I’ll be damned if I wasn’t stoked off my ass when I saw that ‘End-of-Year Critter Day’ was added to the white board. I’ve been here ten months and nothing has come close to this kind of event. At 2pm, right after Circle Time, Cassie’s Critters are coming to the preschool to show us all kinds of furry mofos and, dude, we even get to hold them. 

First, I’m going to tell Shylah and Tobias to stop pushing each other, then I’m going to make my way to the front of the alphabet rug so I can get a good view of those touchable exotic animals. If Clementine or Pablo tell me teachers can’t get a turn before kids, and start whining and shit, I’m going to be like, You need to go sit in the Cool Off Corner for the duration of this demonstration and then hopefully I will have effectively stopped two kids from being an obstacle to all my critter delight. 

I’m going to ask Miss Cassie if I can take the chinchilla to the sandbox for a dust bath, and, my God, when that happens, it’ll be the best thing I ever saw. The other kids will be like Can I go, Mr. Jeremy? and I’ll be like, No, children, you must sit quietly and respect our guest, then I’m going to trot down there to the sandbox next to the gate to the street for which I have a key, and let that chinchilla go bonkers. I’ll use the plastic shovel that Seamus hit Brooklyn over the head with last week to softly scoop dust on that domestic rodent and that’s going to create the kind of memory I have been sorely lacking from this career path thus far.

You know what’s fantastic about a chinchilla in a dust bath? It doesn’t need its diaper changed and it doesn’t run into walls because it was just informed that juice time is over. 

I’ll probably tell the children that the Box Turtle can only be handled by adults, and they will believe me since I’m their teacher. Then I’m going to take the omnivorous little guy over to the mini chef kitchen and check out his instincts. Could be he’s interested in imaginary cooking or play-acting as a parent, who knows? That’s the beauty of Critter Day. I get to find out.

If the box turtle seems leery of Pretend Corner, not a problem; I’ll gladly escort him over to the book bins and see if that hard-shelled stoic creature has a hankering for some Pinkalicious or, better yet, kid stories about empathy that I’m told to prioritize when I do Storytime. Hey, if reading’s not your thing, I’ll tell that turtle, we also got dump trucks. 

Christ, if Miss Cassie brings the mini hog I saw on her website, it’s over. I’ll use my teacher badge to open the gate to the Garden Walk, where he can get all up in the dill and marigolds for a full sensory experience. 

Today is Paxton’s turn to do Weather Calendar, but you can bet your ass I’m gonna teach a bearded dragon how to change those magnets. Paxton can throw herself on the floor or cry it out on her cot; I couldn’t care less.

Come on up, I’ll say to the bearded dragon. Choose the magnet that best depicts today’s weather. And if he selects fog when the sun is shining, or hesitates between cloudy and overcast, I will do everything to help that spiky, subtropical-dwelling reptile understand that his participation is just as valuable as correctly identifying the weather. I’m proud of you, buddy, I’ll say. It takes guts to do Weather Calendar.   

Crap, I’ve killed an entire Tricycle Track supervision shift dreaming about Critter Day, which means there’s only five more hours of three-year olds holding their privates and talking about butts. After today, there’s just one more week of preschool, and to be honest, I wasn’t sure I’d make it.

What’ll get me through is knowing that for the remainder of my tenure, I’ll be able to recall the moment I got my hands on Miss Cassie’s kinkajou, the soulful rainforest mammal that I believe will greatly benefit from Music Moments. While I encourage him to lightly tap a toy xylophone on which Terrynce threw up last week, that fig-eater will take to it with a passion not seen around the school once this year. Look how the kinkajou relishes the song’s pacing, and doesn’t rub the xylophone on another student’s knee, I’ll say to the children, one more futile attempt at authority and genuine care. 

Fuck them, I’ll whisper to the kinkajou, I got access to the snack closet. Let me blow your mind. 

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