Comment: Halleluia.

The near-impossible has happened. I finally got my teaching credential.

It arrived in the mail last week without fanfare, and might not have arrived at all had I not sent an email to my examiner/evaluator/paper pusher to inquire as to its status. She then replied that she had approved it, but had forgotten to file it.

She forgot to file it. My question is, where did she put it if she didn't file it?

This, ladies and gentlemen, is bureaucracy at work.

How long would it have taken for someone to figure out that my file wasn't sent to the right place? Would anyone have noticed? Would I have grown gray and decrepit, waiting at my mail box for the day when I would receive said papers, only to find that all teachers have been replaced by robots who teach solely by tweeting and texting? Oy.

The irony, of course, is that now that I have the damn credential, there's nary a job to be found, unless you are in special education. Those jobs are plentiful. But they aren't getting filled because generally speaking, if you go into special education, you want to work with children, not fill out forms all day. And sadly, nowadays, at least in the public schools, if you are in special ed as a teacher, you spend more time with papers, not people.

But actually, I'm not really that bummed out about the lack of jobs. I have several gigs right now that are fun, challenging, and right up my alley. So mostly at this point, that piece of paper is insurance.

It reminds me yet again that completing a goal is satisfying, but having one is even more important. That's what all of that happiness literature I read last year told me, and it's true.

So there you have it. No trumpets or party horns were blown, but I finished something I started.

That's always a nice feeling.