A Public School Girl in a Catholic School World

I’m preparing to teach in a Catholic school, and boy, I don’t think I’m ready for all that a Catholic school entails. For example, I still can’t see look at our religion books without that superior puffing of the chest feeling – “What is THAT doing here? THAT can’t be here! Whatever happened to the separation of church and state?!” – and then I realize in this new world, state is nothing and church is everything. It’s not that I don’t like Catholicism, granted I have my issues with it, but I think every person that grew up forced to go to church every Sunday share my issues. I even went to a Jesuit college where I roomed with my favorite Catholic school graduate. Let me tell you, Catholic school graduates like Kim where in high demand when theology homework came around. I like the idea of leading a moral life and all of that Sunday School be nice to your friends and visit the elderly neighbor talk, what I don’t like are sentences like this one found in my new teacher packet, “May Jesus, Mary, and Joseph our ‘model teachers,’ bless you and your work in the vineyard of the Archdiocese of Boston.” Number one, they missed a comma after Joseph and I’m not okay with that especially since later in the packet they stress the importance of all speech and writing being grammatically correct. But even more disturbing: who compares a school system to a vineyard? Can you imagine if the Milwaukee new teacher packet used this same format, “May George Bush and his cronies our ‘model teachers,’ bless you and your work in the brewing company of Milwaukee Public Schools.”? Come on, only a Catholic school can get away with that. Even Boston Public Schools would sue the District, saying that quote led to increased wine consumption among first grade students. I’m in a whole new world, and this one definitely doesn’t involve flying carpets and genies.

The Hannas

What I did on my summer vacation... By, Beth Hanna

Alright, alright. I know I am at fault here. This was an unacceptable amount of time to be without updates about our fun, exciting lives. Just think of it as our blog’s summer vacation. We all need a little time away, okay?

Speaking of time off – Bill and I just finished a marathon-style vacation. Two and a half weeks and seven cities – Appleton, Breed, Gurnee, Eau Claire, Manitowoc, Milwaukee, and Madison – and those are just the cities where we got out of the car, we went through 2,400 miles of cities in transport to and from Wisconsin. I almost feel like I went on one of those European tours: “Over here you’ll see a scenic overlook of the Fox River.” I really don’t advocate for things to be labeled “scenic overlooks.” It sets the bar pretty high and isn’t every overlook scenic? Unless is has some large obstruction, but I guess that’s scenery too. I think overlook is sufficient.

And now back on track, our vacation was amazingly fun. I think we had a true Wisconsin experience with a trip Up North, Packer discussions, and plenty of cheese. I guess it’s the little things you miss when you move away because that was some of the best string cheese I’ve ever had. Highlights of the trip were Great America and our nephew Will. We couldn’t stop raving about both of them. We also became a little board game crazy. We had to get our fill before going back to two person games. Parcheesi with two people just isn’t fun – well, it’s usually not fun in general with certain strategies, but that’s not my point.

Bill’s brother, Matt, added to our vacation by coming back to Boston with us. I discovered that it really is possible to have a vacation in your own city. We skipped the Freedom Trail, but walked the Emerald Necklace: a group of “green space” as Matt kept calling it, sat on the beach, and revisited the infamous mountain we hiked earlier this year.

I hope reading this gave you a little vacation from whatever you’re supposed to be doing. Back to work now.