Snow Day #2 - Slip Sliding On My Way to Work

There is almost 3 inches of "wintry mix" outside this morning. It started just after I arrived at home after a good day at work, and continued all night. For all I know, it may still be precipitating out there - it's hard to see outside at the moment - seems to be still coming down, but more snow now than sleet and ice. This type of weather makes for some really interesting days at my job.

You see, I work in a psychiatric residential treatment facility for kids with developmental/intellectual diagnoses and chronic psychiatric concerns. We have both a day school program and an educational program for our residents. When the local school district shuts down, we still have clients who live at the facility and who need something to do. So, we have school for our residents.

Now, teachers are not required to attend on inclement weather days (AKA: any day where the weather causes us to close the school), but I have always worked on these days. I've missed three inclement weather days in 23 years - one because I ended up in a ditch, one for other issues (I can't remember details, but it was not because of an accident), and one for an appointment with the DMV (can't miss those!!). I travel the 52 miles one-way to get to work to run my snow day schedule with my residents.

I've often found that getting out of my town and into the town where I work are the most difficult parts of the journey. Once I get out of my town, it is often smooth sailing until I get to the town where the facility is located. Then, I go back to slip-sliding away. I anticipate that today will be no different. I am going to wait to leave until 6 am to decrease the amount of time that I need to drive in the darkness, and then I will go slowly.

The payoff for all this is that I get a day off to schedule at my leisure. We are now up to two inclement weather days, so that means that I get two days off to schedule when I want them. Those days, in addition to my non-contract days (days that I don't get paid for, so I get to take off when I want them), mean that I can have a second Spring Break or an extended vacation at some point. This is a good thing for me, and I will take those days off in a planned manner.

 y7fffffv./ 

Bella took advantage of me leaving the keyboard for a bit to put her two cents in.

During the trip into work, I'll be spending time figuring out what I am going to do with my residents. I see all classes for 30 minutes today, and I try to keep some unique things for these days - things that the rest of my students don't get to use because they get to have a day, sitting at home, playing video games, etc. There should be something special about having to go to school when the rest of the world is iced in. So, I am searching for something unusual to do with my students. We may do a mass game. We may watch Pixar shorts and have a relaxation day (that would fit with my current state of infection and ugh) - I have the new collection of shorts...hm. That may just be the way things go today - Pixar shorts, blocks, domino construction, coloring sheets, stacking cups, and various and sundry other things to do if folks don't want to watch videos.

So, I will be off to work in a couple of hours, ready to have a relaxing day with clients, and looking forward to taking my snow day off later in the spring/summer. I simply have to get to work - that may be the biggest chore of the day. We'll see.

See you soon, fellow therapists!!