Keys jangling. That's what it sounded like. What was my fan hitting that was causing something to sound like keys? I'd never heard that sound before in my bedroom. Someone in my room…? It's five o'clock in the morning, I'm entitled to crazy thoughts. I took three steps in the dark to where I thought the sound was coming from. Kelsey was crouched down looking up at me. I pet her, stood up again, and it flew right in front of me. Shriek. Jump. Don't panic; just a shadow. Lights… look… no, wrong. Shit. Run away run away run away.

Are my students lying awake tonight, trying not to hear parents arguing? Ignoring the yielding thuds of someone being slapped around? Being slapped around themselves?

Are they listening to their own breathing and the footsteps in the hall, praying, "Not tonight, please, not tonight…"?

Are any of them going hungry tonight simply because there's not enough? When will there be?

How many girls are living (or reliving) the date that ends with brutality and bruises and her self-blame and shame?

Do any of them not have a place to sleep tonight?

And how do I teach them in the morning?

Can you imagine living there? A charming turreted corner. Big, friendly porch from which to observe the world. A seat in the window, perfect for reading or watching the rain. Hard wood floors throughout the house, bedroom floors covered with unique, vivid rugs. The arched-top windows cut with prismatic designs. Really, it's too bad the realty company is entrusted. Soon, I suppose, these windows will be rotting out, the porch sagging, the floors inside scratched and stained beyond repair; the disgraceful paint-on-chipping-paint job will give it its final air of neglect. Like the one they're in charge of next door.

I impulsively ordered a pair of Victoria's Secret yoga pants. Bubble gum pink.

The yoga pants would likely be indoor loungewear, so appearances weren't important. I just needed to be able to take the trash to the curb without flinching if someone drove by.

They were exactly the color of a gumball. And comfortable… the models weren't pretending that bliss. It's impossible to get distressed in these pants.

Best of all, besides generating a peaceful state, the pants are honest. Not flattering, not distorting. They show it like it is. And I think they have to be respected for that.

I have an obsession with pens. All pens. Anything that writes. I think it might stem from the trips to the local drug store with my cousins when we were about eight. They were themselves obsessed with these double-ended highlighters the pharmacy carried. All those trips to stare at the row of office supplies, carefully packaged in formed plastic and cardboard—those were the beginning signs of the monster forming within.

My cousins eventually got their highlighters—and I ended up with several myself; I still have two. It's been over fourteen years since Kahler's carried them. Mine still work.

When I was in junior high, I loved the four-colored pens from Kahler's. To write with four different colors without switching pens! Red, blue, green, black. Slightly chubbier than the Bics I was used to, these were actually more comfortable for long periods of writing. And then… oh, and then there came the same style with pink, chartreuse, turquoise, purple. Purple, the easiest to read, became an immediate favorite. I went through several before moving on to the ten-colored pens, which didn't last long because they were poorly made and not comfortable to write with for extended periods of time.

And then, Christmas of my sophomore year, I received in my stocking something that would change my writing forever: a fountain pen. My beloved Scheaffer. Oh, bliss! Extra ink cartridges, too; my happiness was complete.

It wasn't a fancy pen; priced at four dollars, I was able to buy several more. The flow of the ink, the myriad of colors (when you knew where to look)! The elegant nib so unlike base ballpoints…

Happy though I was, gel pens were next. But after being disappointed by too many, I went back to my Scheaffers and modified my collection: calligraphy pens.

Lips trailing the softest of kisses down her neck and over her eyelids. His arms firmly holding her; even should her knees go weak as girls' knees seem inclined to do at such moments, she was in no danger of falling. Again, those lips whispering nothing but exhaling voiceless promises if only she would…

I can't, she replies, pushing his hands away from her hip, the small of her back. Please, I can't. Let me go.

His hands, no longer certain, unwillingly release her, brushing her rigid body as they fall away. Why not?

I can't love. Anyone. I can't.

I haven't finished a book in over a week, and even that I didn't enjoy as much as I normally do. Why? [shrug] I've started at least five different books in the last month or so and have stopped halfway through each one. Not that they're bad books: foul, gory or uninteresting. Just the opposite. The plots were intriguing; the settings complete, vivid. The characters were well-written, quirky, irritating on the level that every human is. I just didn't want to deal with them. Maybe they were based too much in reality. I never was good at dealing with reality.

How to make 8th graders sit up and pay attention: be energetic, make eye contact, be happy; when they look at you and ask why you're so perky all the time, tell them you're happy to see them. Mean it.

How to get 8th graders to read: talk about all the books you've read and how good they are. Listen to them telling you about what they're reading and why they like (or hate) it. Don't tell them to just give it a chance if they're already 50 pages into it. Let them put it back and pick something else.

I glanced up today during SSR and it struck me that every student was reading. None of them were pretending. Eyes were combing each row of words; pages were whispering, snapping as they turned; smiles and pensive frowns were forming.

Last year I had a kindred spirit who told me she got so into a book that she once slammed the book on the desk and cursed the stupid characters. A non-reader friend told her to chill—it's just a book—and she looked at him: Just a book? But I lived in that book for a whole forty-five minutes!

I'm a night owl. Always have been. I love it when the sun's down. Of course, the whole hour while it's actually setting, I can barely keep my eyes open. My preference for the after dark times is what gets me through the week—once the sun is down, I can keep working for hours. However, it all catches up with me at the end of the week, and on Fridays it's typical for me to be asleep on the couch by ten. Which is exactly what happened tonight. And then I was inches from bed when I remembered this.

I know nuclear family is the society's favorite myth. Why do people insist on dismissing that one doesn't need to get married and have kids?

Grandchildren came up in conversation, and the guest looked away from me, pointedly at my mom and said, "I hope your girls don't wait too long to have kids; it's no fun to be this old when the grandkids are little." I reminded her that I might never get married and have kids, that I'm not sure I'd make a good mother, or want to, and she brushed it off with, "Of course you will."

I teach in a middle school. I love my job. I have the best job in the world. Except…

There are fund raisers. My school lives and dies by fund raisers. Jewelry, cookie dough, spirit ribbons, cheese, buy, buy, buy! I smile and say, first come, first serve; I only buy one thing from one student.

Far more dangerous, though, are the books… I'm an addict. I can't stop. I don't want to. And I can rationalize: it's for my students… My classroom library has over 400 books… I'm proud of my collection… the books are for them, after all…

She'd planned this moment many times in her head. The unexpected, serendipitous meeting; shy smile from him; flirtatious, inviting smile in response. Exchange a few words, names, phone numbers… call that night… the perfect phone conversation, equal give and take, genuine interest from both ends of the line. Finally a date is made, and from there—happily ever after, or as close as anyone comes to it.

Here it is. Guy. Smile, phone number. Phone call.

And here's where the picture crumbles; redundant questions. She's being interrogated; she's a little distrustful his questions. He remembers nothing she says. Imagine that.

Wall paper ancient, inked with fruits in shades of brown
A sweet, inviting smell—dish soap, lemons, coffee, and sugar beets
The only stove good for baking her sugar cookies
The little niche between the wall and the fridge, just the right size for an eight year old.
Old fruit shaped magnets; pictures of five girls, all blonde and smiling
The linoleum floor, always a bit sticky in summer
Fighting with Sarah over who gets to help wash dishes
First burns, on stovetops and pancake griddles
Always ice cream in the freezer and menthol drops in the cupboard
Grandma's kitchen

I'm a Post-It nut, too. I must have at least 30 Post-It pads laying around the house, and a whole drawer full of them at school. Walking by the office supply aisle in Walmart one evening I glanced at the Post-Its (conveniently located at the end of the aisle), and I saw a cube. I am convinced now that its whispers were what made me look over in the first place, but this cube, this cute little 1½ inch cube of pink and green and turquoise—I didn't have that one. Internal conflict ensued.

I'm still in the first layer.

When I was little, I thought people grew out of being bullies. I thought all people miraculously turned into well-adjusted adults. Even through adolescence, I thought that most people who were bullies in school must grow out of it after high school.

And yet, now that I'm to be counted amongst those well-adjusted adults, I find that I come face to face with bullies every day, often somehow in a position of power because they have a habit of getting what they want. Now they're adults bullying subordinates out of self-respect, criticizing their employees' shortcomings to avoid seeing their own.

When I was little, my dad was laid off from the trucking company he worked for; my mom went back to work, and Dad stayed home with the three of us kids. Shortly after he'd gotten another job, my sister came down with the chicken pox; inevitably my other sister and I got them a week later). Dad was on call. (Not being high on the seniority list meant that he didn't get to choose routes.) What I remember most about that week is playing Monopoly—the only time I ever finished the game—and learning Yahtzee. Laughing and itching.

Others live in my brain. I can hear them talking, murmuring, muttering, cursing. There's someone (high, I think) spitting a string of, "Bitch, bitch, bitch," and for once the word's not referring to me. I can feel the three year old inside of me throwing tantrums. In the corner of my mental living room, an eight year old (who actually has a name) stays between the piano and the wall; her face is ever contorted into a feral snarl, and she growls if anyone tries to touch her but she won't tell me why. She's the one who haunts me.

In accordance with the accursed No Child Left Behind Act, teachers must prove that they are Highly Qualified.

The teacher over there is; she has her masters in her content area (however dull her classes, however uninvolved her students).

The man who has just returned to teaching after a few years of a different career is not, even though everyone in the school knows he's the best we've got. Letters will be sent out saying, "This man who is teaching your child is not highly qualified." No word will indicate that he is far superior to many Highly Qualified Teachers.

Arms around her waist, kiss on her earlobe. She leans into it, into him, eyes closed.

"I want you."

Nearly stumbling in her panic, she shoves him away.

"What's wrong?" he asks, brows furrowed, concerned.

Hugging her arms to her torso, eyeing him warily, she stands facing him. "Don't say that. I don't know." Her voice is little more than a whisper.

He holds out one hand to her, a sign of willingness to comfort. She backs away.

"How can you want me when I'm like I am?"

"How are you?" he asks, his hand still offered.

Shuddery breath. "Broken."

I used to dream places so real that when I woke up I was faintly surprised not to actually be there. The most real of all of these places was a huge chamber, with stone walls and tapestries and drapery around the bed. The bed curtains were pulled back, because it was the sunlight that woke me. I smiled and stretched and rolled over to greet you—and realized that I was awake, and in my own bed, and utterly alone. I would have abandoned reality for the promise of that dream.

I no longer dare to dream such things.

I was challenged to write an Elizabethan sonnet in twenty minutes. For those of you who don't know, sonnets have a definite rhyme scheme (ababcdcdefefgg) and a certain rhythm and syllable count (iambic pentameter). They're considered fairly difficult to write well.

The sonnet was impressive for something written in fifteen minutes. (Aren't I modest?)

I'd never written a sonnet before. I did write a ballad once for senior English. I read it aloud to the class, purposely waiting to be the last one to read, and when I'd read it, someone in the back said, "Sure, leave it to her…"

My mother made it her mission to teach my kitten to speak last summer. Zoë is now over a year old and doesn't shut up. She mews at closed and open doors indiscriminately. She's also figured out that doorknobs open doors. One night she kept pouncing on my feet so I banished her to the hallway. I heard this screeching nails-on-chalkboard in the wee hours and thought, "She doesn't have front claws…"

She was grabbing the doorknob with her front paws and trying to find purchase with her back claws, presumably to give her leverage enough to turn the knob.

It's been a rough week. I told my colleagues that I was just going to walk down to the local Mexican restaurant and go overboard on their biggest strawberry margaritas.

But I didn't go for my margaritas. I don't really like drinking alone, so I went for a long walk instead. My destination turned into a local grocery store, over two miles away. I walked out feeling a little kinky. My purchase: two cans of whipped cream, evident through the transparent plastic bag. I giggled about it the whole way home. Passers-by wouldn't know about my hot cocoa addiction.

Naughty.

I don't like spiders, but I often feel guilty for destroying many of the spiders in my house; after all, they just want protection from the elements.

I seem immune to guilt where the little black jumping spiders are concerned. You know, the ones with little white spots on them. I hate those—you never know where they're going when the jump out of your reach. Like mice: quick and unpredictable. And then there are the chameleon ones—they're translucent and you often see their shadows sooner than you see them. That's the kind on my bathroom ceiling right now.

I dreamed that I showed up unexpectedly at your door. My stomach was a convention of butterflies. I wasn't exactly sure why I was there, until I saw the expression on your face when you opened the door and realized it was me—lips slightly parted, eyes blinking disbelievingly. I knew I was the last person you'd expected to see on your stoop. I'd wanted to surprise you.

You asked me in, but I knew from the cars your friends were there, people I've never met and who doubtless think very little of me.

I wanted to stay, you know.

In the supermarket parking lot today I saw a man who looked like my great-grandfather from the side. His profile had the same crooked, huge nose and the same thick white hair. My great-grandfather used to give us a quarter to kiss his cheek. I always thought there was something a little creepy about that, but what little kid doesn't like to hear the satisfying clunk of a quarter dropping onto a pile of other collected coins? He had that gruff sense of humor kids don't understand and he smelled of chewing tobacco and other old man scents I never identified.

My beautiful, silky calico Kelsey is patiently perched, purring, on my lap as I type. She is watching my fingers tap dutifully across the keyboard, stubbornly assaulting the delete key—one, two, five times. She wishes those fingers were scratching her chin or massaging her ears. Do you know how many muscles cats have in their ears? Thirty! That's a lot of muscle in one tiny little flap of flesh. Imagine the strain their ears must go through, adjusting position for every sound and emotion.

Oh, there she goes, chasing after Zoë. Brrr. I always forget how warm cats are.