Don’t think I am making light of a serious subject.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have seen abusive relationships for real,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fortunately, always from the outside,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But sometimes first hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So I am<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dead<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Serious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Teaching…<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are my profession,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And I’ve had a long, long relationship with you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But Teaching, I have to say,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This has become an abusive relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was so in love with you, Teaching,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the start.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You seemed to share my deepest values.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The individual voice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Knowing facts, but also telling the Truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Inspiring love of learning,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Love of reading,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Love of writing,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Knowing the power of words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We wanted the same things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We worked together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You appreciated my creativity and you encouraged me to grow<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a person and as a professional.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sure, there were some growing pains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The kids we had in our care were a bit difficult to deal with at times,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But you helped me to find ways to deal with them,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And our time with them, and with each other,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Got better and better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To this day, Teaching,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I remain enamored of you still.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When did it begin to go all wrong?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Perhaps it was when you insisted on judging me<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For things that were beyond my control, turning one little feature<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Of our relationship<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Into the only thing that mattered,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Blowing it all out of proportion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You felt you had to test me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Constantly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And then there was the issue of trust.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once upon a time we had a relationship<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Where we had certain expectations of each other,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Commitments that I took seriously and worked hard to meet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But then you started to not trust me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You started telling me what to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And then when to do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And then how to do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You told me to stop thinking for myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You got… controlling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You demanded compliance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And yet,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When I would think about leaving you, Teaching,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You would act like things were better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You would appear to relent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And I would decide to stay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Maybe things would get better now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You told me you had a new set of standards we would live by,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And they would renew and transform our relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They looked good the way you presented them at first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They promised more freedom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Things would be different this time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But then, after I’d recommitted, things only got worse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now you tried to control,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not just the how and the what and the when,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the why, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You tried to control my thoughts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You asked me to betray my most deeply held beliefs,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The very reasons I had gotten into our relationship in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You asked me to betray myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Worst of all,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You asked me<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To betray the children in our care,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To betray their trust.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To tell them their stories don’t matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That education is nothing but facts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That they are cogs in a machine,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Scores,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And that’s when I was ready to leave once and for all,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To get out of this abusive relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But there was no way to take the kids with me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Maybe it was then that I realized that you were no longer yourself,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You had been kidnapped,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Replaced by someone or something that looked like Teaching,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But was really someone else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are now an impostor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are not Teaching anymore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are Standardization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are Reform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are Compliance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are Test Prep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are Hoop-jumping.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are Text Complexity and Zombie New Criticism and Writing to Text.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are Rigor as torture<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And Death to<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Creativity, Curiosity, and<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Wonder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are… everything that is not really Teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But I am not leaving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I am calling you out for the impostor you are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I am searching for the real Teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are still there, somewhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And I will find you again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Don’t think I am making light of a serious subject. I have seen abusive relationships for real, Fortunately, always from the outside, But sometimes first hand. So I am Dead Serious. Teaching… You are my profession, And I’ve had a long, long relationship with you. But Teaching, I have to say, This has become an Read More >><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[13,70,39,69],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":162,"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161\/revisions\/162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrfitz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}