Dear Middle School Friends of Room 124,

I’m preparing you now so you have some time to compose yourself at my mention of the word UDDERS tomorrow. And a scene showing a woman from 1889 simply milking her family’s cow. Yes, milk comes from the cow. Through her Udders. Cheers!

Fondly, Ms. Wise

Attention Middle School Boys of Room 239:

Whoever is slinging the sopping wet, brown globs of paper towels up to the ceiling in the upstairs boys bathrooms- please meet Mr. Sands in the Custodian’s office at lunch. You’ll be slinging the by now cement-like paper pieces off of the ceiling until it shines like the top of the Chrysler Building! (whaaa? You’ve never EVEN HEARD of Annie?!!!) I imagine you’ll also miss playing Basketball Knock-Out in Gym today, as once ya’ll are done in the upstairs boy’s bathrooms, you can head on down to Ms. Rita’s art room where you can begin the tasty task of removing all of the Sparkling Grape Hubba-Bubba gum from underneath the art station desks. MMMMMM….sounds delish!  

Attention Middle School Boys AND Girls of Room 239:

Your classroom pencil sharpener is no longer available as your “office water cooler”. In addition, please arrange to have your brain wrap around the idea that I am a teacher. I hear all. I see all. I am all. Lastly, I suggest you find other outlets for your vertical pitching skills and masticating needs. And, for GOD’S SAKE stop snatching all of my rubber bands off of my desk…MY desk.

Fondly, Mrs. Wise

Right to write. The classroom that filled her days with absolute joy and a whole lotta pain was empty. The windows shut and the computers unplugged. She contemplated taking the rolled-up rug from the corner beneath the spent vintage pencil sharpener that seemed to demand punishment from her middle school boy students. Decision made, she lightly and slowly backed out and with a skip in her step, practically slid down one flight of gray-Lego-like stairs out to the blinding sun towards Teacher Lot 2. She was spent. She was driving out to the stop sign in a paid off 2008 Passat Station Wagon with a sunroof.

Her chocolate Frosty from Wendy’s next to the school tasted so sweet. Sweeter and colder than she could remember in a long time. She wiped up the ketchup stain from her stack of personal journals that practically wept with joy at the sudden physical attention. She grinned on the way home as the back-left window unintentionally allowed a small piece of trash escape out onto 97 South. She knew that piece of decade-old slip of paper would be where she picked up when she was alone and safe with her writing- her way of developing who she was in this world and her way of carving out what she wanted her sons to know and remember. Her seat reclined ever so slightly, she eyed it in the rear-view mirror as the dust settled behind her and the blinking highway sign above alerted her of the 19 mile back up on Route 50 East towards the Bay Bridge.

Right to write. The classroom that filled her days with absolute joy and a whole lotta pain was empty. The windows shut and the computers unplugged. She contemplated taking the rolled-up rug from the corner beneath the spent vintage pencil sharpener that seemed to demand punishment from her middle school boy students. Decision made, she lightly and slowly backed out and with a skip in her step, practically slid down one flight of gray-Lego-like stairs out to the blinding sun towards Teacher Lot 2. She was spent. She was driving out to the stop sign in a paid off 2008 Passat Station Wagon with a sunroof.

Her chocolate Frosty from Wendy’s next to the school tasted so sweet. Sweeter and colder than she could remember in a long time. She wiped up the ketchup stain from her stack of personal journals that practically wept with joy at the sudden physical attention. She grinned on the way home as the back-left window unintentionally allowed a small piece of trash escape out onto 97 South. She knew that piece of decade-old slip of paper would be where she picked up when she was alone and safe with her writing- her way of developing who she was in this world and her way of carving out what she wanted her sons to know and remember. Her seat reclined ever so slightly, she eyed it in the rear-view mirror as the dust settled behind her and the blinking highway sign above alerted her of the 19 mile back up on Route 50 East towards the Bay Bridge.

Is it Worth It? A Story of Half-As* Housekeeping Madness

I find myself staring blankly at the smudge on our floor beneath the dish washing machine. That smudge is from an unidentifiable foreign object that may be associated with Aunt Jemima, Box Merlot or an Ice Cream Sammy. Regardless, the color has noticeably changed over the last 2 weeks or so. Like the sudden realization last week that I have sun-spots- A LOT of sun-spots that have so callously appeared on my skin without warning- I curiously wonder if that spot has always been there or has it just recently emerged as a new Wise-Guys visual stimulation-exhibit?

Does it cross my mind to wipe it up? Well, yea, in my absent-minded-Amelia-Bedelia-like way…I’ll get to that spot…perhaps.

Sitting on the boy’s bathroom toilet (trying not to touch too much) waiting for the younger one to finish his bath (in a tub you couldn’t PAY me to take a soak in at this point), my eyes adjust and focus on 3 of the thin slips of plastic that one peels from a bandaid.  One slip of plastic is intimately connected with the small, round “cover”- (bolt cap, see featured image). That area, surrounded by RED circle and dotted/splashed with yellow represents THE MOST DISGUSTING GAG-INDUCING PART OF THE TOILET.

What the hel* happens in this bathroom? Seriously, are my boys urinating all over the toilet on purpose? To spite me? No one in my home ever thinks to ask who is cleaning the toilets, even as I’m screeching at them to back it up, I’m cleaning the toilets. I’m getting a bit nervous about the lack of urgency (pun intended) regarding the bathroom hygiene in my home. Knowing that sooner or later I would have to take care of the bandaid invaders, I add it to running mental list of things to avoid/do/avoid.

The Yellow Part of the Toilet Diagram, well, that’s where I’m convinced P-Targets are located. Notice on featured image that the pee goes everywhere except where it’s supposed to…

The Purple represents an iffy-area. Taking off this amazingly heavy ceramic piece off and placing it somewhere is Issue #1.  Insecure in my Toilet “Fixing” skills, I uncertainly place on the floor. Be aware that this cover, also, will have urine samples clinging to it (sorry, super grody).

The Orange is perhaps the most risky, fraught with danger. The diagram does not include the actual seat cover. The exposed area is one that no one is clearly interested in sanitizing. One has to basically thread bacterial wipes through and around the area which is also filled with small unmentionable DISGUSTING things…small pieces of toilet paper? Hair samples? Lego Pieces? No one wants anything to do with actually cleaning that area-except I am FORCED to deal with it.

I mean, it’s pretty bad when I keep my bathroom light off during showers or brushing my teeth so I can avoid identifying and analyzing the grime that has been steadily sneaking up on myself and family.

Per the diagram above, the area circled in RED -the bolt caps- who needs those? I’m ANNOYED by those. I know they are intended to cover the bolts, but more often than not, I am crouching, breathing through my mouth and squinting my eyes as I reach for those god-forsaken bolts when they slyly roll themselves behind the toilet. Notice the Yellow. YELLOW REPRESENTS URINE. Note the AMOUNT of Yellow OUTSIDE OF THE ACTUAL TOILET BOWL???  Why bother even having a toilet?

I have, found, due to the Half-As* Housekeeping Madness in my home, when I do clean the bathrooms, I lord it over the others in my home-

I find myself constantly shouting to the menfolk that yes, it was ME- again- who cleaned the thrones, and that it was SOMEONE ELSE’S TURN TO TAKE CARE OF THAT CRAP!!!!!

As soon as I hear a panicked child rushing in from down the street saying he needs the bathroom and he needs to go Number 2 and then, ha ha, just as a joke, threatens Number 3 on his way towards “my” bathroom off my bedroom, I violently fling my body in front of the entrance, claiming I’m in the middle of cleaning it and they can use their OWN UPSTAIRS BATHROOM- as if I can ban them forever from my now sanitized WC.

I really love it when I wander above randomly poking my head into one or all rooms upstairs later that day and find a thoughtful surprise or two or three waiting for me to take care of in the bathroom. It’s literally never ending. The struggle is real. The madness is evident.