wishing I could use my head more and heart less

It was a rather emotional day yesterday. I had parent teacher conferences until eight, and then I dreamed about the kids all night. It was the first time I’ve ever completely redirected a parent in front of their child—actually nicely chewed them out in front of their child. Told them how they were treating her was unacceptable and cruel, that they needed to act like the parent and get in touch with reality. The conversation lasted nearly an hour, and all of us at one point or another were in tears. It was one of those moments where you think about what the consequences could be of your words. You could lose your job. You could cause a lot of drama. You could be the one fucking person who has actually stood up for a little girl to her face and tried to do something. One of the moments when you remember what is important—and it isn’t keeping your job.
After, I went to my principal and social worker and gave them a warning (my principal has always asked if we do something that might make a parent upset to let her know so that she won’t be taken off guard—I’ve had to do that more than once). While I kept my tone respectful, I broke about every rule there is in public education. Don’t make judgment calls or tell a family what they are doing wrong, blah, blah, blah. I was expecting, at the very least, (even though my principal is crazy awesome) a reminder of my professional responsibilities. Instead, she said, ‘Good job. That’s what I would have said—someone needs to.’ Crazy awesome. Take that college professors at UNC who told me I shouldn’t be a teacher because I was too concerned about the kids lives and not worried enough about Shakespeare (Which is why I abandoned my teaching degree the first time around)!
Developing a crush on someone has also come with its pit falls—much more than when I was just going on dates and excited to see someone. While I have no idea how things may go with this boy or if it is even smart, I do have a pretty sizable crush on him. Which is triggering a refresher course on how much I love and miss Chad—you know, just in case I’d somehow forgotten. And, it’s strange to actually have feelings for someone else who isn’t the man that I can’t seem to not see as my husband (how’s that for a confusing sentence?). To top yesterday off, it was the first time in several weeks when I couldn’t stop the tears over him and stuff the ache that has become such a constant that I don’t even notice it.
Tonight, my principal (crazy awesome, remember) is letting me jet out of conferences early to go to dinner and a musical (In the Heights) with my bff and his bf. Should offer some solace, stability, laughter, and love in the midst of it all.

(Just realized this is my 500th post. Huh.)