I teach music, so I worked for music schools in all different places at once— lessons here on Mondays, lessons there on Tuesdays. The life of a new music teacher. I lived in the city, but commuted to suburbs for the schools. The school furthest away from me was a three hour commute each way, but it paid the best hourly rate and initially offered me the most hours, so I gave it a shot. What’s six hours travel time if it means I have groceries covered?
I finished the school year and long story short it wasn’t fun, so I didn’t renew my contract in April, had a little goodbye party with all my coworkers and students, and enjoyed my summer. In September I happily started my first day back at a different school, one that gave me full time hours and a half decent salary. I didn’t need to commute or split my time up anymore! I felt like a million dollars!
Halfway through the first lesson of the day, my phone started ringing off the hook. I ignored it as long as I could, but it wouldn’t. Stop. Buzzing. It was CONSTANT, to the point where my class was starting to stress out. (“Maybe your house is on fire,” said one of them!)
I told my boss something was up, had them watch the room, and stepped out to make sure my house was not on fire. The phone calls were coming from… my previous school??? I answered the phone.
A breathless secretary asked where in the hell have I been? There is a LINE of families waiting for you! You should have been at room 309 hours ago! We’ve been trying to send you your schedule for weeks, but nothing went through to your work email! You never signed on to the online scheduler!
“Oh no,” I said. “I resigned in April.. That’s why my work email was disabled in June. One of us must have made a huge mistake.”
I heard a lot of frantic sounds on the other end of the phone, and then, “could you maybe come in for the rest of the day while we figure this out? We have… An entire afternoon and evening of students scheduled for you…” This was in the morning, so without any confirmation from me, they had fully booked me from 9 AM until 8 PM!
My response was “sorry……. No,” and I hung up. I wish I could tell you it was the most satisfying “no” I ever said, but I was honestly so flabbergasted that it was just a confused reaction. I literally didn’t know what to say to that so I just hung up.
I did tell my current classroom what had just happened and they laughed. My new boss also found it hilarious. For the rest of the year, my boss and other teachers would tell me “why aren’t you in room 309???” Or jokingly say “sorry……. No” to regular things.