Night and Day

Thursday, the boy were just awful. Oh my gosh, they were in a mood. Yelling and slinging furniture at each other, and storming out of the classroom, and hitting each other, and stabbing each other with thumbtacks... I actually had to jump in between them several times to stop all out fighting. And I'm pretty sure they weren't even at each other because of each other- they just felt like bucking the system, but they knew they'd get kicked out if they fought with me.

And then I met their old Art Therapist, Joelle. She and Marco told me a story from a few years back when some of the boys in her class got into a paint fight. Marco started calling a couple of them the Blue Man Group, because they had shaved heads and were covered with blue paint.

THEN, while covered with wet paint, the ran into the rectory- into the living room with all the nice furniture. Fortunately, they didn't spread the paint past each other.

Joelle said through her laughter, "I nearly quit that day!"

And I felt better, because I was no longer alone with my bad day.

Later, Sonia (one of the receptionists) said to me, "They were so bad today!" Every time they would storm out, they would go mess with her (because she's young and pretty and I'm more than fairly sure N's got a crush on her). I said, "you're telling me!"

Then she told me about her awful day. Apparently, everyone was having a bad day on Thursday, and since Sonia is a receptionist, she got to deal with everyone's bad moods. She said, "I don't get paid enough for this." I said, "Neither do I." She said, "I don't know how you do it." I said, "I just take a deep breath and remind myself that I love this, even on the bad days." And it's true. I'd much rather be here than delivering chicken for WingZone (as much fun as I had at that job- it just wasn't very fulfilling, you know?) Later, Marco told me that he and Sonia decided that when the time comes and I die, I"m going straight to heaven for working with J and N.

Then I got on line and did my taxes and found out that since Michael and I only worked half a year last year, we came in under the poverty line- so we get everything back! Woo-hoo!

No one came for tutoring. I went home early.

Friday, the boys were ten minutes late when Sr. Angie stopped in and told me that N had been picked up by the cops. He was in the back of the police car, and the cops came in to check out his story that he was on his way to school and was going to pick up his friend (Later, Sonia told me that the cops were giving her attitude, which is strange, because Holy Cross is a rather cop-friendly place).

Anyway, Sr. Angie said that they drove off with N, so he probably wouldn't be in that day, but that didn't explain why J was not yet in, because he wasn't with them. I asked if I should go down there and check on him, but Sr. Angie said, "No, if he did something to get arrested, there's nothing you can do right now."

Fifteen minutes later, I went to call Oscar and Alberto to tell them J still hadn't shown up. But I heard voices, and found that J and N had just walked into the office, and were yelling to Sonia about the cop. We went into the computer lab, and they yelled for about five minutes, and then sat down and got to work, and were perfectly pleasant all day long. The difference was night and day.

Apparently, N got picked up for 'running from the cops', but it had been someone else. So they drove him around and then brought him back. But it's sobering. A friend of theirs was picked up last week with a semi-automatic weapon, and he's going to be doing some time.

The fire keeps creeping closer. I really hope we can help them stay out. But it's hard sometimes.