The First Day of School

To be retitled later, "Oh my God all hell has broken loose."

Today was the first day of Kindergarten. I spent the last 2 days preparing for it, I should have been ready. Right? After a day of my schedule being rearranged twice, and teaching five classes of "we know our names and that's it," I think that parents who are waiting until they're ready to have kids are trying to pull the wool over our eyes.

There is no ready when it comes to kids.

The classes went as well as I could have hoped, really. There will always be the girl who wants to learn, the nerdy boy who wants to learn but his drive is more than his potential, and the boy who eats his boogers instead of paying attention. They grow up to be, respectively, the underpaid office manager, Michael Scott, and CEO. And so life goes on.

I couldn't pick any of them out of the crowd normally, but today when one started to cry, I knew instantly where to be and who it was. And I knew instantly who did it, too. Evan. There must be something with the "v" in the name. I had best avoid Victoria. I successfully named one girl Ruby. I think 12 of the 16 understand the words school, teacher, boy, girl, book, and the concept that I am Kate Teacher, and we are learning English. I really like that they're young enough to speak in whatever garbled version of English they think works; they haven't been corrupted into believing there is a right and wrong way of speaking English. At the end of the day, it is better to ask incorrectly for a beer and get coffee than to ask for nothing and get exactly that.

That said, a guy I met dancing Saturday night has been texting, and it makes me smile. He's younger than my sister, so in my head I call him "아기," the Korean term for baby--not out of condescension, just endearment. He sets himself up with his English dictionary and tries to have a conversation with me. It's really flattering. He also corrects my Korean which makes me sigh heavily. After having seen the movie He's Just Not That Into You yesterday, I smile knowing there's someone at least a little into me.