Teacher Appreciation Week

I've decided I dislike my job at the tutoring center. It's not the kids. No. I like the kids. It's...my boss. And frankly, I really need to secure a full-time job for the fall before I shrivel up and die inside.

The center I work in is severely lacking in new, clean materials. We routinely use books with pages falling out of them and books that have been written in, making them look not only unprofessional but ALSO a cheating student's dream. We're expected to use dry erase boards and markers for a significant part of our lessons, but the dry erase boards are warped, bubbled up, peeling, and dirty, and the dry erase markers barely write anymore. Despite this, my boss will not shell out for new materials. Why? Because her bonus check at the end of each year is dependent on the center's profit, and if she can avoid buying new teaching materials it means more money in her pocket at the end of the fiscal year. Lovely.

My main problem with this boss is that she's extremely passive aggressive, and I don't handle that well, especially when it's sooooo obvious and pathetic...not the careful manipulation someone like me could orchestrate. For example, our time cards are processed on Thursdays, so in order for our Thursday hours to count, we have to fill out our time worked on Thursday on Wednesday evening before we actually work the Thursday hours. Typically, I will get done with work at 6:45 on Thursdays. However, twice now she has stood over me and forced me to write 6:30 as my clock-out time for Thursday so she can avoid paying me an extra 15 minutes. I want to stab her for this, and the second time it happened I made my body language very clear that I would destroy her if she ever stood over my shoulder again and tried to cheat me out of paid work time.

A couple of weeks ago we had a small run-in about my work attire. I went to work wearing black pinstripe crop pants and a black shirt. The crop pants fall about 3 inches above my ankle. When I said hello, I immediately noticed she was giving me the up and down. "Oh God, WHAT?" I thought to myself. But I said nothing because she said nothing. So I went and worked my shift. At the end of the evening when everyone was packing up to leave, I was cornered on my own when she came up to me. "I just wanted to let you know so you know for the future," she said as I sat at my desk and she stood over me, "that shorts aren't allowed." What I wanted to say: "Are you freaking NUTS, lady? These are not shorts and you f-ing KNOW IT." What I DID say: "Well yeah, of course. That would be unprofessional, and I don't ever wear shorts anyway. I haven't since I was in middle school." Her response? "Well, just so long as you know." Um yeah psycho, whatever.

Fast forward to yesterday. Apparently it is Teacher Appreciation Week. Nothing...and I do mean nothing...makes me feel more appreciated for my $9/hr than what I found waiting for me at my table. I rounded the corner to discover a single napkin on my chair. Atop that napkin was a single cupcake that (I swear) was literally the size of a quarter. My boss rounded the corner right behind me and proclaimed, "That's just a little something from me for Teacher Appreciation Week." I tell you, friend, there are times when I can literally feel a part of my soul dying. I felt that sensation loud and clear when I had to suppress everything inside myself and feign the kind of extreme enthusiasm I knew she expected for her "generosity." I felt the bile rise in my throat as I exclaimed, "Thank you so much! That's so nice of you!" If that wasn't f-ing bad enough, she stood there and waited, nonverbally insisting that I eat the tiny, pathetic, quarter-sized cupcake in front of her and further express my gratitude.

God. It's times like this I hate my life.