Diana Darby ** "I V" ** Intravenous

Tamed Kitty

Woke up tired.
I don’t think I fell asleep until 2a.m.
even though I got in bed around 11p.m.
I think it’s those weird Chinese vitamins I’m taking.
They keep me up at night.
So this morning,
because I was so tired,
I didn’t get up at 6a.m. and check the substitute phone line
to see what jobs they had for the day,
and by the time I did get up,
around 7:20a.m.
there was nothing available.
It seems everyone has the same idea as me,
to work this week since you only have to work five days (instead of the usual ten) to qualify for the $100 bonus.
The only problem is,
when a job comes up,
rather than just grab it and take it,
I hesitate.
First, I mapquest it to see how far away it is
and then I look on my list
to see if it is one of the “scary” schools
that pays an additional twenty dollars
to any sub brave enough to sign up for it.
Then after I think about it for about three minutes and am ready to press the accept button,
the job is gone.
It’s happened two days in a row now.
I guess I lack that killer instinct or else I’m just not desperate enough.
I’m not willing to take anything,
just to make $100 for the day.
I feel like one of those lion cubs
who was taken from the wild and raised in captivity by pacifists in a commune.
My killer instinct, my ability to react, is gone.
When I see meat dangling in front of me on a string,
I don’t just reach out and grab it.
I look at it,
and then I play with it, and then I think about it,
and then by the time I actually decide I want it,
some other hungry mother fucker of a lion
has grabbed it and run off with it.
Tomorrow, I swear I am waking up early
and I am grabbing the first job I see.
(as long as it’s not in Antioch).