The Pencils

There's a Thirdlander in my class who keeps ripping the erasers off our pencils.  Then he breaks the pencil in half.  I ask him to stop but he keeps doing it.

I got annoyed yesterday and handed him a bunch of massacred pencils.  "Put these in your backpack and give them to your parents.  Then come back here tomorrow with a new box of pencils."

He didn't say much and later I regretted the exchange.  I doubt he'll bring back new pencils and then I'll have to say something lame like, "Okay, you didn't bring back any replacement pencils, but don't break pencils anymore.  I don't like it when you do that."

Who knows why the kid keeps wrecking our pencils?  Maybe he's anxious.  Maybe he's bored.
I'm trying not to take it personally.  But a pencil's a pencil, no matter how small.  And we've got to look out for the pencils in our midst.  I feel so sad about the pencilocide.  I just want it to stop.

Here's another thing I hate.  Because of school shootings, all our doors are now locked.  Come to find out, I carry several bags, a couple of lattes and other sundry school items up to the door each morn.  One of my custodial coworkers has taken to calling me Bag Lady, which frankly, I resent. When I get to the building, I have to place all this stuff on the ground and unlock a set of doors.  Then I hold the door with my foot, pick up all my stupid bags and wedge my body through the unlocked door. Then I repeat this with the second set of doors which are only 4 feet away from the other doors so I don't even understand why they too have to be locked.   There's absolutely no reason why we can't install a retinal scan door opener at this school.  I keep asking for this, but Custodial Co-Worker says retinal eye scans aren't a good solution because people can steal your eyeballs and use them to enter the building.  Sure, I get that. But there's got to be a way around that issue.