After years of dire need, there is a community darkroom opening up in New Jersey.  And it is not in Jersey City, thankfully.  I love Jersey City, but I know how tough it can be for some people to get there.  It is opening in Newark.  Woohoo!!!  I missed the deadline to contribute to donations, but I will once there is an opening for that again.

I have been digging deep online and happened to find an article on the Emulsive website.  It looked like the darkroom was in an area I drive through when going home from the club, so I took a gander on the way home on Saturday.  I cross the street shortly before I get to route 280.  I was in no mood to drive around on Saturday - a gross, persistent guy hitting on you will do that to you - but I plan to drive by the location tonight.  (Yeah, clubbing tonight.  The night before Thanksgiving is always a big deal at the club.  Only black lights.  Everyone's teeth and hair glows.  I need to rebleach my stripe for this.)  So then I started digging into different kinds of film.  Oh dear.  I found some fabulous colour films - wild, psychedelic stuff.  I will put them on my Christmas list, for sure.  Then I found this dreamy black and white film by a brand called Svema.  Gosh, the Eastern Europeans have it going film and paper-wise.

I am trying to get a friend back into shooting.  He has taken a break from it - no access - so I hope that giving him a camera I have laying around will inspire him.  I see so much crappy "art" out there and to see someone with fantastic talent not able to use it makes me sad.  I still have this dream/fantasy of going on shooting adventures with friends.  I had so much fun shooting with a couple of former students over the summer and I want to do it more often.  The creativity osmosis can be quite cool.  Then, imagine having people to develop and print with in my basement?  My sister and I tried to start an art collective years ago.  We envisioned a Morris County thing that would involve the freak artists - not the rich suburban housewife ones in my town - but it never went anywhere.  Maybe when I am done being the Chairperson of the NNJDSA, I can spend more time on my art.

I went out to dinner with a former student yesterday. She is doing so well in college.  She is adjusting perfectly.  Then I was surprised by another friend/former student this morning and he is adjusting well too.  Too often I hear of the kids from this school bombing at college - too much partying, not adjusting to living independently, not handling the workload - and I know that many of my colleagues teach too easily.  I loved last year's class because of the kind of young adults they were.  They were so different and hearing how they are doing in college makes my heart sing.  Last year's bunch was so unique and seeing some of them this week is helping with some stuff right now.

Then I get a massage today, deliver a bag of catnip to my friend, and hopefully dance my ass off at the club.

We have professional development today.  I picked all things that pertain to me and my kids:  trauma, abuse, and addiction.  Hopefully these will be much better than last year's batch.  I felt a bit cheated last year.  I had my hopes up for some and they were nothing but a letdown.

So then we have teacher's convention weekend.  I am going to DC, of course.  There is a phenomenal Gordon Parks exhibit that just opened.  Timely, I have to say.  I cannot wait to go home to DC.  It is the only place in this country in which I can walk the streets and feel I am home.

Now, most people in this area say that about NYC.  Not me.  I worked there for eight months.  All I felt was unwelcome and like an intruder.  However, since I have tomorrow off, and the weather is supposed to nice, I want to go in and walk around.  Maybe go to galleries, maybe go to Bluestockings.  I am so socially awkward I am holding myself back from being social.  My friend works in midtown.  He is having a rough time at work.  He has offered to meet for lunch when I go into the city in the past.  I could offer to meet him to bring some levity to his day, but the fear of rejection stops me.  I also have someone else I would like to ask to go with me but the fear of rejection gets me again.  So if I go, I will most likely be alone, which is usually how I do it anyway.

The last time I went on a Thursday night for gallery openings, I stumbled upon a David Hockney exhibit.  That was thrilling.  It was a lot of new paintings and digital work on monitors.  And he was here in all his bespectacled cuteness.  There was also another two or three big openings but I was not impressed.  The Picasso show?  Meh.  I am not a disciple of his.  Misogynist.  Then there was the socially popular one that had all of society holding court and flitting about and there are me and my friend seeming like the losers who crashed the party...  Quite fun.


I guess I wouldn't mind crashing another art party with a friend....

I keep having dreams about being at my grandmother's house.  Sometimes the people who bought it are there and sometimes they are not.  Last night, they were there but we still owned the house.  Sometimes it is in repair, sometimes it is not.  Sometimes her things are still there, sometimes the house is empty.  Last night, I was going through her stuff.  My sister had taken all the things she wanted - as she did when grandma died.  I was going through the living room taking down draperies to keep.  Then, I was going through all her costume jewelry in a dresser.

Sometimes I dream I am back working at the NBA.  I am taking care of the dupes and slides, filing away and keeping the library in tip top shape.  Sometimes I even go get a coffee from that fabulous coffee machine.  That thing was so legendary that when a friend of my sister's heard us talk about it, he sent us a photograph of the updated coffee machine.  Twenty years later and that thing still has fans.

So I dream about places and people I have good memories of.  Luckily, in my dreams I am back at places that made me happy.  Unfortunately, there is always a profound sense of loss in the dream.  I seem aware of the fact that this is not real or permanent.  When I wake up, there is sadness.

I think I dream of these things because I know that any happy moments I have are fleeting.  I was so happy in my job the last few years.  Now, the security and happiness are gone.  I love the subject I teach but the administration and colleagues have taken the joy out of this.  That is not to say that my job was a cakewalk.  I do come in at 6.00 am every day just to get all the work done.  It has never been an easy job.  But that exhaustion was balanced by a love for what I did.  That love is still there but the joy is gone.  I have a lot of selfish, short sighted people to thank for that.  I just graded a class worth of projects and need a nap.  I am exhausted.  I am burning out.  I am tired of fighting.  However, I am four years away from retirement benefits guaranteed - or at least as much as can be guaranteed in this anti-union climate.

I have a new friend and I am so content with this.  However, I know nothing in my life will last.  I dream of having friends that last long into old age but that never happens to me.  I tend to attract the selfish sort.  However, with a couple of the relatively new ones, I might have found people in it for the long haul.  That makes me happy.  But there is always the knowledge that I was not born to be happy and might lose friends I love dearly.

The dreams are kind of happy, but there is always sadness in the end.

There is a tightness in my chest and I fear it will be here for the whole week.  We are jumping through hoops here doing what we can to make the program last, knowing it might all be futile.  Yesterday, I took my first day off to go to Rutgers to take part in an informal talk about Feminism and the organization I am the chair of.  I thought all was ok because I was the specific one asked to participate.  However, during an executive committee phone call meeting last night, I was given the impression that I should have deferred to someone else.  It was not until I clarified that it was about feminism and a woman's perspective that the accuser relented.  I had to clarify that this was not a talk about the organization and it's presence on college campuses.  However, I would like to point out that the individual who is our college point person is MIA much of the time - not on phone calls, rarely comes to meetings.  Yet, I do not get snippy.  I note that he does a good job when I am contacted by college students about starting a branch of our organization on campus.  But I am the one who slipped up.

Then I am given the impression that I should be getting membership updates on a bi-weekly basis.  I get the feeling that every idea that this couple of members have is discussed at length as a failing on my part instead of just simply making the suggestion to me as they come up with it.

No offense, but I do not have a job in which I can just sit around all day contemplating the fate of the organization.  I am teaching all day and even dealing with school stuff into the night.  I am not commuting on a train or bus and able to do organization stuff on my commute.  Hell, I have kids with me each and every lunch period.  I barely have time to take a piss.

Someone might point out that I am going clubbing every week and yes, I am.  But am I supposed to give up all my free time for the organization?  No.  I was told that I should delegate and that is what I am trying to do.  Have others take care of things.  I do not do the social media stuff because we have an elected person in charge of that.  He doesn't do a great job with the facebook stuff, but when I hinted at that, I got nowhere. I refuse to give every minute of my free time because I know I will burn out.  I saw that happen with one of our elected officials last year and he is slipping in his volunteer activities right now, even though he is not elected.

Another point of contention:  There is apparently a problem if I find a meeting location that is not 100% accessible but the branch has had meetings in a building that is not accessible.  I feel I can do nothing right as of right now and after I encounter this one (and sometimes one other) person, I want to quit.

Luckily for me I had a friend contact me yesterday after we hadn't seen each other for a couple of weeks.  He was "poking the bear" - aka getting a rise out of a mutual acquaintance online - and we chatted on and off all day, just like old times.  I will see him Saturday night and I cannot wait.  I also chatted with a new friend into the night and it all made me feel better.

Than I came to work and saw my substitute did not hand out the sheets for my students to work on yesterday.  Aggravation.  And I will be here until 9.00 pm tonight for an open house.  And I am having phone problems.  And I got an email at 6.30 from my least favourite member about sending out an email.  So while I breathed easy last night after an aggravating phone call, the tightness is back.

I want to cry or punch a wall.

So basically this is my theory:  Move the last one hired in our department to the Technology Department; fire the next three (that includes me); move a guy into our department or move her back to our department; keep the first one hired; end up with an Art Department of two people.

The last woman hired has been given the Web Design class to teach.  She has been directed to get her Technology certificate.  She would be the first one fired but if she is moved to another department temporarily, then the last one hired in our department changes.  They already RIF'd one person so they have no barriers to RIF others in the department.  They can fire three of us.

There is a teacher who is going for a certificate in media, film, and digital photography.  If he is doing this, they can move my class out of art and into technology and have him teach it, while scrapping the darkroom.  I lose my job.  They can then move the last one hired back in the art department, leaving them with two proper art certified teachers for the whole school.

There are claims left and right that money is tight, but they are spending money all over the place.  They removed a person from and administrative position and had to offer him his old teaching job back.  There are too many teachers in that department.  Someone should have been let go but due to the political connections of the last two hires, they could not do that.  So the department is overloaded and teachers are not teaching full course loads but getting full time pay.  But they RIF'd an art teacher.

Is all of this coming from the little man?  I do not know.  I do know that I had a couple of conversations with people familiar with him.  He did not leave anyone with good feelings in his past district.  As a matter of fact, the look of horror on people's faces when I bring up his name should be enough to make you wonder why we are dealing with him here.  He was run out of his district and the rumour is that the state fired him.

I am tired of this place's games.  I am depressed and having a hard time getting up each morning.  The time from 6.00 am to when I start seeing kids is so hard for me.  The treatment of us is abominable.  I am on more medicine due to the stress and anxiety.  I do believe there are a number of us teachers that could start a mental cruelty lawsuit here.  I have never worked in a place like this, ever.  I am so sad and angry.  I need people to talk to about this who are neutral but no one wants to listen.  I do not want to talk to colleagues because we are all going through the same thing.  I am either on the brink of tears, about to punch a wall, or numb to it all.

I think I will go and write some college recommendation letters.

Today is a special day.  Kodak Ektachrome is now up for sale.  After over 5 years of being off the market, there is now Ektachrome available to shoot.  I am ecstatic.  I have read a bit on the development of the film up in Rochester and saw some test images.  It is all so exciting.

So what the hell is the big deal about film?  That is like asking me why I prefer vinyl records to cd's - I do not do MP3's, people.  There is a rawness to the medium.  It is also more deliberate.  You must be fully engaged in what you are doing.  It is like the difference between hanging out with a person who looks you in the eye and talks and listens to you versus hanging out with a person checking their cell phone every few minutes.  I can honestly say I am obsessed with analog because there is a different, more pure inherent quality to the media - photographic, musical, you name it.  I do shoot digital and lots of it, but the images just do not reflect my inner thoughts and emotions they way analog does.  I have not a clue as to how that happens, but it does.

The part I like about teaching is watching the kids go from not knowing a thing about analog to being obsessed with it.  I see it in a kid in my first period.  He talked about how great it FELT to shoot with the film camera.  Listening to a girl's A-1 shutter whoosh open and shut and the thrill we got from that cannot be duplicated digitally.  The kids are getting.it.

The administration?  Not so much.  Technology, technology, technology.  But what about those chemists and photographers who are working to bring back the analog methods and media?  Where is the career path for them?  Who will introduce them to this when you get rid of my darkroom and push me out?

I am excited about the return of film and know that if they do push me out here, I will find a path to preach the gospel of analog, one way or another.

We had a disturbing meeting last week.  There is a consultant who - according to him - has so much power that the superintendent does whatever he says.  I know this man from another district.  The residents and parents could not wait until they got rid of him when he was the principal.  He was practically run out of town.  But he is calling the shots here at my job.

The rumours:

• he sees no need for the arts.
• the Art Department is going to be disposed of

After the meeting last week, I believe the rumours.  He claims his art department in his school was second to none.  I had friends who went to his school.  I subbed there.  It was good, but it was minimal.  In the 1990s, they had only two teachers for a student population of 800.  They now have only one.  They have only four classes to offer the students.  My high school had only 2/3 the student population but had twice the art offerings.

PCTI is sucking us dry.  Kids go there, we lose money to the school, they transfer back here and we do not get than money coming back with the kid for two years.  Because of that loss of money, programs need to be trimmed - people or subjects.  

Here is a wild proposal:  There are teachers in the Math department who are not teaching a full schedule but getting full time pay.  RIF one of them.  They RIF'd an art teacher last year and we have full classes and no drop in the number of kids wanting to take our classes.

What we have is a group of people pushing kids away from our classes and into the CAD and Criminal Justice classes.  Guess what?  If you push everyone into two or three careers, the market will be flooded with candidates and no one will get jobs.  It happened in the field of law.  Forbes wrote about the overloaded market some hears ago.  Instead, provide the students with options that have proven to be winners in this school - namely the arts - and watch the kids flourish.  But no.  Everyone is going to be a cop or an engineer.  Good luck with that.

So we have been warned that we are on the chopping block. Oh, the phrases were "Things have to change", "The money is not there" and so on.  However, when you have been in other jobs and districts, you know how to translate those misleading phrases.  Here is a novel idea in addition to the one I propose above:  Get rid of some sports or instate dues for the athletes.  One school I looked at forces their students to pay a lab fee for their photo classes.  I do not think we can do that in the classroom.  But where is the harm in charging a fee for an extracurricular?

So it has been a depressing week.  I am in a financial situation that I am not worried about my job.  I can sub in my towns near me and be ok.  I have no debt and no kids.  However, I will not give up on this place and this program and jump ship to another district.  I had someone mention they would like me in their school.  I am waiting this out.  I love the kids here too much to give up.

I had some visitors last night during a break in the Back to School Night schedule.  It was a parent I have a real good relationship with and a couple of former students.  They do not want to see Photography go.  Ever.  They said there would be a major pushback if the program was harmed.  These are your taxpayers talking.  I do not need to fight for this program.  Like I said, I have employment options.  However, I stay here and do what I do for a love of the kids.  I love my students dearly.  How many schools can say that their teachers feel that way?  To whittle down this department means getting rid of the few of us in this building that feel that way about our students.

To listen to that man posing as a consultant with good experience and ideas is a mistake that will do a great deal of harm to our kids and this community.  Think carefully before you act.