By: Nic Hertzler
Ten months is long, ten months is short.
Five months are gone and I’m all out of sorts.
It started off slow, but then it went fast.
It’s hard to believe that ed season has passed.
The last month has been a roller coaster of feelings,
There was so much to prepare for.
Saying goodbye to the children left many of us reeling,
And bang! five month members knocking on our door.
With five months down and five months to go,
To the SCA, AmeriCorps, and the planet our service we lend.
Spring is coming and is bringing an end to the snow,
The corps is excited to see what’s around the bend.
But the blooming of flowers and the budding of trees,
Means the coming of a season other than spring.
We’ll be out and about enjoying the Massachusetts breeze,
Hitch season has arrived; yeah that’s a thing.
But enough on the future I’m here to talk about before
And to do that justice I can’t speak in rhyme anymore.
I know that when I say this that I speak for more than just myself,
That this experience isn’t something that you can pick off the store shelf.
As I mentioned before, the past month brought us 10 monthers the end of education season. It was a relief to some and the opposite for others, but the general consensus was that it was an amazing experience, but that hitch season will be amazing too. I know that for me personally I’ll miss hearing my name said with a certain excitement that can only be found in the voice of a kid who can’t wait to learn about erosion (and the equal amount of sarcastic disappointment when I tell them that the dirty bins I brought to class were for us to clean and in no way related to the experiment we were about to do).
Coming back from a week-long break in the middle of February posed quite a challenge for us *cough* expert lesson planners. I’d compare it to the feeling of senioritis. After the break we had two weeks of teaching left, but only one week until our new family, the five month members, arrived. The simultaneous excitement for the new members and the end of ed season caused the time to fly. The final lessons were more relaxed than before so that we could cherish our time left with our kids.
On a different note, the weather has been strange, we had almost a week of 50+ degree weather a few weeks ago, and its slowly been getting colder. Although almost all the snow has melted up here in the hilltowns, the pond is still frozen and there’s a snow storm on the horizon. Here’s to hoping that snowstorm never comes, I’m ready to get out and wear shorts.
And needless to say, we’re still “Out here in Hawley, livin’ real efficiently, usin’ less energy, doin’ it sustainably.”