A Sacred Time

On Wednesday last week I found out that without treatment, I have a year to live. With chemotherapy, I would gain about 2 months. I decided to enter into a Phase 2 Trial of immunotherapy and vaccines because I figure science is my best shot and if it doesn’t work, at least I’ve contributed something.

I talked with my Rabbi yesterday. It’s hard being Jewish sometimes. There’s no focus on an afterlife since we focus on the here and now. After all, no one’s come back to tell us what an afterlife is – if there even is one. It’s a bit scary, but it feels more realistic to me and easier to handle. I’ll be judged on my study of the Torah, my honesty in my business dealings, and my gifts to charity (tzedakah). Seems fair to me.

So instead we talked about how this is a sacred time for me. Throughout most of human existence, we had no idea when we would die. It just happened, young or old. Religion handled that pretty well for most people. It was what it was and that was that. Now, with the advent of serious medical science, we can now know (in some cases at least) our “expiration date.” And that leaves us in a weird place where we feel like (or I feel like) I have to accomplish certain things before I die, yet simultaneously keep up my hope that the Phase 2 Trial buys me more time that is “good” time. Rabbi talked to me about how this is the time to be selfish, to try to remain centered, and to think about my goals.

I am still not sure what my goals are. So many of them revolve around my daughter. I love her desperately, but she is struggling with mental health issues like so many of this COVID generation. She is not working and sabotaged herself at school this last spring. I don’t know if her therapist understands. My daughter is angry a lot and I don’t know how to help her. I worry so much about her. I want her to be employed or in school full-time just so I don’t worry about her when I am gone, whenever that may be. But as Rabbi said, this is not my goal – I can’t make goals for others.

So what is my goal? I want to teach this year. I really want to teach my Intro to Criminal Justice course if at all possible, but I also understand my department chair’s fear that I may not make it through the semester. I’d like to help with Debate and Speech, but I’m not sure how much time I care to devote to it with limited time left. Part of me wants to just chuck it all and travel in the 3-week increments that I have between immunotherapy sessions. But I don’t know if that’s even possible. Sometimes I just want to buy an electric bike so I can enjoy getting outside. Yet that seems expensive for limited funds…and potentially limited time. I also want to write, to see if I’m any good at it. A memoir would be nice. Mom won’t recall things as easily and I’d like to get her story (and Grandma’s) down if at all possible.

What is my goal? What is my goal? What IS my goal? One year left, and time is moving on.

A teacher embarks into the land of COVID-19

A funny thing happened on the way to the forum… no, wait, that’s not it. In the week before Spring Break, our governor ordered a shutdown of all schools, giving us some time to figure out how to do “distance learning” without the students at school.

For the first couple of days, we attended online meetings helping us find curriculum/lesson planning options, which was great. Our department decamped to a very large classroom so we could watch it together – appropriately spaced out throughout the classroom – to watch and participate. We were on mute, so we could discuss in real-time what was being suggested. And one teacher was on his phone – for a good reason, bringing a colleague in on the discussion as she worked from home. Very professional, right?

And we texted on our phones during the meeting and looked at news websites (we are high school social studies teachers, after all).

We chatted socially (something that is tolerable in a classroom – to a point).

In response to a question about whether Google Hangout lets students dump the teacher out of the Hangout as one colleague had heard, we were told “it’s probably pretty difficult so I doubt someone would do it” – and the screen the leader was on promptly went dark: “So-and-so has left the meeting.”

The teacher being helpful on his phone proudly admitted he just dropped our meeting coordinator, and it was super easy.

Fortunately, the coordinator came back on “I don’t know what happened there” and laughed when told of the “simulated student behavior.”

We became our students in about 7 minutes flat.

But I swear, “We were paying attention, Miss!”