Many of my kids were wondering where Rachel was today.  I guess
they thought she was cool and were expecting (hoping) that she’d come
back today.    One boy asked me if she lived with me.  I had to
say, “Sadly, no, she lives all the way in Alaska.”

So this morning, I hug Rachel at the airport, she starts to walk in, I
turn around to get in my car, and there is an airport police officer
standing there waiting for me.  He asks me, “Ma’am – can you tell
me what happened to your sticker?”  I think he’s talking about my
peeling bumper sticker “I  CITY LIFE” but really he’s referring to my non-existent
year tag on my license plate.  I say, “OH NO!  Someone stole
it again!  That’s the second time that this has happened to
me!”  He looks at me like I’m talking about the moon.  (I
want to say, “Yes, I live in a city – these things happen, maybe not in
the county, or at the airport but they do.  You should know this –
you’re a cop.”  But I don’t say anything.)  So I hand over my
registration and license, thinking it
won’t be any big deal.  Instead, I sit in my car for 20 minutes,
waiting and waiting, (getting more upset by the minute, missing Rachel
and getting more and more late for school), while he chats with his
buddies, talks on his cell phone, wanders around, and sometimes seems
to be working on some paperwork.  So finally I go over to him and
say, “Sir, I’m not complaining but I’m a school teacher and if I don’t
leave very soon I’m going to be late for school and i need to know so I
can call them.”  He says, “I’m working as fast as I can,” LIAR,
“and I’ll be with you soon.”  So that’s it, I get back in my car,
lose it, and he comes over to me with tears streaming down my face and
hands me two citations – one for my missing registration tag and one
for my cracked windshield and has the audacity to say, “Why are you
crying?”  WHY AM I CRYING???  I am crying because I just
dropped off my sister, I don’t have any family close by, now I’m
sad,  you just gave me two tickets, now I have to spend $350 on a
windshield that I don’t have budgeted (I was going to get it fixed
eventually but not before this summer) and I’m going to be late for
school.  THAT’S WHY I’M CRYING.   So he  tells me
to drive safely and wear my seatbelt.  Yes, you have a nice day
too sir and enjoy chatting on your cell phone!

So I drive back to school (it took me 35 very long minutes to get
there) crying on and off, desperately trying to compose myself, knowing
that I will have hardly any time to compose myself before the kids come
and I launch into a long day of school, and arrive at school barely
under control.

That’s my day.  Actually, my kids were fine, we had a fire drill
so we got to go out into a beautiful day for a few minutes, and I got
everything done that needed to be done.  So my day turned out fine in the end.  And now I’m going to try
to figure out how to get a new registration tag.

Or maybe I’ll just go to bed.  I do have ten days after all.  (How generous, Mr. Police Officer.)

I belive Anne would call this a Jonah day.  Thankfully, they only come around every few months.