Hi. It’s been a while, I know. Life has sort of unraveled and then wound itself back up again since last we spoke. Lather, rinse, repeat. I’m back at work and the school year is in full swing.
I went back to the same job I had last year and at the same school that wore me down in every possible way until I was a blunt force instrument to use only against myself. I packed up my shit in May with no intentions of coming back.
The job market in the college realm is not great at the moment, even for people with doctorates. Many positions are consolidated to trim budgets, or they go to in-house people who know people. Needless to say none of the positions I applied for went to me.
So here I am. It has not been a bad year so far. I am stabilized on meds and, if I could stay well physically, I have mostly ok days. Sometimes even good ones. Yesterday was one of them.
He looked at me slyly before he spoke, as if it were a secret he shouldn’t reveal.
“Hey, you know our book [S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders] is at my house.”
I brighten. My students are from poor homes with many siblings and barely enough food to eat.
“It’s my mom’s,” he finishes.
I smile back at him. “Oh, and she loves it too?” I was genuinely interested, as I usually am in my students. A mother who reads will impart that to her child.
“Yep,” he replied in his easy way, “It was my sister’s. Do you remember her?”
I sit back as cogs in my memory click into place. I do remember her. She had loved that book. Every now and then there is always a student who falls in love with a book and asks to take a copy home. I usually have a beat-up copy reserved for just such occasions. I realized then that I had given her that book, and that she had given it to her mother who treasures it now.
And that mom and sister who love the book…well now I am teaching that book to their son and brother.
“Yeah, we talked a lot about The Outsiders last night,” he continued, happily nodding as he recalled the pleasant memory. “I went to sleep reading it.”
I smiled. Those days are good days to be a teacher.