“I wonder if you all get your cycle at the same time?” a parent asks. “You know that can happen.”
The whole class was an emotional wreck. They had a great year in spite of the fact that it would be the teacher’s last, and they would be off to high school, leaving behind the protective environment of the small country school.
They all huddled together on the floor crying lugubriously. They were intent on watching movies all day while eating salty snacks and swilling sweet carbonated beverages.
The principal let it be known that she didn’t approve of unhealthy foods even in cases of end of the year parties. She came into the room, bristled, and walked out in a huff. What was she going to do? She had stuck by her decision. The Ides of March had come and gone. This popular free wheeling, free thinking teacher who inspired her students to heights no one had ever thought possible was really leaving. And it was by the principal’s own hand.
The teacher was crying right along with her students. No one wanted to see this end. They had had a blast the last couple of years! Laughing and learning, doing projects, opening their minds to new ideas. The teacher learned as much as the students. At first she was surprised by this and then very pleased. She loved it when a student presented her with an “Ah-ha Moment!”
It was the first time the kids had ever been taken seriously. Their opinions and voices were heard openly and without fear of repercussion. They loved her and she loved them – even the ones who drove all of them crazy. This didn’t mean that they couldn’t make her mad. That was a sight they didn’t want to see. She would turn red in the face, almost pop a vein, and yell really loud.
Knowing this was to be her last year, Mrs. Lew walked the school grounds on her assigned yard duty with vigor and appreciation of every shadow, every sound, every scene photographed in her mind forever. She recorded the sound of the creek roaring behind the school in her mind. She snapped pictures of the skyline silhouette made by the surrounding forest and held them deep in her cerebral cortex.
The world seemed round up there on a clear night with the crickets clicking and the moon high above the trees. Fall, Winter, Spring, and Summer – She memorized all the seasons, all the days, all the hours… It was the best thing she ever did in her life – teaching middle school students with love, laughter, and compassion.
(First published 2/28/13)
