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| LJHS swim action against Valhalla Thurs., March 12. (Photo by Ed Piper) |
Thurs., March 12
Substitute-teach at Poway High School. Pouring rain on the way to school. Dark with the time change the weekend before to Daylight Saving. Low visibility on the 163. It feels unsafe.
Even though I leave home in Clairemont almost 50 minutes before the 7:30 a.m. start of school, I don't make it into the classroom on time.
7:10 a.m. Left turn lane onto Espola Rd., Poway. Traffic is two lanes, bumper-to-bumper to the high school, hardly moving in the rain. I don't park my car in the side light on campus off Titan Way until 7:34 a.m. The lady handling substitute teachers is freaking out--"Can you park in a visitor's space?" "No, I can't move" (due to bumper-to-bumper).
Music class. No responsibilities until 10:12, third period. Woodwind I class. Kids, well-behaved and friendly, are coming in wet. It has been raining all morning. Thinking of the La Jolla High track meet scheduled for 3:30 p.m., I'm thinking, No way it's going to be held. It's going to be cancelled with all the rain. (But I have been mistaken before.)
In class, in which the students don't have practice, since the music teacher is absent, one student plays recognizable tunes on a trumpet, sax (George Benson), and some other instruments. A virtuoso! It has me smiling, passing the long one hour, 13 min. class more quickly. Not that it's a problem, because the kids are calm, chatting, doing homework, hanging out. Very chill. I comment to another student about the one entertaining us on all the instruments; "Yeah, but..." as if he wasn't impressed the way I was that one student could dabble in all those instruments.
I circulate constantly, chatting up students, taking roll off a printed roster, then electronically in the teachers' office on the regular teacher's computer. I look out the back door: water spewing out a drainage pipe attached to the roof of the building. A lot of water...
Lunch. Then period 4. No responsibilities. I have written on my sports blog covering LJHS sports, read about Negro Leagues baseball on my phone (Kindle app--Negro Leagues have been my thing lately), all sorts of things. I don't drive anywhere, even though I have long breaks, because I just don't want to get out in the rain again after the disaster coming into school at 7:30 a.m.
Period 5. My only other class of the day. The other music teacher (present today) has me take his roll, as well, then departs for the day. I'm on my own. Students are great, milling, talking, friendly. Occupying their time. They get the drill. This period, three students play violin, another on viola--they play all period, with energy. They play everything: Christmas carols, to pop songs, to anything else they could find music for. It was a blast. Two other students tap out tunes on keyboards. (One student plays low, low notes on his trombone; I asked him, "Can you play lower?" He goes lower.)
2:25 p.m. A policeman appears at the back door (near the water spout spewing out tons of liquid). He brings two students back from the parking lot. "Don't let these two go early." Bell to end school is at 2:30. When the cop (a regular cop) leaves, I tell the two, "Just stay around until the end of the period." They: "We leave a few minutes early everyday. We walk past him. He never says a thing. Today he did." Times are a-changin'.
Meanwhile, the coronavirus situation is getting very unusual. On media, the NBA has announced it has suspended its season. Ditto NHL, MSL. Coachella (which the kids are very aware of) has rescheduled for the fall. We've never had a situation like this before.
The one holdout: March Madness. The NCAA still holds out hope of holding the tournament. The only announcement so far is that games will be played without fans present.
2:30 p.m. Guess what the other music teacher didn't prepare me for? Students from all instrumental music classes need to come into the room and pick up their instruments to take home. Guess who isn't leaving right after school? As students come from all parts of campus to get their instruments, the rain continuing, I go into one of the storage rooms. The lockable grates covering the storage spaces remind me of chicken coops. I remark on this to one of the students. He with his friends: "Oh, yeah, we keep chickens, ferrets,..." I go into another storage room with more grates, joke with other students about the ferrets; they: "We keep rabbits, a goat..." We're having fun, despite the fact I won't get to leave my subbing assignment for a while after school.
2:42 p.m. Finally, students have mostly gotten their instruments, now they are just hanging out in the music room. I ask someone what the signal is for sending them home; he: "Just flick the lights, and say, 'Homework time.' That's what the regular teacher says." It works. They all leave. They go out into the rain, which hasn't quit all day. Surely, the La Jolla track meet is cancelled.
Exhausted, no nap, I pull into Rigoberto's at the corner of Espola and Twin Peaks roads. I order more comfort food. (See Wednesday's timeline.) Combination plate with cheese enchilada, relleno, beans and rice, with beef taco added. The cashier: "I don't know if that will all fit on one plate." It doesn't. I eat it all. Yummy. But hard to eat enchilada (dark sauce) and relleno with a plastic fork while it slides across the paper plate while I drive on Ted Williams Parkway toward home. I manage.
3:40 p.m. I finally get to Coggan Pool for the Vikings' swim meet against Valhalla. No rain. I roam the pool deck, snapping photos of Gavin Olson, other swimmers I know and don't know. Mrs. Bugelli gives me the rundown as her son races. Kate Hartford's mom, in answer to my question, "What's new?", tells me all about her daughter's recent appointment to West Point. I congratulate her profusely. On the participants' side of the pool, I run into Kate. I congratulate her. She: "I want to serve, so I thought serving my country would be the best way." I snap a photo of her to go with my story on her news. (I write it later on my blog.)
No coronavirus here. My wife calls, says our grandson has a Mustang baseball game. I drive to Tecolote. Dry. People not freaking out about the coronavirus. I can see my grandson's first at-bat, his positioning in left field from my car. He makes good contact, as he often does. Good hitter. His mom got him lots of hitting practice last year at the Brickyard.
No attempt to go back to La Jolla High to see if there is track. I'm too tired, and it's too cold. Just not the right time for it.
Fri., March 13
Subbing at Canyon Crest Academy off Highway 56. (Right next to Cathedral Catholic.) I talk to a student about yesterday's track meet. She: "I have friends on our track team, and their meet was cancelled. I thought all meets were cancelled." I say, "I'll look at Athletic.net and see if there are results for La Jolla's meet." Sure enough, there are. La Jolla did hold its meet with Serra and Morse. I'm wrong again on a rain situation!
10:58 a.m. Students walk into homeroom, inform me, "School has been cancelled for the next three weeks. Our parents got an email from the superintendent an hour ago."
They want to watch CCA-TV, the student-produced news program. The principal starts the program with a recorded message, reading from a prepared statement: School cancelled to slow the spread of coronavirus. "We care about you." "We really care about you as humans, not just students."
Wow, we've never had a situation quite like this before. Before I retired as a regular classroom teacher, we had eight days off for the fires in 2006, I think; 13 days off when our juvenile court school had flooding problems from a faulty pipe. We handed out packets every morning at a table in the parking lot. Each student got their name checked off, we got to claim ADA (Average Daily Attendance) by our director's instructions. The kids, of course, loved the time off.
I remember the smoke in the air. My brother and sister-in-law, and her mother stayed at our place for a few days. It was a blast. It was like living in a dormitory, or going camping. My brother, a fisherman, took me out fishing at 6 a.m. in the morning, when I got beautiful photos of him in Pacific Beach with bright orange/brown colors of the smoke wafting up down the coast while the sun came up.
And, yes, finally the NCAA announces March Madness (and all spring sports) are cancelled.
I text Dave Jones, La Jolla High boys volleyball coach, to ask if today's tournament is cancelled. After the track meet being held yesterday, I still don't trust any information until I hear it directly from the source. Dave's response: "School is cancelled until April 6." Does that include today's volleyball?! (Yes, it turns out, it does.)
In-N-Out for dinner again. (See Wednesday's timeline.) Yum. With the mini-"apocalyptic" feeling the last two days, with all the event cancellations due to coronavirus measures mixed with the pouring rain Thurs.-Fri., a Double Double is a welcome treat.
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