Teaching is a funny thing.
Luck in the Middle (a title which is entirely tentative, by the way, as I never thought about something as obvious as "They will want you to pick a name for it, you know," until I sat to write this) is a reflection on a couple of really excellent months - what is it, five already? - doing this job. I've admired comics for nearly my entire life. Calvin and Hobbes taught me to read and love reading when I was in the second grade and I haven't looked back since. For this passion, the choice to reflect on teaching in comic strip form was an obvious one. With two weeks of a holiday break, a short list of ideas and a mountain of cheap notepads with a giant corporation logo in the corner (I really need to get some better paper), I started drawing. The original goal was do draw a strip a day - like the pros! - and if you pay attention to the posts to follow, you'll notice I made it four days. I'm not sure how the professional cartoonists do it, and I'm okay with that as it simply adds to the respect and admiration I have for them.

I have managed seven strips so far (turns out January and February are sort of busy months) and I'm excited to share them. I'm also excited to spend some time on spring break diving into a few new ones.

I'm going to write about each strip from a teacher's perspective, providing some detail on the moments that inspired them and how I can use those moments as reminders of how to do and love this job, but I'm going to avoid, with all my power, drawing anybody's attention to the drawings or dialogue. As tempted as I am to toot my own horn (don't be fooled, I'm very proud of this work), I don't think it's really in anyone's interest to read about how well I think I drew myself as a Roman Classroom Warrior (actually though, keep an eye out for that one) or how accurately I've rendered the expressions of a bewildered seventh grader.

Instead, I'm hoping to let the strips speak for themselves as strips - I'll do the reflecting, and I hope you enjoy the comics.

First comic will be posted sometime in the next half an hour. Thanks if you made it this far, I hope it's worth it!