother and her mom because a lady walked in about the same time she did. But the look of horror she gave me spoke volumes. Perhaps because she was supposed to be at a chalet IN Singapore or a camp in school. So she went to all extremes to avoid me only to have me, Dan and my brother's entire family in a small minibus with them to the ferry terminal and back to Singapore. At some point, I was in a dilemma. Should I acknowledge her and let her know that I know that whatever lie she told her parents, I now knew and had some wicked hold over her? Or should I acknowledge her and let her imagine what I was going to do and whether I was going to rat her out? Or, or should I actually give her the benefit of the doubt and allow myself to think that her parents had okay-ed the trip? Especially since my parents let me go away to Club Med with my college boyfriend? But then again, that was with other friends and having the poor boyfriend subject to a stern talking to by my parents about how we should be in separate rooms and how the wrath of God would be brought upon him if anything untoward, in any and every sense, happened to me. And that, coming from my dad is enough to make the most brazen of teenage boyfriends quake in their Nike high tops.
But then again, having been there and done that, I couldn't believe that any parent would let their near 18 daughter go away alone with her boyfriend. So, my eventual conclusion was that the parents could not have known.
This is after I was told by some other students about kids very openly having sex on school grounds. Can anyone say EEEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWW??? So not only do I have to deal with grading sub standard work, I have to contend with such images in my head. Seriously, the hazards of my profession. My dentist says I grind my teeth because of stress. Can anyone blame me? :)
Ondine tossed this thought in at 12:17
1 thoughts...
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At 6:13 pm
yogajunkie said... who's Beth?
