“but some people are stronger in the broken places.”
-Ernest Hemingway
Dearest Readers,
Wherever you are, whomever you are, please for a moment disregard the fact that stoicism did not end up working out that well for Hemingway himself. Instead, imagine that you teach 4th grade.
You are the fixer of wrinkled purple polo shirts, the squirter of GermX, and the sweeper of floors.
You are the tyrant of recess, the author of referrals, the target for flying bits of broken crayon, the harbinger of homework, and the recipient of excuses.
In the past two months, you suffered theft, humiliation, verbal abuse, and yes, bodily injury at the hands of some of the most vociferous nine-year-olds ever to walk the earth.
Right about now, a bit “keep your chin up” advice from the undisputed badass of American literature, prescience notwithstanding, sounds pretty damn good.