Class of 2013

"Home actually existed. Home wasn't just a dream. Sometimes, that's the best thing of all.” –Mira Grant

On Friday night I drove through traffic and rain to get to Woodstock, Virginia.  It took me almost two hours to get 90 miles into southwestern Virginia. When I got off I-81 and entered the best pizza place in town where Central’s English department was gathered, I realized I had also journeyed back two years in time.  As I squeezed into the booth with some of the best colleagues I could ask for, I was once again the person I had been two years ago—an intelligent expert in something I loved, and I was ready to cheer on some lovely kids who were becoming adults. 

Over dinner, Patrick, my old department head, asked me how my morning had been.  It seemed a different lifetime ago when two seven year olds had curled up into me and slept through a band concert, but it had only been that morning.  After the concert was over, I helped the boys stand up, and gave one my water bottle, and the other my box of tissues.  They had one in each hand, and gave me their other hands, in what was becoming a ritual for me with students in this particular class.

If you had asked me two years ago if I would ever walk second graders back to class holding their hands, I would’ve responded with a resounding no.  But now that was exactly what I had started doing.  Not at all in an inappropriate, creepy way, but in a “this is what these particular students need in this specific time” kind of way.

A few weeks ago my roommate asked me if I was worried about going back to a high school next year, and in most ways, I’m not worried.  Even though I’ve frequently felt kind of stupid over the last few years when I’m trying to help with math or sorting out who gets to jump rope first, balancing that with grad school helps me not feel too stupid to go back to teaching high school.  If I worry at all, it’s about switching back to an age group that doesn’t see hand holding as a necessary part of crossing the street.  

It’s not on my mind all the time, but I wonder. 

I walked into Central’s library where the teachers gather before graduation and felt totally happy to get hugs to old friends and be in this place. I felt slightly awkward as I snuck into the gym and sat uncomfortably in the bleachers during the ceremony until it was over and the teacher recessed out.  I slid down off the stands and followed them, ignoring the male crowd control teachers trying to direct me to follow the general public.  I was going to stand with my old colleagues for my favorite part of graduation—clapping and cheering for the kids as we lined the hallway and they walked back down it.  I’ve given a lot of hugs to kids on that walk of whom I’ve felt incredibly proud, and it was a wonderful moment for me that even though I haven’t seen them in two years, a great many students were surprised and thrilled to see me there. 

When I had the class of 2013 as freshman, one young woman, for no real reason I can identify, decided I was her favorite teacher.  She was terribly sad when I left and has continued to tell me just how much she still valued that ninth grade class.  She hadn’t seen me in the auditorium, and when she saw me in the hallway, she burst into tears.  “I was fine until I saw you,” she said as I hugged her tight and told her how proud I was of her.  “Thank you for coming,” she choked out. 

I hadn’t come only to see her.  But when I thought about not coming, it was her unflinching devotion to me that made me realize I needed to be at Central High School on Friday night. 

Several students expressed so much appreciation for me coming, and I was so proud of them, because I could see they had become enough of an adult to understand that I don’t just apparate onto the grounds.  It’s not as easy to come back as wanting to—it costs me time, energy, money and emotion to see them graduate.  And they were beginning to understand that. 

It also made me remember times when I’d let them go to the bathroom with a friend to reapply their makeup after a painful breakup, or sent them down to the counselor to discuss their fear at being pregnant.  It made me remember offering, however reluctantly, a place to eat lunch and relax, and talk through difficult situations. 

Going to Central is like going home.  That place, the people I met there, the students I taught, the houses I lived in during that time—that was my first real adult home.  Newville is my first, probably deepest, and most lasting home.  But Harrisonburg, and Central High was the first home I chose. 

Going home reminded me who I am.  Who I’ll be no matter if my students are seventeen or seven.  I’ll always extend them the grace they need to make it through the day.  And I’ll give myself enough grace to realize that I’ll be able to make the switch back to high school without too many growing pains.