Today I substituted for advanced 8th grade math at Santa Barbara Junior High.

It was fun! I had nearly all of my GATE students from last year spread out among my 5 classes. And, like I wrote about yesterday, they are still as wonderful as ever. Some of them still haven't stopped talking in class (just like last year), some of them still have braces on, still have the same haircut, and so on. And some have changed slightly, which is cool to see.

Being in the same town for 27 years and working with so many youth in so many different settings has allowed me to see all kinds of people growing up, and I like that. I like that a lot.

On a side note, I rode my bike to work, which was wonderful and quick. I rode downtown afterward and played on my computer in a Starbucks and a few of my students from the day saw me in there. "Hi, Mr. V!" and some giggles.

Later, at 10pm, I was grocery shopping (because grocery shopping at 10pm on a Friday night is a beautiful thing to do and it is never crowded) and saw two students that I have subbed for a lot at Dos Pueblos. We talked for a moment and that was cool, too. I know kids from all these different generations, and it's a bit trippy. I see styles in Junior high and high school, I see who is partying with who (on Facebook), I see people making college decisions, and I just have this sort of omniscient view of a lot of little lives around town. Sometimes I feel like a wise old grandfather who is watching his offspring grow up like a wild garden around him.