The Attack

I wanted to stand atop a chair and yell as loudly as my voice would allow, “I’m not doing it for attention! These tears are involuntary!!”

I wanted to scream it from the rooftops, bellow it through a megaphone. But then, of course, that would just draw more unnecessary attention upon myself, which is exactly what I did not want.

So instead, I found myself sobbing in the bathroom on my break, staring desperately at the mirror, willing myself to stop. But my body doesn’t work that way. Crying is, as aforementioned, an involuntary reaction, and on this particular day, I simply could not stop it. I was mortified. And the spiral was getting deeper. Now I was crying because I couldn’t believe I was a grown woman, a teacher, crying at work. I felt like a blithering fool. I felt so defeated.

I’m still not sure what even happened that morning. It was a typical day, the start of a new session with new students. I had just had a delightful first two periods, and now my coworker Yolanda would teach that group of students grammar, and I would have my break.

“So? How are the troops?” Yolanda asked me regarding our shared class. We sat in the office, side-by-side, we were desk neighbors. Behind us sat our manager, Marsha, on her laptop at her own desk.

“They’re really good.” I smiled. “Especially this older gentleman, Beom-Soo. He’s fantastic. Really nice too. He was already asking me about MLA referencing and formatting. I wonder if he learned that from here, or if he’s studied Academic English somewhere else.”

We continued chatting for a moment, when another teacher, Oksana, entered the room. She taught the optional level below mine. I wanted to know more about Beom-Soo.

“Hey Oksana,” I asked, leaning back harmlessly to face her. “Did you have my student Beom-Soo in your class? Because –”

And that was it. That is why Oksana exploded on me. “You know, I really don’t think it’s fair that you guys sit here and talk shit about students!”

I was stunned. I hadn’t been, nor did I ever, “talk shit about students.” Oksana on the other hand, was fairly loose lipped about the students she disliked, and there were plenty. I didn’t get a chance to formulate a response because Oksana kept right on yelling. I sat wide-eyed, my mouth agape, as she continued, “The way a student acts in my class has nothing to do with the way he acts in your class! It is completely irrelevant! It is extremely unprofessional to come in here and talk shit about them!!”

I nodded dumbly with a forced smile. I didn’t necessarily think anything she was saying was incorrect. Just completely unfounded. I tried to get a word in, “Yeah, of course. I just -”

“I don’t want to discuss students!” She screamed before storming out of the office.

Throughout the blast, I had waited for my manager Marsha to pipe in and explain to her that I was not, under any circumstances, saying anything negative about a student. It had been quite the opposite. I had waited for Marsha to tell Oksana that discussing students’ performance across levels was, in fact, encouraged to ensure the best possible path for them. It was good to discuss their strengths and merits in a professional manner that could be beneficial for the students. I had waited for Marsha to tell Oksana that berating a colleague aggressively in the office, in front of coworkers, was completely unacceptable behaviour that would not be tolerated. It was the epitome of unprofessional.

But none of that happened. Marsha sat there silently, and Yolanda wore the same look of horror that I did. I began to wonder if they thought what she had said was true. That neither of them had actually been listening to me, and that they believed that I had been ready to “talk shit” about a student. Teachers do do that in the office from time to time, and although I have on occasion expressed frustrations, it was certainly not a habit of mine. Of all the people present in the office that morning, I was the least culpable. I felt blind sighted by the injustice of this attack. My stomach dropped and my body began to quiver. Tears filled my eyes regardless of how hard I tried to ward them off. I couldn’t help it.

But before I could escape the office, to calm myself down, there was a knock at the door. A student from my afternoon class was here for an appointment I had forgotten we had scheduled. He wanted to go over the outline for his cause-and-effect essay. I took a deep breath and regained my composure, blinked back those unwanted tears and stood up to have our meeting.

I’m not sure if my student noticed my bloodshot eyes as we spoke. He may have been too focused on the complicated writing structure we discussed. Although my body was shaking, I thought I was doing a good job. My student didn’t seem to notice a thing, asking many questions and taking notes diligently. It wasn’t even awkward. I was even starting to feel better.

Until Marsha passed by us on her way to the bathroom. She took one look at my eyes, my pitiful eyes, the eyes I could not control if I wanted to, and she rolled her own. She muttered loudly as she walked by, “oh God,” as if I was the problem. Now I was even more hurt. Wounded. I was trying my best. I couldn’t believe this was the school I worked in. The place where just a year before, in another department, I was being praised. Now I just felt like I was being ambushed. Despite my crumbling confidence, I do think I managed to do a good job hiding my feelings and having a productive meeting with that student.

I had my breakdown in the bathroom after the meeting was over. The weight of it all overtook me, and I sobbed uncontrollably.

2017