Another First Day

As I lay in bed last Tuesday night and thought about what was to come the next morning I had a series of familiar yet new feelings. Wednesday was the first day of school. I've had about 19 of those in my life already, so you might expect me to be used to them by now. But this one was different. This first day was my first day of school not as a student. This was the first time in my life that I was going to walk into a building, meet teachers and greet the principal as a teacher. Not a student. As a teacher - I'm on the other side now.

Oddly, I had a whole bunch of the same thoughts and fears about this first day as I've had about many other first days of school in the past:

• What would my class be like?
• Would the kids be nice?
• Would I get along with the teachers?
• Would I turn down a wrong hallway and get lost?

A new thought I had this time around, though, that seemed to calm my nerves was this: I have been trained to do this. I successfully completed four hard years of college to be here now. I am qualified.

Looking back, I'm happy to report that this year's first day of school went very well. I could see the anxiety I had been feeling in the student's faces. They were nervous, not quite sure that they were ready to leave their parents or the joys of the summer holidays behind them as they stepped into the classroom. They were most likely asking some of the same questions I had wondered about the night before. This is a new year for everyone, though. We're all a bit unsure of what will happen, how everything will work out, and when that terrible day will come (because it always does) when we embarrass ourselves in front of everyone.

I have decided to embrace the unknown, let myself be stretched by it, and learn from it. Here we go!