A dead red bird and the calm before the storm

Tomorrow, I'll start James Hurst's "The Scarlet Ibis" with my students.

Talk about one of the saddest stories ever. To introduce it, I've typed up the first two paragraphs and will hand it out tomorrow, and will see if we can determine the tone of the story based on how those first two paragraphs are written.

A strange week for me otherwise. I'm taking a personal day on Wednesday, eliminating my perfect attendance for the year for a good reason (getting a mortgage to purchase my first home). So it's two days, a real break on Hump Day, and then two more days. Baseball season officially starts on Saturday, when I'll be having the first day of tryouts. It's the calm before two months of the focused intensity and blur of the baseball season, which I love but also fills up my schedule like nothing else can. The intensity will have the exclamation point of buying my first home (closing date is set for March 31) and moving. It's all very exciting.