So how was your day?

Apathy Jack writes:

"Sir, do you remember Jasmine Connors?"
"Yeah, Big Jasmine, right?"
"Wait, you called her 'Big Jasmine' as well?"
"Well, I had to differentiate between her and Little Jasmine somehow."
"How many Jasmines were there?"
"Two that year: The big one and the little one."
"I didn't think teachers labeled people like that."
"You lot do it all the time. You created the name to begin with."
"But we're students."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
"As arguments go, I"m not sure that one is as compelling as you think it is..."

...

One of my kids is depressed. Her reasons, what I know of them, are good. She wanted to stay home today, and her mother would have let her. But she couldn't, because she had English. She tells me that there's no way on Earth she's coming to school tomorrow. She doesn't have English then, you see. This means that she won't be missing the one subject she gives a damn about. It also means that she won't have me on her back about missing school – she knows I forgive people their wagging on days I'm not going to see them: out of sight and all – but my lot all know they're in trouble if the days off start mounting up.

There's hope for this one.

...

Half nine or so and a couple of my kids are waiting to be picked up. I feel obligated to wait with them because, hell, my school's not the safest place to be in broad daylight. If they turned up dead tomorrow morning, there'd be a lot of tiresome questions that would doubtlessly disrupt my mid-afternoon nap.

Eventually one of their fathers turns up, the car weaving about a little, because Dad is too stoned to drive, but just stoned enough not to realise it.

"You sure this is a good idea?" I ask my two.
"We'll be fine," they both reply as they cheerfully clamber into the car and it lurches off.

Have you ever been swamped by a feeling of pointlessness so overwhelming that it bordered on nihilism?

Yeah, me too.

...

Sitting on the bus at ten o'clock, reading poetry written by one of my little goths. It's a bit on the overblown side, and has borrowed a little from the Rollins I've been lending her, but hey, I like overly earnest angst poetry, and I like Henry Rollins (but I repeat myself).

This kid's actually good. And her stuff's more than a little scary.

I read the line

If you're hungry I give you my arm
Your hunger causes my veins to rise

I hunch down in my seat and pull the hood of my jacket down over my eyes, because I need to hide from an idea that intense.

Sleep deprived and half crazy though I may be, sometimes the little bastards amaze me.