Trouble, trouble, when will it ever end?

Thanks for all your kind notes and comments. In answer to drgeek, I have actually considered breast-reduction surgery, but not really seriously. When they are properly contained and covered with clothing, I look fine. Also, I didn’t start out with large boobs, they sort of crept up on me over the past 15 years or so. My mother, who also had a full figure at my age, has lost practically all the excess fat on her body, including her mammaries, and it seems kind of pointless to reduce them now if nature will do it for me later. But the thought does cross my mind every now and again. Especially when I find myself in lingerie stores. As for the clear straps, that is a possibility that I will look into.

And now, to continue with another topic that is still very much on my mind, the dean must have had a chat with my former student today, the one I really am sorry to lose, because she gave me this note just before choir started, handwritten on pink and white TinkerbeII paper ripped out of a notebook:

Dear Elgan:

I am sorry that this has all come as such a shock for you. You were so excited at my return, and I hate disappointing people. I really enjoyed my year with you--we got along great, and you’re such a lovely person. I just wanted to have the chance to experience a different teacher and see what happens.

I am really, truly sorry if you are confused and hurt in all of this, that was never my intention, and I hate to think that our relationship is over. I hope we can still be friends (no matter how lame that sounds--it’s true).

B.

P.S. I definitely learned a lot from you, and I value the things you taught me.

Believe me, this lovely letter, as well intentioned as it sounds, does not make me feel any better. It is almost verbatim to the one I got from another student who also left me after the first year. Her reasons were purely political. I don’t believe that once B. spends a year with the other teacher she’s going to turn around and try the third teacher in our department, or return to me. It just never seems to work that way. But doesn’t she make me sound good?

I am going to write an email to the part-time faculty union rep in order to determine what my rights are in all of this. In the collective agreement I am guaranteed the first two new voice students who come into the department. One of them, the prima donna, has absconded after one lesson. We do have a department policy that students can’t change teachers mid-year, that they have to wait for the current session to be over, and it is a full-year course. So, my husband has suggested that I demand the following: a) Since I am losing two students to the other teacher, I am entitled to take two of hers to even out the workload; or b) If I don’t get two replacement students, then I get paid my entire salary for both of them for the year; or as a last ditch solution c) I get paid for the one lesson I taught the second-year student and still get paid for the whole year for the new student, as she was “guaranteed” to me in the contract.

I hate being a bitch about these things, and I really hate being vengeful or vindictive. But I think he has a point.

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