I’m somewhat stunned at how the reaction to my retirement announcement has grown. Besides all the students who have contacted me, one current students at school has started The Official I Love Robert Sabella and Want Him To Stay At PHS Group at Facebook, and within 48 hours 78 members have joined it, most of them current or former students of mine (as well as one math teacher; in some ways that is the most flattering of all).

I love my students, and probably always will, but I have waited 30 years to get back to writing fulltime. And let’s face it, I’m getting older and if I do not start writing soon I might never be able to do it. After devoting myself to my students for so many years, I should be able to think about myself for awhile, no?

But, yes, I do feel very guilty, as if I am abandoning my children. :(