is it karmic retribution or just bad luck?

I'm starting to wonder if I inadvertently pissed off some cosmic deity that is now wreaking physical and emotional revenge on me. This has been a pretty crummy week so far, and it's not even over yet!

It started on Sunday, of course, with my crash on the bike (which was entirely my fault, I admit that). The weather's been pretty grey and crummy all week, and I'm officially sick of winter and ready for spring to get here. February is a dreary month, and it's that time of the year for the winter blues. Add in all this uncertainty about my future with GEOS, and this is the first week in Japan that I've felt the on-comings of a blue funk.

The situation with the school has been escalating, though I didn't realize it until today. Usually when I see Benni-sensei and Hitomi-san conferring quietly in the office, I mind my own business and let them come to me if it is my business. Turns out, today's conference was. After my afternoon class, I went in to mark attendance, and Hitomi-san told me that she had been told by the Ito Yokado school boss that she should make a schedule for me that combines my current schedule with the NET's schedule at the Kids' school. Essentially, I'm intended to take over his position when he leaves in April.

This is highly laughable - and also insane. The NET at Ito Yokado has 74 students and 30 classes; I have ~45 students and 22 classes. Also, I am supposed to take over Benni-sensei's students to, which would give me maybe 10-12 more classes (most of her students have said they prefer to quit). On this schedule of mine, I have an estimated 55 classes.

I never claim to be good at math, but even I realized that this wasn't adding up. My days are 9 hours long, and I work 5 days. That's 45 weekly hours for classses. Notice the number difference: I would have to work 11 hour days to get all those classes in, without breaks, the majority of them kids' classes.

Well, Hitomi-san was having a mental breakdown trying to get it to work, even though I kept telling her that it was impossible, and she finally called her boss to find out what the hell the deal was. I've made it pretty clear that I don't want to teach only kids classes, and I've been falling back on my boss's reassurance that that wasn't going to happen. However, Hitomi-san was informed that I was slated to take over the NET position at Ito Yokado and that the only classes to be sacrificed were the adult classes. GEOS has made that clear enough already, practically encouraging us to convince our students to quit rather continue their contracts at Ito Yokado.

This did - and to an extent still does - infuriate me. In January, I told my boss that under no circumstances did I want to become a kids only teacher, and he told me that wasn't what was going to happen. Either I go to Ito Yokado in essentially the same capacity I'm in now or I go to a new school - that's what I was told. Now, the Ito Yokado head is telling Hitomi-san that my boss "lied to" or "misinformed" me. Also, she told Hitomi-san not to show me the schedule or even speak to me about the proposed move to Ito Yokado. Thankfully, she ignored this.

I spent most of the evening working myself into an agitated state and consuming large quantities of chocolate. Because I have not been "officially" apprised of the situation, Hitomi-san didn't want me to contact my boss and demand an explanation. Instead, she sent him a harried email, to which he replied that he was "occupied" but that someone would contact me tomorrow. She gave him my available times, apologized to me profusely, and suggested that I not agree to anything that had to do with Ito Yokado, to tell my boss that I wanted to move and request an adult school and nothing else. She also told me the head of the Ito Yokado school was crazy, but I'd already figured that out.

Here's why I'm mad: I was told that I would go to Ito Yokado with my students, separate from the kids' school. I would not be replacing the NET there, who has been coerced into staying even though he's wanted to leave since October. And now, I'm starting to wonder if this was the plan - to have me replace him. I don't want to believe that my boss deliberately lied to me, so I'm anxious to talk to him to get the story straight. Because if I find out I'm being tricked into going to Ito Yokado as the only NET, I'll be very displeased indeed.

I talked with Benni-sensei a while after our last classes, then headed home. I decided that I needed a bath to relax me, so after my shower, I stayed in the bathtub to fill it up and relax. I'm sitting there, washing my still scabby knees and thinking about the screw-job that GEOS is doing to me and about how idiotic and enfuriating the whole thing is.

The next thing I know, I'm having some weird "Twilight Zone" moment where I have no idea where I am or what I'm doing. Complete disorientation, total black-out. And I'm aware of a dull pain on my forehead. I touch my fingers to the sore spot and discover that I have a ginormous goose egg developing. I think what happened is that the warmth of the air and the water overwhelmed me (taking Japanese hot baths is a lot like taking a sauna), and I passed out for a few seconds. I've gotten drowsy in them before, but I've never lost consciousness, until this time. I hit my head on the sink, and that brought me around again. I must have hit it pretty hard, because not only was there a large and lovely goose egg, but there's also a little scratch near the top.

My first thought was, "oh, crap I hope I don't have a concussion," especially after I stood up and was hit by a wave of dizziness and nausea. Nothing came of it, and I didn't feel confused and the dizziness passed quickly, so I figured I was mostly alright. My main problem now is that my arm is going to fall off because I'm holding this thing of whipped cream to my head.

I don't have any ice, but I do have this soft plastic bag of whipped cream. I used it on my knee the other day, and now I'm holding it to my head. My arm hurts. My head feels better - still a bit of pain, but it's very dull, and the swelling has gone down some. There's a bit of warmth, but that's to be expected. It's not fever, just some heat around the goose egg. And my hands are really cold too, so the heat feels even stronger.

Actually, my head feels a lot clearer now. I'm still mad that I'm being played like a chess piece in the grand GEOS scheme, but perhaps I'm also thinking about it too much and letting it get to me. I'm taking things too seriously, worrying about something that I can't do anything about yet. I should focus instead on what I want, what I need to do for myself. I also shouldn't get worked up about things when I don't have all the information. I'll speak to my boss, lay out my concerns and desires, and let it go from there. It's really all I can do.

In the meantime, I'll remember to pay more attention to my surroundings, to pay attention to the good things that are around me. One thing I'm still enjoying immensely is my classes. I hope that's something that never changes.

Also, gyoza party. All the gyoza I could eat (which amounted to too much), and good company as a bonus. Also, when our students came into the school, they all said pretty much the same thing: "Smells like a chinese restaurant!" We smelled like it too, on our clothes. Eau de gyoza, very nice.