Here I am, sitting on my comfortable chair that I bought in a fancy store that

makes only one-of-a-kind furniture. But it hasnt been always like this. I come from a very
sexist family that suffered quite a bit because of it. My mother quit school in order to work
to help my grandmother with the house when she was in High School. My grandfather was
a jerk that would look for prostitutes and leave the family every now and then. And in one
of these days he left for good (or evil, it depends of how you see it), he married one of the
whores that he was feeding and gave a middle-class life for her. I now have the life that he
denied to all of his family, and I wont even talk about my father, that poor ignorant could
die now and the only thing I would care is the gases he would emit and pollute the air.
As I watch the sunrise from the balcony, I remember I have to get prepared for
work. Its my first day in a public school. I studied my whole life in public schools but this is
the first time I work in one. I have worked in colleges since I finished my doctorate and five
years ago, I was accepted in a Federal University as a professor. The common opinion would
judge me hard for choosing to give up a University professor salary and accept less than the
half to teach some gritter kids that wouldnt care about me and my classes. I know its not
going to be easy but I believe I can make the difference somehow, even with all the
difficulties a teacher has to go through every single day, I still have hope and keep myself up
during hard moments with those Paulo Freire bullshit that nobody believes nowadays.
When I got to the kitchen, Antonia, my housemaid, had prepared a cup of milk
with coffee and a cheese sandwich for me, as she does during the week. She works from six
to three and I pay her well. She is treated as if she were my sister, I tell her everything and
she helps me a lot making difficult decisions. My son was ready to go when I finished
breakfast. Antonia had dressed him and brushed his hair as she usually does, all nice and
behaved as the beautiful boy you are she says to Rodolfo. The poor boy doesnt like it so
much because the other boys mock him but hes my little rebel and knows how to defend
himself. While I am starting the car and Rodolfo is putting on his earbuds, Walter, my
partner, is already working on his laptop on the front sit and we are ready to go. He recently
changed careers and is struggling to keep up with the young employees, so hes working all
the time.
After Ive dropped Walter at work, I left Rodolfo at school. It is difficult to
see him leaving the car without even giving me a kiss. He stays at school all day, the next
time Ill see him is at the dinner table. All those parents honking in their Mercedes make me
hurry and I dont see him getting in.
 Twenty minutes, thats how much Im early. I decide to take these last minutes
to get to know a little more the school facilities before the first class but, surprisingly, there
is a presentation going on for the whole school. The students from the eighth grade are
welcoming the newcomers by talking about their experience in the school so far. It seems
that it is an old tradition and the students feel quite glad and comfortable. Its all going well
for me until little Catarina gets on the improvised stage and starts to give her speech. She
tells everybody how she lost her father to drugs and it was good and bad at the same time,
since he used to beat her mother and he was the only one who was working in the house.
She continues by saying that now her mother is married again and shes feeling a little
forgotten because of her newborn brother. Catarina also talked about the details of her ten-
square-meters house but what really got me was how she sees the school as a refuge from
her reality, where she finds acceptance and love and when she gets home the only thing she
thinks about is going back to school the next day.
The rest of my first day, I cannot describe here. When the time to go home
came, I was sitting on my car with a feeling that I havent felt for a long time. The doorman
knocks on the window and asks Is everything alright?. David, thats what was written on
his badge. I just look at him and nod as I start the car and leave for home. I felt silenced by
my thoughts. The things I listened and saw in the school made me remember things I
promised to myself I would never forget. What I most desire now is to get home
In a strange way, nobody was home. That was the quietest afternoon I had in
that large apartment that now didnt feel so mine. All the furniture, the electronics, the small
souvenirs Walter and I brought from our several trips to Europe, the tapestry we bought in
Saudi Arabia, the figures sculpted by members of a South African tribe, out of the sudden
everything felt so dirty and disgusting. Like if I had betrayed myself and became everything
I once pictured as the incoherent humble person that has a poor background. The only thing
I can do in this moment is to sit and stare the nothingness of my bookshelf. All the things I
witnessed in the school made me remember I once was just like them, and I had promised
myself I would never forget the things I went through in order to succeed in life.
Bernardo helps his mother to clean the house. He washes the bathroom once a
week and dust the furniture while his mother works. He only sees his mother at night when
shes already tired from the ninety-five-minute travel home by bus from the house she works
at.
My son never made his own bed.
 Julia started some kind of trainee program that I didnt know it was possible
because of her age but I found out later she is seventeen. Her father and she are saving
money to travel in the end of the year. This is the first time her father leaves the state.
Walter and I already visited the six continents.
William was happy because this month his family got to rebuild their house. He
said he couldnt wait to get home to help his brother with the painting job.
My son never had to help with any manual labor in our house. We live in an
apartment located in the noble area of the city and always we have to repair something we
call somebody.
The problem is not only with what I do today but with what I promised and
forgot. I dont see any problem in living in a good neighborhood but why in a 400m
apartment when we are in three people? I have a housemaid that works far from her house
and my son never touched a broom, why cant he help in the house as I did one day? I have
the financial possibility to travel anywhere I want but Ive never thought about helping
Antonia with her sons school travel that she complained she cant pay for.
While I deal with my thoughts, my attention involuntarily turns to a book on the
floor near the shelf. It is opened as if it fell freely and in an unhinged way, like somebody
pushed it. It is an old book of Irish poems. Coincidentally, it was opened exactly on the poem
I read while I was on my most overthinking times, when I was almost graduating from
college. The thoughts that come to my mind are not different from the poem. I find myself
in deep discontent with the life I have now. I leavenot for evil but for good I know I will
find.

Dear Walter, I disappointed the real me and the only thing I need to do now is to confront
myself. I do not know if I will find honeybees or linnets, or even if I will listen the lake water
lowly lap by the shore but I have to arise and go now.
Simone