School dreams. Every teacher I know gets them. Usually, the dreams surface before the start of the school year. The teacher is inappropriately clothed in front of class, or he/she forgets the lesson being taught, or some student is refusing to do what the teacher is asking. All these are normal school dreams, and all teachers have had them (and more) at one point or another.
This year (2020) has added to those dreams, brought on by stress and fear and the unknown. I've seen my peers on Facebook talking about their horrible school dreams, and I commiserate with them, for I've had those, too.
And then I had this morning's dream. I've had dreams before where I had dreams within dreams (I am not assuming they're prophetic), but this felt so real. I dreamed that I had missed school--that I had fallen asleep and not awakened at my three alarms. I dreamed that I walked in to the school at the end of the day once I had actually woken up and realized I'd missed it, only to find the administrators all waiting for me to explain why I had missed school and had not called in to get a sub.
I explained first to one, then another, and then yet another (all not actual administrators for my school, I realized, once I awoke and was mulling it over) why I, who had perfect attendance for most of my long teaching career, had just "skipped" without contact. To make matters worse, there was a school board meeting (in my classroom, which was kind of like my house...so that should have clued me in to the fact it was a dream), and I was going to have to go before the board to explain my dereliction of duty.
My dream excuse was this: "I woke up at three in the morning and couldn't go back to sleep, so I got onto Canvas to do some work and plan for the day. I then must have fallen asleep in front of the computer, but I didn't realize I'd fallen asleep. In my dream, I got up at my alarm, got showered and ready, and left the house as I always did. I even dreamed I carpooled with my carpool buddy and listened to her audiobook as we drove to school. I went to first hour, took the kids' temperatures, and started my lessons. I went through the whole day in my dream, teaching the virtual kids on zoom while also engaging the students in my classrooms, all the while answering emails from parents and students about how to fix their computer issues at home or to explain for the fourth time how to find a particular assignment.
"I did all the things: grading, adding new content to Canvas to keep it interesting, emailing a student's parent about his grades and why he was failing, eating a cold and hurried lunch in my classroom so I could make some phone calls to the virtual students' parents about how their children weren't following the behavior expectations on zoom, and keeping track of the attendance and participation of all the kids on the umpteen spreadsheets I've had to create so that I could document all of those things.
"At some point in my dream about the school day, I explained, I woke up to find myself still in my PJs, sitting in front of my computer, and realizing by the light streaming in the window that it was well into the day. I looked at the clock in the bottom right corner of my computer screen and realized that the school day was almost over. I panicked and reached for my phone. Surprisingly, I had received no phone calls from anyone at the school. Could I have mistaken the day? Was it the weekend? I checked the calendar in the bottom right corner of my computer screen and realized that it was Monday--not a day off. Cringing inside, I shakingly called the school, and the secretary said I was expected to come up to school for the school board meeting."
And that's how I ended up in my dream, walking into the school building, feeling the dread of what was to come causing my heart to beat erratically and my knees to shake. I walked up to the first administrator to give my excuse, and I wanted to ask why no one had called me, why no one had bothered to check to see if I were okay since I had not missed a day for illness or non-school related reasons for many years. Instead, I meekly told administrator after administrator that I had not shown up for school because I had, in my dream, already been at school. And then I had to speak in front of the school board to convince them I should not be fired, all the while knowing that there was nothing I could do to change their minds.
And that's how I woke up this morning--disturbed and worried and, ultimately, relieved when I realized it was Sunday. And then I checked my phone and saw thirteen emails from school. Sigh. I certainly hope that dream wasn't prophetic.
