Can we take a moment to talk about all the cleaning I did yesterday? At my highschool, there are two desks and two cabinets dedicated to ASE’s (Assistant Supervisors of English). Which means that I have a desk and cabinet and the other ASE from Austrailia has a desk and cabinet.

When I tell you that these desks and cabinets were a mess. I don’t exaggerate. There were books that haven’t been used for years, lesson plans from 2008 and tons of dust! Papers, old quizzes, and books that were so old they were disentegrating. When I first arrived, over a month ago, I tried to curb the mess on and inside my desk drawers. I spent a few hours going through the “wall” of binders and folders on top of my desk and inside one set of drawers. I thought that would suffice. But as my mom likes to say “a clean space helps you think clearly” or something like that.

I can’t describe how irritating it is to have unnecessary things clogging up your, very limited, space! So, I convinced the other ASE that it was a good idea to clean. Clean out those two cabinets and the drawers. What started as a simple production turned quickly into a Broadway show! Papers that had began to turn brown. Cricket paddles, pictures, books that reeked of the 90’s. We found resources (printouts) for every type of Bingo ever invented. Job bingo, halloween bingo, days of the year bing, booger bingo, sleepy bingo. Just kidding on those last two but I wouldn’t be surprised!

We filled a huge black trash bag with all the stuff. We were able to clear out a whole cabinet (two shelves) and now we can see our entire desks! All of our resources are now in one location and multiples have been discarded. It feels so good to finally have a whole desk to work on. I still have one drawer that I need to go through but for now I am content. It feels like the sun is shining over my desk now. Before it felt like a dungeon. I can clearly see the woman that sits in front of me. I don’t have to peer around a wall of junk!

I hope the next few teachers that come from the U.S. and Austrailia appreciate what we did. And if anyone ever says to you “I’ll leave that behind. Someone might use it.” feel free to smack them! When 7 years worth of old paperwork, is your job to clean up you will think twice about that. Pass on kindness and thoughfulness not trash!

“A message from the Lord”-Veggetales Jonah

P.S.

One of the Japanese teachers asked that we tell the teachers around us to clean also! LOL! Not all teachers are horders but many are. Look at those walls of books and papers! Find the blonde in the picture and you’ll find my desk next to her.