My Rock Star Aspirations

Little known fact: What I really want to do is ROCK!

 

 

 

Alas, I am classically trained and have not had many opportunities to be a rock star. But occasionally, I like to pretend.

 

One Halloween, I dressed up like one for school. I mean, I am the music teacher. It totally made sense.

 

 

 

In high school, I performed with a pop/rock/jazz group. I even sang back up on the Pat Benatar song, "Heartbreaker."

 

Listening back to the lyrics, I am kind of surprised they let us sing this in the public schools.

 

 

I've played Florence twice in the musical Chess. She sort of rocks out during the course of the show. The first time I was in it, my husband, Dan, said I reminded him of Stevie Nicks, which seems unlikely. The second time I did the show, I flipped off Freddie at the end of one of the songs in order to add to my rock star persona. 

 

Yeah, I'm super proud of that.

 

 

 

Whenever, I play guitar at school, the kids think I'm a rock star. Surely, that counts for something.

 

I tried to form a band with two other teachers at my school a few years ago. We had one really good rehearsal of Simon and Garfunkel's "Only Living Boy in New York."

 

I also play a mean "Shake It Off" for my students every year.

 

Channeling Lisa Loeb, yet singing Taylor Swift

I recently played cajón for my church's treble choir. It was my first time playing for adults, and there was a guitarist and pianist . . . like a real band.

I was way more excited about this than I needed to be, and I texted my dad. Here's how that went [insert facepalm here]:

Me: I got to play cajón last Sunday. I'm officially a drummer now.

Dad: Drummers wear shades.
Me: Only when they're stoned.

 

 

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

That One Day I Was Young and Cool

One day, a couple of weeks ago, I received a few ego boosts. This school year, I go home most days wondering if I even remember how to manage a classroom. But this particular day, I finished my day feeling pretty good about myself. 

 

My day started with my students asking, "How do you sing that so fast?!" 

 

We had just sung an opening song, the tongue twister "Hagdalena Magdalena."
 

"I’ve been practicing it for over twenty years," I answered.

"You’re older than twenty?" one of the fifth graders asked.

"I've been teaching twenty years, so yes."

"You look twenty-five," another kid said.

"You’re my favorite class," I told them.

I tell every class they are my favorite if they say I look young. So classes do comment on my youthfulness from time to time.

 

Teaching Year #21

 

That same morning, after playing my guitar and singing for a third grade class, one of the girls said, "You should be a YouTube singer."

 

"I'm too old for that."

 

"You could be the oldest one," another little boy said.

My third graders thought I was cool enough to be on YouTube. Winning.

 

 

That afternoon, a group of older students saw me as I was loading up my car to leave for the day. 

 

"Whoa, Mrs. Duggan, is that your car?!" one of the sixth girls exclaimed. "I thought music teachers only drove vans!"

 

"Not this music teacher!" I told her.

 

I was also wearing a black turtleneck that day, and one of my students said I looked like Steve Jobs. 

"Do you know who Steve Jobs was?" I asked him. I mean, the kid was eight.

"One of the founders of Apple," he replied

 

"Okay. Nice."

 

Really, I was going for more of a Beatnik vibe.

 

 

"You should probably write that one down," one of the other students said.

 

They must have figured out my blog post material secret . . .

 

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

What Will You Be For Halloween?

 

 

Last year, my husband, Dan, and I took a year off from Halloween. But this year, we were back, baby. Or to poorly quote a scary movie from my generation, "We're baaaack . . . !"

 

Music teachers love Halloween. They don't necessarily love the effects of the sugar consumed on Halloween, but the holiday lends itself to so many fun activities. I'm not sure any of my lessons for the rest of the year will live up to the standards of these past few days.

 

 

"Mrs. Duggan, what are you going to be for Halloween?" all, and I mean ALL, of my students asked me.

 

"I'm an adult without children of my own," I thought. "Do they really think I dress up to stay at home and hand out candy?"

 

Apparently (after seeing the myriad of Halloween costumes splashed across the timelines of my Facebook friends), people do this. Maybe I'm missing out.

Out loud, however, I answered the kids with, "I'm going dress up like a Mean Music Teacher: Evil Mrs. Duggan."

 

I almost added, "And she has a goatee," but I wasn't sure they would get the reference. 

 

 

On Halloween night, we weren't sure how many kids would show up at our house. It was a Sunday night, and it started to rain that afternoon. Plus, we're still living in a pandemic in Idaho where people just won't get the jab to save their lives (literally).

"Are we going to be stuck with this whole pumpkin of candy?" I asked as the rain started to fall.

"YES!" Dan answered a little too enthusiastically.

 

 

For a couple of years, it seemed like parents dropped their kids off in our neighborhood to trick-or-treat. We were one of the cool spots in town. This year, we ended up with about half of our candy left over, which was fine with Dan.

 

We watched The Muppets Haunted Mansion and passed out candy to the children who showed up.

 

There was an Elsa and a Harley Quinn and one I didn't recognize with a kooky skull mask who got very indignant when I asked if he was from a movie or a TV show.

 

"I am NOT from a movie!" he scoffed.

The Squid Game and Scream guys who came to our door as a pair were super polite.

 

"Thank you. Happy Halloween," they said.

I told one girl, "If you hold this candy wrapper under a light, it glows in the dark,"

 

"Mom, she gave us glow-in-the-dark candy!" I heard her as she ran down our walkway.

 

A couple of teens on roller blades and dressed in animal costumes showed up toward the end of our evening. Keep Boise awesome, you know.

 

For those of you still need of some major post Halloween cuteness, I will conclude with this.

 For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.