the weeks of lasts.

The school year is now turning into lasts. Tomorrow is the last vocabulary test, probably. Last week was the last seminar. I introduced poetry on Tuesday, the last time I'll have introduced a new unit to the freshman.

Life comes in firsts and lasts, or I suppose it seems like it does because I've never written a blog post called "the weeks of middles." Soon, I'll pack the boxes in my room, but I won't know where I'm moving them to. Soon, I'll have to lug all of the books out of this office, because I set up shop here as though I was planning on staying for a long time. The last day of Advisement, the last day the cafeteria is serving chicken patties, the last day an English class feels like a real class before the "lasts" officially take over and leave my entire classroom in chaos. The last time I'll be known as Ms. P in these halls, the last time I'll tease the two students in my class who are dating (the ones who only hold hands at school because their parents say they are "too young to date") and accuse them of pass-time rendevous, the last time I'll collect a big chunk of papers, the last time I turn on the overhead, the last time I create an assignment sheet. The last time I'll come to school in the morning and tell Mr. O I don't really have anything good planned for the day when I sort of do, the last times at Century.

And, of course, then the firsts will start, but along with the firsts will come the "oh great, agains," like: Oh, great, again I don't have a summer job, place to live, decent relationship with my family that should lead them to kick out Dingleberry before I move home. Oh great, again, I'll have to skirt around credit card payments and student loans because I can't afford to give other people my money. The first day of the summer job, then, whatever that will be, the first day of a new class, the first day I leave Rochester for good, in a couple of weeks, only a couple weeks out from the anniversary I moved down here. 1 year and two weeks.

Everything tastes a bit sweeter. Everything will soon just be nostalgia and I'll miss it like fucking crazy. Goddammit.

Meanwhile, my freshman don't hate poetry, which is enough for me right now. Meanwhile, I think I'll be participating in a study at Mayo, donating my body to science for money. The only requirement for the study is that I be fat, that I "carry my weight in my hips and thighs." They inject things into me to see where the fat goes where it goes, and by the time I'm done, I'll finally know why my thighs and arms hoard my fat like the ignorant in the South hoard canned food before a two-inch snowstorm forecast three weeks early. They'll pay me $800, if they find my fat adequate. Although, I worry. If my fat gets rejected, then I won't know what to think of myself. I was traumatized after the Mankato blood people didn't want my plasma four weeks. I gave up trying to sell it to them.

Yesterday a man dressed in his army uniform was outside my classroom windows for the entire day. They'd set up a rock-climbing wall for people to use during gym and lunch. The girls in my class flocked toward the window. They're wearing short-shorts now, tank tops that require strapless polka-dot bras underneath. They have to worry about falling out all the time, falling out of everything. I would turn my back for a second, and then the skinny little things would be by the window, staring at him. Ms. P! He's so hot, they'd say. You should date him so he can be a guest speaker in class!

No, he's married, said another girl. He has a ring.

BUT HE TOUCHED GABBI ON THE ARM! Oh my God, he's so hot Ms. P.

Remember that Diet Coke commercial from the 80s? The women drink some Diet Coke up in their office building and then look at the construction workers below? Yeah, it was just like that.

And if you'd have walked in at just the right time, you'd have seen the 5 seconds I joined them, open-mouthed and staring, splitting the blinds with my fingers and peeking through, looking like their leader.