This article, which comes out of a research project exploring teaching as intellectual work, focuses specifically on a young woman who worked as a substitute teacher after she graduated from a two-year teacher education program at her local university. For Penny, substitute teaching was an interruption as she shaped a professional life moving toward a full time permanent contract in a western Canadian urban school division. Although she yearned for a permanent contract, Penny's many experiences as a substitute teacher helped her learn what she wanted and what she did not want in her identity as a professional.