Fiiiiiiiix Itttttttt!!!

Let me first say that I love my job! Yes there are days when it's stressful, but overall, it's truly a joy to get up and go to work every day. Knowing that I work at a middle school, you may find yourself questioning the wisdom of this, but trust me - there is much to love about this job.

Though each day is different, the one thing I know I can count on every single day is interesting interactions with our students. Today was no exception.

Just before lunch, one of our students stormed into the office, clearly upset. He stated that someone had 'stolen' his wallet during PE. When I asked him where his wallet was and he told me that he'd left it in his backpack and felt that it was safe sitting outside the lockerroom area because 'there is a yellow line painted around it which means it's a safe zone'. Huh. Apparently, it isn't.

I felt bad that his wallet was missing, BUT, this particular child has an attitude a mile wide - and has since he came to our school two years ago. I began a dialog with this student reminding him that both the Principal an the Assistant Principal have one our school-wide newscast every moring telling students to keep their personal belongings with them, or put it in their PE locker for safekeeping, and asking why he hadn't put his wallet in his locker during his PE class. He completely ignored the implication of responsiblity, told me his locker has never worked and he refuses to talk to his PE teacher about it, and ended the tirade by shouting "I am the victim here!"

Hmmm. I think not. The victim of your own irresponsiblity, perhaps. Just then our Assistant Principal walked into the office and I explained to her what was going on. As I was talking, the student let out a huge whine "Just Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiix Itttttttttttttttttt!!"

Now, I was pretty irritated with this kid, but I couldn't help but stifle a laugh. If you have a middle school kid, know a middle school kid - or let's face it - were a middle school kid, you know that this is absolutely the response you would expect.

Eventually he calmed down, apologized for his behavior and went back to class. We weren't able to "fix it", but his wallet did show up later, so everything turned out just fine.

The interaction just made me smile - not the behavior part, but hey, he's just a kid - but the part about wanting to just shout 'Fiiiiiiiix itttttttt!' and really believe that someone can do just that. If only life were that easy.

...but who knows? Hope springs eternal, right? ;o)