I broke my own code of conduct

I was so busy being angry, I forgot to be thankful.

I'm actually still angry, so I'm going to tell you about that first.

Whom am I angry at? Myself, that's whom.

Why? Because I broke my own code of conduct. And I paid a heavy price for it.

Oh, let me stop being all noble. I'm not angry at myself at all. (Well, a bit.)

Who I'm angry at (don't say it should be 'whom', I don't really care at this point) -- who I'm angry at is the idiots who parade themselves as 'pre-school educators' and don't know education from an elephant's arse. (Ass, if you prefer.)

So they decide they want to do this session for kids, and they call me in as the 'expert storyteller'.

And then they want to control everything.

The age group of the kids coming to attend the session (3 to 7 years); the content of the story; how I tell it, the outcome ... everything.

And I broke my code of conduct on so many counts and took up the assignment. I was having a rebound-moment from having fought with someone else on email about another assignment I'd turned down.

Code of conduct #1 -- Three year olds and seven year olds are at different places in their lives. You do not combine children who are at different places in their lives in a session, you wind up doing injustice to both.

Code of conduct #2 -- Do not work with people who don't give you some space if you're the 'expert'. Ideally, you should have the ultimate say in all the important things.

Anyway, I took the assignment.

I tried my best. I really did. There are photos and videos of the session -- I think I have evidence that I tried my best.

But the content, in trying to cater to such a wide age group, was pertinent to no one and the parents wound up being the real participants.

To top it all, the girl who was changing the slides in the background (did I mention I'm allergic to technology during a session) got the pacing wrong in spite of a rehearsal and very obvious cues. (For example, if you say 'ants', the slide with ants on it needs to come on screen. It didn't. It did, the third time the word 'ANTS' was uttered.)

Anyway, so a bunch of parents built a bunch of houses out of ice cream sticks and play dough and pictures were taken by one and all of smiling kids with parent made craft.

And I came out feeling an idiot.

An ungrateful idiot.

Because you know, I don't have to stay angry. I have a lot to be thankful for.

I'm thankful that I am not financially dependent on ever seeing these people again.

I'm thankful that I have a Dad who supports me and lets me vent.

I'm thankful for friends who are available on phone and chat when I'm upset.

I'm thankful for WDC, and the Cramp judge who gives me a prompt that makes me write this piece and see the silver linings.

I'm grateful that I still have a sense of humour and can think of making a joke about flattering the judge with the above line -- when in truth, it's true, typing this now is cathartic at this very time.

I'm thankful that I haven't actually met the prompt.

It was to write about someone who forgot to be thankful.

Thanks to your prompt, I remembered.