My Cardboard Balcony

by Belinda Roddie "What the hell is on your head?" "Dude." " John." "It's a viking helmet." " JOHN." "Have you never seen a viking helmet before?" "Why are you wearing a viking helmet?" "Well, I mean...it's not really a viking helmet." "...What." "I mean, sure, vikings wore helmets or maybe went bare-headed, but there's no reason to believe they had horns on their helmets." "..." "In fact, Gustav Malmström was an artist who created the horned helmet in the first place, and then Wagner - " "Stop saying words  right now!" "What? It's all correct!" "I don't care!" "I think the vikings wore a rounded iron cap, actually..." "I. Don't. Care." "Well, you should! 'Cause history is awesome." "John, why are you wearing a 'viking' helmet?...

It's happening. School starts again on Monday. I am at a new school in a new district, teaching new students and working with a new faculty. I have a new classroom, I'm teaching new books, and I'm actually working with new grades. Sophomores! Seniors!  Freshmen!  For the first time  ever,  I am teaching a 9th grade class. And this is after honors has been removed, so it'll be interesting! Honestly, I would not be as comfortable and confident as I am now without the help of some of my amazing new colleagues. Heck, I only learned I was teaching 9th grade English (known as English 1) at my school two days ago, and I got so much support. I'm of course nervous about how this year is going to go - I really want to do well - but I think it'll be a very good year, with a lot of opportunities for me to improve my classroom management skills, my approach to equity, and my development of consistent expectations, rules, and disciplinary strategies. It also feels good to...

It Begins Again by Belinda Roddie The classroom is ready. The whiteboards are marked. Let's go.

The War Bear by Belinda Roddie The war bear is primed and ready to fight! Her armor is pristine, her claws sharpened, and now, she's ready to take on each knight of the Silver Kingdom. The day will end with bloodshed on the battlefield, and this means we shall handsomely reward Ursa with berries and, of course, the finest fish from the river. We love her, and vice versa: she is our queen, our savior, our delight, our fav'rite. And once the war has been won, she'll hibernate through winter's day and night, while we drink and revel until the sun has risen. Our war bear is cheered in pubs, while she rests after having sweet bear cubs!

Here we are, merely mammals, living in a cocoon of our own making. A cocoon built from steel and plastic and discarded souls. A cocoon that holds a studio apartment that we pay two thousand dollars a month for. A studio apartment where we maintain our belongings, which aren’t much – besides ourselves, our sweet tabby is our closest companion. We play board games in our cocoon. We drink wine in our cocoon. We daydream in our cocoon. But we never achieve metamorphosis. Mammals don’t get that perk.