Co-Workers as Friends

So I've probably said it here before, but I really like the other 8th grade teachers...or at least most of them. Some of them I would consider more than just co-workers and say they are actual friends. People I talk to on the phone and would hang out with after work hours are over. There's really only the one lady on the team who gets on my nerves, and most of the time I try not to let it get to me or affect the rest of the team.
The annoying teacher and I had a big blowout in the middle of last school year. I didn't really get into a lot of the details on Blogger, but it had some serious affects on our relationship with each other and dynamics with the rest of the 8th grade team. The awkwardness pretty much carried to the end of the school year, to a lesser and lesser degree as the days went by, but I vowed to never let her push me like that again. Even the end of the year was awkward.

I'm not looking forward to the start of this school year for many reasons. The heat is really affecting me (makes me nauseous), I'm teaching a class I've never taught before and trying to make maternity plans for it, they're making us jump through even more pointless NCLB hoops, and of course-this teacher (we'll call her A). I'm really hoping it's her last year. It would make my life so much simpler.

So I wanted to have lunch with a couple of my teammates before the start of the year. While I wouldn't have minded inviting other team members, I realized that I'd have to invite everybody if I invited too many people and that would include A. Now I can be a big girl, but lately, I haven't felt like being one. And so I decided that it was only going to be 4 of the 7 of us. Not only would I enjoy the lunch more, but it would be less complicated for seating at a busy restaurant at lunch.

This was a concern for one of the people I invited. He's worried that we'll hurt A's feelings if she finds out we had lunch "behind her back". I tried to explain that it wasn't a "team" lunch. It was just me having lunch with some of my friends. Why can't it just be that simple? Obviously it's not, because he called one of the other people invited to go and she had to call me to discuss the situation. I finally said, "Invite whoever you want. I'll deal. I was just trying to have a simple lunch." It already feels like 8th grade drama.

This has essentially ruined the lunch for me. I don't even want to go. But if I don't go now, it just looks like I'm being a drama queen. And I'd rather suck it up and go than let them call me that. *sigh* I just don't think I have to be friends with everybody on the team just because they're on the team. And if that makes me a brat, then I guess that's what I am.