bang head here

I know that relationships are hard.
I know that they are not all sunshine and daisies.
But there are days that I think I could scrap all of it and just be alone.

I mean, it is hard enough to meet your own expectations of how you want your life to go... and then throw in your kids' expectations ... and your ex's expectations of you... and now a boyfriend's too.

I was told last night that I don't meet his expectations of how I should treat his kids.
I looked at him dumbfounded and said, "What??! I don't treat your kids badly!"
He responded with, "You're right, you don't... but you treat them like they are one of your students."

Now, if you know me, you know I am very loving to my students. I care and worry and cry about them and get frustrated for them.

Do I treat them like my own two boys?
No.
... because they aren't mine.

...and his aren't mine either.

I guess knowing expectations is a good thing... but not when you don't think it will change things... then it is just frustrating.

Choices

The choices that she made... there were never really any good ones.
You'd think that would be because she didn't think before she acted...
But you'd be wrong, it was quite the opposite.
She would think on topics late into the night.
She would weigh options... try to see the good and the bad.
So much until her stomach hurt and her brain swirled.

But it seemed that no matter how much planning and thinking she had done, the choices she made always ended up wrong.

Stay with the wrong guy for all the "right" reasons.
Want to leave the good guy for all the "wrong" reasons.

No. Her choices never seemed to be made correctly.

And she knew it.

She tried to let others help her, but that seemed to muddle the thought process.
Made her upset when their opinion of the situation differed from hers.

So, instead, she made the wrong choices time and time again... and she hated that she couldn't get that decision quite right.

It could be him.... Right??

A few years back I wrote a post about a new dad that met in my local grocery store.
While he and I talked about our lives, he mentioned that maybe one day his kids would have me as a teacher.  We then talked about where he lived and I told him that was not in the school district I taught at.

That was 3 years ago.

Now, each morning, as I drive to school, I see a dad sitting out waiting for the school bus holding his young son - probably kindergarten age. Sometimes they are playing. Sometimes they are just embracing. Sometimes they are pointing out the cars that go by.

The first time I saw them, without thinking, I waved to them.

Now... I can't pass by them without waving.

Each morning, I see the inquisitive look on the father's face trying to place how he knows me.

I know he doesn't know me... I just can't stop myself... because a huge part of me believes he is that new dad that I met 3 years ago.