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Teacher shares sweet Halloween treat

Halloween is a rough but rewarding day for people who teach little children

Date published: 10/31/2008

T HE WITCH IS disgruntled about Batman butting in front of her in line.

Batman is very upset because Spider-Man keeps stepping on his cape.

The Pop Star Diva is all worked up because she spilled chocolate milk on her sparkly spandexy pants.

I get everyone calmed down and headed out of the cafeteria in something loosely resembling a line. It's Halloween; we'll take it.

About 30 feet out of the cafeteria, I look back at a fretting Cinderella tripping over the cascading tulle of her dress. She's all in a tizzy about having lost one of her shoes.

I glance back toward the cafeteria to see one tiny clear plastic high-heeled slipper sitting there in the middle of the hallway. I send Luke Skywalker to rescue it and we turn around to again inch down the hallway.

Snow White has left her tiara in the cafeteria and has to go back for it. Three kids ask me if it is time for the party yet. Another Batman is dancing a little jig because he couldn't get out of his costume on his own at lunch. So I am trying to untie a knot as he wiggles and hops up and down chanting, "I gotta go, I gotta go, I gotta go!"

I'm still doing OK at this point. I got the obscenely large 24 oz. coffee at Wawa this morning in anticipation of the day. I just had a "lunch hour." I can do this.

But then I really start to wonder if indeed I will make it to the end of the day without losing it when Tinkerbell begins to explain that her wings are drooping down and her dad said I would have to blow them up at some point in the day.

I begin to ask myself, as I unplug the little nozzle and begin to inflate, "Is this really my life? No, wait, really--I'm being paid right now to blow air into wings? When did I sign up for this, and, anyway, when did costumes start coming with inflatable parts?"

All this in the two minutes on the way back to the classroom from lunch? I can only imagine what the afternoon will be like.

Jamie Soper teaches kindergarten at Smith Station Elementary in Spotsylvania County--and has rested up for another fun Halloween today.

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Date published: 10/31/2008

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