They are embossed...and shiny

Only six or so weeks are left in the school year and here I am facing a time that was normally reserved for me to find a summer job to milk a stock pile of money to last my wife and I through the year. As the Thaw throbs (this place avoids predictable weather to such a degree that one wonders if meteorology is an actual science, like how rock-paper-scissors is a science) I desire a time when the air does not scorch my lungs with ice while only moments later my colleague turns on his car's air conditioning to soften the sun's blaze. I dream of Summer. I dream of our House (it IS being built, at such a mouthwatering pace I can barely contain myself as the aroma of its completion is curious and tangy). Alas, the monotony of a career is offset by the howling of pubescent and angst-ridden teens. I am a teacher. Although I timidly admitted to this profession before -feeling as though I could not count myself worthy of a job that twitched the early stories of these youth- I now proudly claim this Assignment: "I am a teacher, look at my first battle scars." These "battle scars", however, are more like the accomplishments glistening and dangling from the fishing line of a grinning gangly boy who finds pride in his six inch "monster of a catch". I cannot boast. But I am using my gifts, and only the Lord knows how the seeds I am helping Him plant will grow and mature.