You know I love the South...

but right now I'm irritated that living in the South can mean sharing my air with small-minded, uneducated people.
So, I'm "retiring" from public education. I love teaching; I hate all the other crap that goes with it. Working full-time in a career that seems to be spinning out of control because of the rules, regulations and beliefs of people who have never worked in education or who have forgotten what it's like to be a teacher, is just more than I can handle. So I'm not returning to the school I've been at this year. I LOVE the school, but it's just too much. (I didn't intend for this post to be about this, but I guess I needed to preface a little.)
Anyway, so I'm looking for a part-time preschool job. I LOVED teaching preschool last year. I loved the other teachers (not my two crazy assistant teachers who weren't worth a toot) and I loved the kids and their parents. And I got paid very well. Unfortunately I worked for a crazy lunatic who micromanaged everything (including how many paper towels we could use every day--seriously) and who needed medication to manage her OCD/ADD/Bi-polar disorders. A friend of mine who I worked with last year told the director of her new preschool at a local Southern Baptist church that I'm interested and that she should hire me. The director called and we talked tonight. All was going well until she said, "So Lisa told me you're Mormon." "Yep," I say. And she asked me to explain my beliefs. No big deal. She said it's not an issue for her, but she can foresee there being problems for some of the old men who sit on the church's preschool board. I have to write a "statement of faith" to let them know what I believe. She really stressed that I need to talk about my "walk with Jesus." (What does that mean, anyway?)
Seriously? In this day and age I have to defend my religion? I could understand that they don't want someone who's not Christian to work there. I mean, it's a church preschool that teachers Bible verses and stories and has chapel every Wednesday. And I understand that as a private facility they have the right to hire who they want. But good grief, who does not know that Mormons are Christians?

This is why I don't introduce myself with "Hi, I'm Wendi, and I'm LDS." Because I have had SO many friends and co-workers, who after knowing me for a while, say "You're Mormon? Really? You seem so normal." (I know--normal is relative and I'm not sure I'm actually a normal Mormon, but that's beside the point.) I wonder if I would've even been friends with some of these people if they had known from day one that I was LDS.

So, I wonder if I should include a picture of my family with my resume. LOL I'd probably have to write a statement of genetics to explain how Wesley is black and his parents are white. :)