“Why are you so nice to us when we treat you like dirt?” the kids ask Mrs. Lu one day after a particular grueling day in the middle school classroom.
“You know I really am a sweetheart, but don’t make me mad,” Mrs. Lu explained. “I’ll take it and take it and then just snap, crackle, and explode!”
She really did fill the whole room when she got mad. She got big, really BIG! Seeming to grow in size until she almost popped. Sometimes that’s what it took to control a hormonal, throbbing classroom full of young teens.
Some of her students were talking about her to the new kid. “Just don’t make her mad… otherwise, she’s cool.” The new kid just doesn’t believe it. “No, really man, you have no idea. She made Joey cry. She gets big, really big.”
It didn’t happen often, but when she did lose it, it made her feel terrible afterwards… even if the kid deserved it; like they were bullying some defenseless nerd, they were brandishing a knife, or had brought fireworks to school. After the fit of anger, she was a rash of emotions, full of regret, apologies, penance, and finally love.
She felt like it was part of her job to teach the kids how to act when they did get into trouble. She counseled them on appropriate behavior and tried to get them to see how they could have handled the situation. She talked to them about their parents’ fears (drugs, pregnancy, and death) and how to negotiate a punishment by being respectful and accepting of consequences. But even she needed reminders.
Some teachers thought that it was wrong to admit a mistake or that it showed weakness to apologize. But she felt that by showing that she too was human and could make mistakes, it would lead the kids to see a clear path for themselves. So she apologized when it was warranted and always tried to do better.
She tried to use humor to diffuse situations or to deflect a baited moment with a recalcitrant teen. When someone gave her a sneer and an attitude, she said positively beaming, “Oh. I love that! It’s Elvis! Elvis is in the building!”
Even the principal was akin to the boys that were plaguing her, “I hate you,” he said to her almost daily as she entered the gate inside the school grounds.
“Well, I love you,” she said to him in return with a melodious voice.
She tried to do everything with love. If someone said or did something negative, she tried to reciprocate with kindness or beauty. She wanted to work in the positive. “So that’s why I am kind to you after you have been mean to me… but I really hope you never make me mad. I just hate getting that big.”
(First published 12/13/11)
