Wrinkles

Okay, so I’m not an ironer. When I lived alone and did my own laundry in the past, I always make sure that when I dry or hang things out to dry, they hang so that they are basically unwrinkled. I did iron occasionally, but you’d be amazed what wonders a hanger and a steamy bathroom can do. I can feel my mother cringing as I write this. Sorry, Mum.

Well, I’m learning my lesson now. Almost every morning for the last three weeks I stand in front of my cupboard looking, often desperately, at the trousers and skirts and tops hanging in my cupboard for a combination that first, works aesthetically, and more importantly these days, is perfectly straight with not a single wrinkle anywhere. Because after that, I walk out my door onto the covered corridor after the second bell rings and stand next to the head of house as she calls role, facing 27 silent Form Ones and after role call she asks them to look at the skirt of the person next to them. At this point, for the first week, she strongly berated them for their appallingly wrinkled skirts. The second week she occasionally (at my suggestion) recognized one nicely ironed skirt… just before she rebuked the rest for their wrinkled ones. You should know, these skirts looked perfectly ironed. And it’s not just because I’m not an ironer, I can tell ironed skirts and these looked fine, a few wrinkles here and there, yes, but mostly impressive, especially this was the first time many of these little Form Ones had ironed their own clothes. Today, after three weeks, they looked immaculate and she told them so.

There is no way I can walk out in anything that is not absolutely wrinkle-free.

Two nights ago, my head of house asked for permission to have a “bed drill”. What’s a bed drill you ask? I did too. Basically, you (if you a Form One) make your bed again, and again, and again, and sometimes again, until it is perfect, because, as we learned in a house meeting last week, the state of your room shows who you are. Oh dear. She can never come in my room. And I straighten like crazy when she comes for a meeting in my lounge.

I’m becoming an ironer.

A whirlwind of new things

I'm going to add "arriving back in the country, moving in to a new flat and beginning a new position and starting to teach new classes within one week" to my list of excuses for the lack of a weekly blog post. Things have been busy, my apologies.

I have moved on campus and am the new Housemistress for Angwa house, the boarding house for Form Ones (Grade 8s). Fortunately, I have the most amazing mother who cleaned and packed and made sure my flat was ready for me to move in with the least amount of stress possible - including coping with a red polish disaster on the floors - and I am now in, living amongst a few boxes, but in.

It has been a week of new things: a new flat, a new position, new students, new classes, new ideas, new stresses, new worries, new hopes. I haven't had a lot of time to think through it all. I'm learning each day new things my job as housemistress involves (a bit more complicated than just enforcing bed times and mopping up homesick tears), trying to tweak old syllabi and get to know new students (both those living with me and those in my classes), figuring out what extra (extra?!) activities I can commit to, and madly trying to prepare new texts before the L6s arrive back at school next week. And, right, I occasionally teach in the spaces between.

So far, though, new is good. I'm excited for this new year of new people and new jobs. I hope I will have time to sit and think and write about some of them as they become comfortingly old and familiar.