I think this school year just ended has been one of the most challenging of my career. In ten years, I don’t think I’ve had this many disappointments, sudden reversals, and strange difficulties. I’m also conscious that some of the flaws of this past year have been of my own making.

In any case, I had this notion that I could do my own NaNoWriMo in June, since November is such a trying month for me. But I’m basically out of ideas. I’m so far out of the writing habits necessary to do good writing (daily practice, editing, word vomiting, etc.) that I’ve not got a single good idea about what to do or where to go.

I did win an award. The school’s board of trustees honored me with their annual Educator’s Award (which came with a copy of The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch). It’s a nice bit of recognition, but I also screwed up because we do these mini-biographies of each ninth grader that’s read as they graduate… and all four of the ones I was supposed to do were wrong. I goofed. It made me feel awful that I screwed up these kids’ memories of their graduation day.

At the same time, there’s not been a class that I’ve been as happy to see graduate as this one. In many ways, they were a great group of individuals, but I never felt like their abilities and powers gelled as a class. One on one, I enjoyed their company; four or more in the same place tended to overwhelm me.

and I are committing to each other for a year-and-a-day on June 21, and if you’re interested in coming to that please let me know.

Other than that, though, I have virtually nothing planned for the summer. I’ve been dithering about teaching summer school or participating in boy scout camp, though — anything longer than a few days of effort is not on my calendar at all. Part of me feels like I need a break, and the absence of ideas for writing is kind of the proof of that.

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