poppy seeds

I have discovered that my new favorite meal is a mashed avocado (mixed with a little salt and pepper) spread over a toasted everything bagel. Delicious. Amazing.

We had both everything bagels and avocados in our house this week, so I ate this twice. Avocados are good for your brain, you know. Each time I made it, though, I had this moment of hesitation, because everything bagels are a dangerous food for me. More specifically, anything with poppy seeds is a dangerous food for me.

Allow me to explain.

My job requires me to have a bus license. Not like a commercial driver's license, but a certification that amends a normal driver's license to allow one to drive what is called a "camp vehicle." I'm still not sure I could define "camp vehicle," but suffice it to say that my license allows me to drive those half-size school buses. It is not my favorite part of my job, but it's required, so there it is.

Because we're required to drive these buses, the state (or our insurance company? I'm not sure which) also requires drug tests to ensure that we faculty are not careening around New England in buses full of teenagers while simultaneously under the influence of anything stronger than caffeine. We have random drug tests, which are an inconvenience but not a huge deal. This is how I thought of the first drug test, which was required in order for me to be issued my bus certification. I thought, "Easy! I've never tried a single drug in my life! Not even pot!" Let's all pause while my mother breathes a sigh of relief.

You can imagine my surprise, then, when three days after my first drug test, the school's business manager called and told me I had failed my drug test because it revealed traces of opium.

Now, I was a whole two months into my first teaching job, and suffice it to say life was not easy at this point. This boarding school thing is a hard gig, and it's easy to get overwhelmed and feel completely lost. I was at that point already, and then that phone call had me convinced I was going to get fired and forever go down in boarding school lore under that "It's always the quiet ones" headline. "Who would have thought the demure English teacher from New Hampshire with all the floral skirts and the red shoes was a heroine addict?" they would say.

Long story short, I had overreacted a little bit. I had to go to the doctor, and after she inspected me for track marks, she signed off on a form that verified I did not, in fact, appear to be using an intravenous drugs. Then I went back for another drug test and that was that. File sealed, all taken care of. Except for the fact that those "random" drug tests, which are supposed to technically pick different faculty every time, landed on me four more times within the next two years. Perhaps the floral skirts didn't really convince my bosses?

So what, you say, was the cause of this calamity in the first place? It took forever for me to figure it out, but then I remembered our faculty lounge, which regularly serves poppy seed bread. And suddenly Elaine Benes and I had a lot in common.

image via dailyseinfeld.com