Have I mentioned lately that I love my job? Not only do I love the job that I have and the students I teach, but I love the ladies with whom I work. Most notably Pitbull (my boss), and Chicky, her second in command.

Chicky, is an amazingly beautiful single woman who is thisclose to finishing her PhD. in Clinical Psychology. She is one of the most genuinely polite and nice people I've met, and Pitbull and I have done our level best to pull her over to the dark side...with some degree of success.

I've known Pitbull for about 12 years, when she was still single, childless and a "mere" teacher's assistant who ran a classroom and did everything asked of her (and more) on pay that was below the poverty level. She drove a van of B.D. students, taught them all day, and drove them home. She is little, and did more physical management than any man there. She made lesson plans, graded work, wrote out report cards, attended staffings, planned staffings, covered the toughest classrooms. She had to work a second and at times a third job. She waited tables and taught gymnastics and she put herself through school, got married, had four children including a set of twin boys (whom she birthed as I did, 1 vaginal, 1 C-section, 2 hours apart), and eventually rose to become the principal of the school we are at now, and had the good sense to call me in to join her new team.

The verbal sparring between Pitbull and I has gone on since we met. She calls me "Anus" as a play on the second part of my real name. In retaliation, I began calling her "Herpe" because she get more cold sores than anyone else on the planet. One day I was talking to her and the large lump on her lip kept drawing my eye.

"HEY!" She shouted at me. "My face is up here, stop talking to my f*cking LIP!"

Yeah, she tells it like it is.

So on any typical day, one can walk down the halls, and if you listen to the conversations taking place outside of student range, you might hear....

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Me: Who's going to get lunch today?

Pitbull: Yo MOMMA!

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Pitbull: Did you f*ck the computer nerd to get that new printer?

Me: (wiping my lips and brushing off my knees) Uh....no.

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Pitbull: How late did you stay here last night, you brown nosing over achieving ho?

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Pitbull: Kiss my flat white ass.

Me: Kiss my fat white ass.

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No matter what her words sound like, I know she has my back, and she knows I have hers. She IS my Pitbull, she offers on a regular basis to kick that ass of anyone who so much as looks at me cross ways.

We have over 160 kids in our building right now, an all time record. She knows the name of every one of them, she knows which school district they belong to and she knows why each one of them has been sent to us. For most, she knows their home lives, their background, their quirks. She still drives kids home many nights. The toughest kids, and into the toughest neighborhoods. She can go into the "in-school suspension room" and get right into a high school kids face and say "Hey, what's with your eyes, man?" The students love her, even when they are cussing at her. The school district coordinators love her, because she won't tie them up in red tape. She takes any kid they send, and would rather take them without the necessary paperwork than keep them out of school while required signatures are gathered. She is bombarded minute by minute with requests from students to talk to her.

Every single morning she is on the phone, talking with each of her children as they get ready to go off to school. She has lunch packed as well as a snack. She makes sure that they check it to see that they like it. She reminds them to wear a jacket even though her husband has already done so. She goes to their special events at school.

Her gait gives away the pain she is in from years of gymnastics and too many physical managements. Her freckles are having a harder time concealing her worry lines as she and her husband struggle to find a new home for their family, away from a pyromaniac neighbor.

My Pitbull is having a rough time right now. Not only is she chewed on almost daily for one stupid thing or another, but her dad just went into the hospital and will lose his foot within the next week. I wanted her to know that she saved my career. She is responsible for me smiling every morning about going to work. I like to stay late. I love what I do, and it is almost completely because of what she has done with this school. And I just wanted her, and anyone reading this, to know that.

Thanks PitBull.

TODAY'S QUOTE

"Only your real friends will tell you when your face is dirty."

*Sicilian Proverb*

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The Digital Bastard's Claim as of date 5/20/02:

Beginning Weight: 204.5

Goal #1: 184 (Met 5/19/02)

Goal #2: 164.5

Total lost: 22.5

Pounds to go for goal #2: 17.5

Pounds to go to my final target....58.5

I hope to meet my final target by May 1, 2003

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