How did I get here?

So, one of the kids asked me an interesting question. Have I always had it this good? I look around my happy domain and realize, "NO, I did NOT." It was a long hard fought road. My first year here was HORRIFYING. Let's see if I can highlight the horror.

1. I spent most of my free time hanging out in the basement with the head of maintenance for the building and some of the other building crew. Seriously. People were mean. Everyone I saw either wanted to tell me how bad the previous adviser was, what I needed to do differently or some other thing. It wasn't fun.

2. The kids were mean. Not all of them, just most. The previous adviser set me up because she gave a pool party the night before school started for everyone on staff . . .and then they got to meet the new teacher that "took" her job. Oh, yeah, that was a good time. The comparisons were constant and believe me I lost most of the time. She had total cult of personality and the kids really didn't have to do diddly.

3. Truth be told, I arrived here having done 3 middle school yearbooks that, well, sucked. Not the most horrible of sucking that anyone has ever seen, but they weren't winning any awards, I can say that with confidence. So, I had no clue how I was going to oversee the creation of a 450 page yearbook with a staff of 75 kids. YIKES. Oh, and did I mention that I was going to teach a darkroom photography class, but I didn't even own a camera? Gulp.

OK, where am I now?

Well, I have fabulous and amazing kids. So, to you the amazing: here is my shoutout. AK and CD totally keep me in line with grades etc. I would total drown without those two. MMT makes sure all my bills get paid and the money gets deposited. KM, HP and HR are making sure the book gets put together. They are rocking editors-in-chief. BT, MS, KLR oversee the photography. Assign jobs, taking pictures themselves, helping the newbies get good pictures all of it. We have a 720 page yearbook and a staff of about 100, and I get to blog a lot.

Oh, and we have lots of money in the account so we have lots of computers, laptops, cameras and other miscellaneous stuff. In fact, if I ever leave this little job, I won't have anything electronic. Well, my phone, I'd die without my phone, but nothing else.