My first day in Canada

Started with some border troubles. Apparently they think I'm overqualified to be considered a volunteer, because I have an undergraduate degree, from Brown no less, though I can't tell whether that part meant anything to them or not. Was held up for an hour and (politely) interrogated and investigated. They looked at my letter of invitation, which Tim said they probably wouldn't need, and my criminal background check statement of official cleanliness from the Cumberland County Sheriff in Maine. He asked to see my diploma, which obviously I carry with me everywhere, and a CV, which I never had to show anyone to land this job, and also don't generally carry around, being a 23 year old vagabond over all else, but I did have 2 laptops in tow, and good thing too, because the old one had some resumes saved on it. My brain was moving slowly and aching because I didn't sleep at all the prior night, I stayed up to inefficiently and meticulously pack all my belongings in Anchorage, after I finished partying and saying goodbye to all my train friends, around 2:30 in the morning. Nicole, Hope and Caitlin were having a slumber party on Blair's king size bed in his vacated room, but I was working on getting my stuff together. Despite the horrible and chronic sleep deprivation, and its eventually unavoidable and undeniable consequences, I remembered I had a resume on that computer and sooner or later found an up to date one with all relevant teaching experience etc. Shortly after that I realized that I was still carrying around the program from the Department Ceremony of my Brown graduation. Because I'm sappy and sentimental like that, and thought it was a worthwhile memento to keep around. So I showed him that as well.

I'm not sure if it was ultimately good or bad of me to prove my worth and qualifications so thoroughly to the border police. It seems they're pretty strict with their immigration policies up here (I'm entirely unsure of why, especially with their southern neighbors who have no real motive to sneak up here to stay, work and live for extended periods, at least not while we have no military draft going, but there it is nevertheless) so his options upon reviewing my credentials were to A) detain me, B) deport me, or C) charge me $150 for a 60 day visa.

He chose option C, which I guess is good because the other two would have been a great hassle, and I would have had to rework my plans for the year a bit, though I'm sure I would have made the most of it. I was rather tired to face either that night. My understanding is that now most of the work is in Tim's hands, but he needs to open my job to the Canadian labor market, and if some Canadian labor board decides I am indeed the most or only qualified person for the job then I'll get a work visa and be allowed to stay more than 60 days. I think this will mean that he also has to pay me. Which is pretty cool I guess. I hope it doesn't unduly tax the institution, but my understanding is that I wasn't going to get paid originally more because getting a work visa sounded unpromising and like a lot of unfortunate bureaucratic effort than because he didn't want to pay me or didn't think I deserved to get paid. So I think it will work out for the best for all of us.

In the meantime, upon regaining consciousness this morning after the first night's solid sleep in a while, I toured the school with Tim and quite quickly reached the conclusion that they could use a bit more cash. So I started to brainstorm ways to get it, and I'm planning to write up a proposal in the next few weeks and see what I can come up with. Appeal to one or two of the wealthy sugar daddies I know. The ones with extra dough lying around they don't know what to do with, who believe in creative, innovative, dynamic, passionate, international, community-service-heavy education and want to help a little baby school get on its feet and make some more magic happen. So, dear reader, if you know anyone who matches this description, make sure to send their name (or money) my way. For now, I have at least one lead I plan to pursue.

We struck a spontaneous deal that if I get the school some money (the off the top of my head goal is 500,000-1,000,000,000, but I'm going to try to hash out a few more budgetary details before I write any official proposals) Tim will make sure I get to go to the world's biggest Shakespeare festival, which is apparently not far from us in Washington state somewhere. I'd never heard of it before this morning, when his wife Melissa mentioned it to me, but it piqued my interest, so I chose that as my incentivizing prize for success. I still can't remember the name of it.

I was awoken this morning-- in my new bedroom, in a dorm, which I found with Tim last night around 9 pm or so, after dining hurriedly on leftover chicken stew at his house after he retrieved me from the Victoria airport 45 minutes or so of driving away--, by Tim and Jerry, the Head of School. (Tim's the Principal.) I doubt I made a great first impression on Jerry, exhausted, groggy and bedraggled and pajama-ed as I was at 11 am, but I said hello and apologized for my extreme fatigue, feeling it was fairly justified. Tim recommended I make it to lunch at noon, so I roused myself, took a shower, got dressed and made it. I met a few of my fellow teachers over there, and ate some food. When I was finished, I went to see Tim in his office, and he took me on a private campus tour. What a lovely chap. We struck up our deal on the way down to check out the lake. I also met another coworker down there, Diana, who teaches French and two or three other things. They like to make the most of their faculty here. One of the many repercussions of not having many students or quite enough monetary revenue. But it's also kinda cool, they're making the most of everyone's varied skills and expertise. Making us work for our money, or theoretical lack thereof in the case of some of us.

I made my way back onto campus with Diana, into the French Annex where I met the campus lizard, quite lovely, and told Diana a bit about myself. Shortly thereafter, she demanded a chance to read my literary arts thesis, my 30,000 word whimsical magnum opus of silliness and gargantuan proportions. So we're off to a good start there.

Eventually it was 2:15, and time at last for me to meet my class. I did so, with style and panache. Sonia, my co-teacher and fellow-at-arms, who's been graciously holding down the fort and forging a productive and symbiotic class dynamic for the past 2 weeks, kicked the year off with a newspaper project. The students are writing articles, and had brainstormed some interview questions, many of which were written up on the white board. Sonia suggested that they practice on me, to get to know me and concurrently hone their interviewing skills.

No punches were pulled, on either end. They asked me tough and excellent questions. Including, but not limited to: "Where do you see yourself in 10 years?" "What are your 3 biggest fears?" "What do you hope to learn or do in BC?" "What's your spark?" That last requires some explanation. The Dwight school motto is something to do with uncovering each student's unique "spark of genius." I suppose it means one's passion, reason for being, motive for getting up in the morning. I don't feel I entirely understand what specifically is meant by the expression or the question, and it would be hard for me to pick just one thing even if I did, so I waffled about and listed a few things I love and am passionate about. Friendship, people, love, travel, writing, reading, acting, I believe were all included in that verbal list. I probably forgot to mention sailing and adventure, but oh well. We have all year to get to know each other. It's good they didn't get it all in one shot.

I already like all the little buggers. There are 14 of them. One sixth grader, the rest are 7th or 8th. Most are Canadian, there's one who's from South Africa but has lived for a while in New Jersey and there's another from Hong Kong. Most of them are day students, rather than boarders. It'll take a while before I can talk at length about any of them, or remember all their names, but I had a good chat with a few of the boys about hockey, and I think I made a friend out of the resident class genius. When I came in I told them to call me Shana, since we all agreed "Miss Tinkle" sounds extremely silly. I unintentionally opened a can of worms by saying I would call them anything they wanted me to, within reason. One fellow requested I call him King Edward III. Actually, this will probably be a good way for me to have pseudonyms for them on here, so I don't have to worry about talking about them behind their backs, if I feel so inclined. I probably won't much, for the sake of professionalism and confidentiality and all that important good stuff, but for the sake of writing entertaining anecdotes, I might have to from time to time. In any case, Eddie 3 is clearly a very bright individual with a curious mind and a knack for history in particular. Towards the end of the class, Sonia mentioned that she wanted to work on articles with some members of the class, and pulled them out of the interviewing session. After that, the class structure was mostly broken down. It was 2:45-3:20 on a Friday afternoon, last block, and I didn't have much interest in keeping them all in their seats to barrage them with more info about me. So we threw around some bean bags and listened to some music and talked about hockey, and the King asked if he could go to the library to read. I told him I had no objections, as long as he checked in with Sonia on his way in and she had no problem with it.

As far as I'm concerned, that's how teachers should always respond to a student's request to go read in the library. It's not how mine were usually received when I was in middle school, but I think my time would generally have been better spent that way, and it was a mistake on those educators' parts to say no to me.

Basically, I appear to be in an environment where I am allowed and encouraged to put into practice the philosophy of education I started out being raised on and have always believed in. So far, I'm a pretty huge fan of the situation.

After class got out, I attended a faculty meeting in the intimate and renovatable, but still rather charming little campus library. I mostly listened, trying to soak it in and get a sense of the place and how things work. I definitely have a lot of bearings to determine and catching up and settling in to do. Thus far, I've been doing so efficiently.

Meeting got out around 5. Chatted with Sonia and Melissa about having a meeting with the girls in my dorm because apparently there have been some pretty serious issues already emerging this year. Dinner was 5:30-6:30. The food here is, as promised, quite nice. Simple, and limited in options, but tasty. And there's salad, fresh fruit and vegetables, so I feel like train world detox is under way already, and I feel pretty good about the situation before me. Not so sure how I feel about the drum set on the stage in the cafeteria, but regardless of how I feel in practice, I certainly find the concept quite delightful. Tim thinks the dining hall needs a more creative name. I suggested the Nosh Nook. He also wants better names for the dorms, currently A, B, C and D. We're thinking something thematically linked. Like Azalea, Begonia, Chrysanthemum and Daffodil. Or Daisy. But these are just early brainstorms, given time I'm sure we'll come up with something better.

I got caught up in conversation at dinner with a couple of upper level students, 11th and 12th grade boys from Iran and…somewhere, Hong Kong perhaps, and Chiara, a girl who has been helping out in Sonia and my classroom and who plans to stick around until November or December. She attended the Dwight School in New York, which is where she hails from, and she is planning to attend Harvard next year, after her gap year gets done. The boys were asking me about college, and about why I chose Brown, and one of them, before long said, "You really hate Harvard, don't you?" I tried to explain that I was trying to be polite and not rag on Harvard, but that I actually don't hate it at all. I just didn't think it was the right fit for me, and I think it's the kind of school that many people go to or want to go to for reasons I'm not crazy about. People want to go there because it's super famous, and has a big-ass reputation, and it can help them get high-paying high-profile jobs after they graduate. None of that interests me. I wanted to go to a school where people wanted to be themselves and enjoy learning and not take themselves or anything else too seriously. And I think Brown is kind of a good middle ground, because it's that, but if you want it to, it can also help you go cool places in life. But I see that more as a convenient side effect, rather than a reason for going there. Or something like that.

I actually ended up chatting with several of the older students, those boys at dinner and some girls in my dorm (Dandelion Dorm, upper level, where the 13 boarding girls and Sonia and her family live) about colleges. Because it's something I know a thing or two about, and have thought about on and off, one way or another for at least 6-8 years now. And I guess it's the kind of thing that comes up now and then at a boarding prep-ish IB-ish school, even a hippie dippie follow-your-bliss sort of school. I don't mind, I think I have some good wisdom to impart. Mostly I try to tell youngsters not to stress so much, and just to go places they think they will be happy, learn something and have a good time. Everything beyond that is fairly irrelevant.

I had a little down time after dinner, during which I rang my parents and chatted a bit. Then we had our problem-solving powwow in our classroom module--me, Sonia, Melissa and seven of our thirteen ladies in residence. It took about an hour and a half, but I think it was productive. In any case, it ended with chocolate. Not a bad place to start.

I spent most of the rest of the night chatting with the various (hopefully former) factions of girls, about this and that, and nothing in particular, mostly fun light-hearted stuff. I seem to have most of them on my side anyway. This is promising to me. I have high hopes of harboring a happy, healthy, fun, comfortable, respectful and kind kind of living environment. My ultimate goal is dance parties in the hallways, but I'll take what I can get for now.

So…so far so good. I think I'm off for a fruitful and delightful, exhilarating and extremely educational year. Here's to it.

I figure I'll feel overwhelmed and exhausted a great deal of the time. But when I do, I can remind myself that Sonia does everything I do along with raising and parenting 4 kids. And Tim does everything he does (and more) with a wife and 3 kids and 2 cats and a dog in his house. I think this will help me count my blessings, hours of sleep, and maintain a sense of perspective. And it should help me stick to my singular sense of singleness and celebratory celibacy. Heck. Yes.

I am thinking about adopting a cat though. We'll see.