I’ve been at school several weeks now
After 5 weeks on island time
Living with the tide and sun
Suddenly I’m sitting through meetings
Boxed in by schedules
Summoned by the imperious red light of my Blackberry.

Life reduced to a
blurred montage of scenes

4:45 a.m. Arrival Gate A
Meeting the first round of new staff at the airport
Settle them in to a new country;
cars, appliances and bank accounts.
A new school;
handbooks, assignments and expectations.


Construction tours
Snag lists
Deadlines
WTF

A room chock-a-block full to the ceiling of boxes labelled in a code
always hidden on the side on the bottom.

30 tables to be assembled.
17 sets of legs.

Whiteboards mounted
Moved from here to there
Sometimes back again

A virtual flood of
Tech and maintenance requests.

An army of workers cleans and rakes and plants
and takes synchronized tea breaks.

All for this:
To throw open the school bus door as soon as it has stopped
Let loose a flood of grins
Mr. Ben, look I lost a tooth.
Hugs
Watching anxious glances become smiles
And see the new kid in grade 7 reach out and take the hand of a first grader
and walk together into the new school year.
Come on, he says. I’ll show you.

Welcome.
Welcome back to school.
Welcome to a new start
A new year