In Which I Totally Blow My Cover

Late last week, the school board had a hearing for public comments concerning the change in teacher pay, i.e. strip the teachers, bus drivers and school nurses of their pittance and let the central office employees have raises.

After hearing that the Vice Chair said that "the teachers were okay with it," I thought it might be necessary to make an appearance at the THIRTY minutes they were allotting us to be heard. My compatriots and I got there an hour before the hearing started because parents were also slated to speak concerning a change in report cards.

I had told LawyerBoy that I was merely going to lend my support at this function and I promised not to get arrested. He did, however, stay at his office late because it is close to the jail that we would all be hauled to if things got out of hand.

No one had signed up to speak for the teachers when we had arrived, so I threw caution to the wind and signed up to speak on behalf of the teachers. I had time to prepare - although I was sitting in the midst of a maelstrom - and my words were succinct, thoughtful and not one bit disrespectful. When it was my turn, I did a great job. The teachers I was with said that at one point there were other people shouting, "Amen, sister!" and clapping and cheering. I was, however, trying to read my own writing and trying not to faint. I finished before my two minutes were up and sat down. Now, by the time the meeting got started, guidance counselors, school nurses, bus drivers and school teachers had signed up. But we only got two minutes apiece.

Oh.... did I mention the TV news crews and newspaper reporters who were present? Didn't think so.

Oh, and did I mention that there wasn't any air conditioning in the boardroom? I think they wanted to sweat us out.

When I got home, the news mentioned that the teachers had met, but that was it. I was pretty happy. Didn't have to mention anything to LB - lots of teachers were there, lots of teachers spoke and lots of teachers were unhappy.

Friday afternoon, I turned on the news. Apparently, they were saving the teacher story for the weekend. And there I was; thankfully, I didn't have my name scrolling under my face as I was speaking, but you couldn't miss me. Even the girl who does my hair called. However, LB didn't see and I didn't mention it to him. He was on a need to know basis and he didn't need to know.

Saturday morning. I checked Facebook. And I believe the words from a fellow teacher I read were: "Hey girl, you're all over the front page of the paper. You rock."

Oh my holy hell. I was paragraphs 2 - 6, above the fold, in a front page story about the teachers and how they felt betrayed over the superintendent's secret raise.

LawyerBoy is now all clued in on my Thursday night antics. I believe he wanted to protect me from being an idiot in front of the Board; he said that what I said was absolutely appropriate and I had nothing to fear. And if anyone did have an issue with what I said needed to remember that he was conversant in civil and constitutional law.

Whew.

He also went out on Saturday afternoon, leaving me alone in the house, and asked if he'd be reading about what I did in Sunday's paper.

Ha. Ha.