Pending

 There are plenty of moments in the course of a week as an elementary school teacher that give me pause. These moments tend to fall into one of two categories. The first one is labeled, "Was this in my job description?" These are the instances in which I find myself doing things like rescuing a wounded pigeon from a curious throng of kindergartners. Children and bird are both doing fine at last report. The second category is harder for me to negotiate. These are the times when I realize my feeble understanding of the trauma experienced by most of the children in my charge go far beyond my creative writing degree. Years of experience have given me plenty of brief insights, but I am still routinely knocked off my pegs by confronting the challenges some of our eight year olds are regularly asked to endure. 

If you have hung around here in the place named for the measure of chaos in a place I call "paradise," you have perhaps become familiar with stories of this disconnect. This past week offered me a chance to double down on those experiences 

ICE came to our little town. One hundred federal agents were deployed to the Coast Guard Station in Alameda. The sweeps that have taken place in other cities across our state and our nation have begun, based on the island in the bay that was created back in the early twentieth century by the Army Corps of Engineers. This allowed the United States Military an edge when it came time to create bases on the newly created island. An Army base and a Naval base have seen their time come and go, but the Coast Guard Station remains. 

That is from where the ICE Storm will emanate. 

Or not. 

While parents and administrators and staff wring their hands about where they might show up, we stand on guard much in the same way we do for fire drills and earthquake preparedness. These are the things we should do. These are the things we shouldn't do. 

Heaven forbid. 

Because just like fires and earthquakes and wounded pigeons, they're out there. We hope they won't be coming to our door. There is plenty of trauma without them, thank you. 

Our job, mine and the kids', is hard enough.