Dear Teachers ... I trust you.

Photo courtesy of: http://www.good.is

Dear Teachers,

The range of meaning that some words contain never ceases to amaze me.  The word "teacher" for me encompasses such a vast span of my life, both personally and professionally.  It is a simple term that no longer gets the venerable inference it deserves, too often associated with the assumptions of undeserved tenure, incompetent instruction and too demanding class of laborers.  As a result you also miss the facets that include the overworked, underpaid and unappreciated maestros of the didactic arena.  When you hear "teacher" what does it elicit from you?  Does it brings to mind your favorite one from school, what image does it evoke?  She's the stereotypical young woman who is patient and quiet, perhaps even boring.  He's the shop teacher with the gravelly voice and missing digits, she's the disciplinarian who obviously never remembered what it was like to be a teenager.  He's the English teacher who droned on and on about how wonderful "Crime & Punishment" is as a literary work (Sorry Mr. H, after Chapter 2 it was no Crime and all Punishment).  She's the History teacher that noticed your eyes were red-rimmed from crying and made a point to distract the class in another direction, conveniently forgetting to collect your paper.  He's the Biology teacher who made you look forward to anatomy class, and it wasn't just for the lesson plan ... (Mr. K, you know who you are.)

Titles like "teacher" stop becoming a role and begin to become a category, which can be unfortunate because labels reflect the lowest common denominator.  The word "teacher" to me gets tossed around like a Frisbee.  When you think about it, it behaves much like those same aerodynamic discs.  Depending on the skill of the toss, it will can soar a great distance - rising higher with each draft it can catch before gracefully floating back to Earth.  It may catch the first breeze it comes across, or gets slapped with and wobble broadly as it tries to find purchase on its invisible terrain.  Perhaps it will simply careen to the side and slam into the ground, having gained neither grace or distance.  I am forever grateful for those teachers in my past (and present) who had the ability and measure of personal investment it took to help me to soar when I could, and make the best landing possible if I could not.

Now that I am a parent I realize more than ever what a sacred relationship there is between a teacher and their students, for I am their teacher as well.  I am beholden to them to make sure that I can provide and protect them, and that does not just apply to material things.  How to be resilient, compassionate, to see the world with an open mind and fair intent, this is no small task and now that autumn has come once more I have to let someone else share that responsibility with me.  In many ways it is a hard, hard thing to watch them get on that bus and drive away from me.  Now I must trust.  I must trust them and I must trust you.

What I need you to know, more than anything right now, is that I do trust you.

I trust that you will at the very least be fair, that you will be attentive and understanding.  That when you notice signs of struggle you will not look the other way.  That you will correct, that you will be firm, that you will invest and stand by your convictions.  That you will demonstrate the behaviour you want my children to display as adults, for you are their role models too.  That you will give them homework, and that you will be reasonable.  That you will not be afraid to communicate with me - about even the slightest issues.  Most of all I trust that you will care, not just about all kids but about my kids, as individuals.

What I also need you to know is that you are not alone in this.

I will make sure they sleep, that they are clean and dressed (I claim zero responsibility for the 7 year old's fashion sense.), that every day will have time dedicated where my attention is on nothing else but reviewing with them their day, reading their assignments and helping them with what I can.  (Though I have NO idea how you people teach math anymore, so if I can't find it on YouTube I'm kicking it right back to you with a sheepish note.)  I will correct when I must and if I have to lock the electronics away for another school year I will not hesitate to do so, they can chew their own pencils sharp and do it by candlelight if they have to.  I do not negotiate with terrorists and it is not your responsibility to give my child a grade they have not earned.  I will not hesitate to provide both positive and negative reinforcement, all decisions have consequences and to go without sends a life lesson that never ends well.

In short - I've got your back.  I will communicate openly with you, for if we do not function in tandem my children will not have the best chance at success.  That's all either of us really wants, isn't it?  All I ask is that you do not violate my trust, for my response will be swift and will be terrible - as I am certain yours would be on behalf of your children.

I believe the most successful teachers do not do this as a job, it is a vocation - a divine calling which is challenging, heartbreaking and ultimately rewarding on a level that the rest of us can never know.  Whether you are in that category or not, you are holding up the mantle of those that are as well as yourself.  You should be proud of your investment and the measure of trust that is laid upon you each day.  When the burdens of the school year weigh heavily on you, or perhaps you are confronted with parents that place the onus of success solely on your shoulders, remember that we are out here as well.  We know you are their for our children and are eminently grateful for that, and they will be too - across the breadth of their lifetime.

Thank you in advance.  Have a great year.

James and Meredith's Mom

Over The Fence

This is Meredith on Te, winning her first show.

Several months ago, my little girl rode in her second "competition" today, every few months the stable hosts a Barn Show so the students can learn how to compete and show off their skills.  The parents show up and take pictures and it's basically the horsey version of a dance recital.  The little ones start off in "lead line" classes, where their instructor leads their mounts through their paces and basically they judged for the ability to stay upright.  Meredith won her first blue ribbon a couple of months ago, sitting straight and proud on a half-ton of lazy brown horse.

That's right, I said a half-ton.  It's one thing to look at smiling pictures of giggling children on pony rides, it's quite another to wrap your head around the fact that there is very real risk in little girls on big horses.  I do not allow her to do it because it's cool, or fashionable, or because it's what little girls should do.  I allow it because she has sincere love for the animals, because it teaches her responsibility and partnership and having respect for other creatures. 

I do it because a lifetime ago it was my life as well, long days filled with the stamp of hooves and the smell of fresh hay and oiled leather.  Before there were ambulances in my life there was horses - stocky Quarter horses, athletic Thoroughbreds, graceful Arabians and everything in between.  Barrel races and long summer afternoons spent daydreaming, sprawled across the sun-warmed back of an old draft horse as it grazed its way across a green pasture.  Most don't know that about me.

Now my little girl is up there, and instead of being beside her I'm relegated to my position with the other parents - on the other side of the fence.  It's a very hard place to be.  You want so much to protect them from anything that will hurt or scare them, to let them float in this protective bubble of love and happiness that exists nowhere in this life.  Instead I put a helmet covered with hearts and cartoon ponies on her beautiful blonde head and send her off with breath held and fingers crossed that I am doing the right thing.  More than most I know how fast everything can change, a misplaced hoof, a shadow that spooks, gone in seconds from joyful ride to tragedy ... and still I let her go, even when inside I'm in knots.

As I watched the warm-ups this morning, she took her sweet time on the long way around the ring.  It was one of those moments you stare at extra hard, trying to imprint the visual image on your brain forever, knowing you will fail.  I could never fully relay to you how beautiful it was, this autumn vignette of a small golden haired girl on beautiful white horse.  A sunlit halo around them both in the cool early morning air as they meandered along, the rolling landscape behind them spectacular with the russet palette of fall.  There is nothing like the Northeast in fall, as if someone dragged a paint-soaked brush in random swaths of red and gold and orange.  On the far side of the ring, she was so far away from me and I was torn in two.  I'm so proud of how much she can do and yet I know every success pulls her from me, just a little bit.  I bite my lip and hold my position on my side of the fence.

This is her first show without a lead line, she'll be out there all by herself.  I watch her steer Cloud around the ring, carefully listening to the judges instructions.  It's not easy, the riders are young and the horses tend to do their own thing.  She walks away from her first class with second place and a loudly cheering family.  One more class to go.

Not twenty minutes later she was face down in the dirt of the competition ring.  Cloud was ancy all morning, she just had a tough time keeping him straight.  He acted up in the ring, she got frightened and lost her stirrup, sliding sideways and hitting the ground ... it's so far away for a little girl.  Embarrassed and scared, she let go of the reins and when she could regain her wind howled her indignity at the Fates as the class ground to a halt.  I had seen the whole thing from my vantage point on the wrong side of the fence and knew that her injuries, if any, included her considerable pride and not things like her liver or spleen.

I wanted to climb that fence so badly, never in my life have a fought an urge that strong.  To run to her across the ring and scoop her out of the dirt, to tell her that it's alright and that none of it was her fault and everything would be ok.  That's what mothers are supposed to do, I believe we are hardwired for it.

I did not climb that fence, I did not even express upset - other spectating parents were more visibly concerned than I was.  It was so hard, watching her get up and knowing she was embarrassed.

My fists were so tight that my palms were riddled with red crescents, reminders of how hard I was pressing my nails into the skin.  I held my ground, even as I was assessing her for injuries from a distance.  The owner of the stable collected her and lifted her over the fence, saying soothing phrases to her and telling her that she did not have to get back on today if she did not want to.  He is a good man, and was concerned for his own reasons as well as hers.  I finally let my breath out and collected her from him, she was on my side of the fence again.

I held her tight, catching her sobs in my hair as my hands quietly ran over her in a subtle inspection.  Yes I knew she was alright but there is always that small chance ...

Cloud stood passively, unattended, head down and tail swishing slowly - waiting for direction, unconcerned with the drama surrounding his sidestepping reaction to some minor upset.

Meredith continued to sob indignantly, announcing that she would never get on him again and she wanted to go home.  The owner assured her quietly that she did not have to do anything she did not want to.  I stopped them both.

She had to go back in.  To ride a horse is to enter into a partnership, an agreement, a mutual responsibility that needs to exist in order to succeed.  She was responsible for him, even if he let her down it did not mean she could fail on her part of the agreement.  She cried louder as I told her what she had to do, but now she would turn and sneak looks at poor old Cloud and you could see that she understood what I was saying.  Shame and responsibility are big concepts for such a little girl, it was like placing a burden on her you did not know she would be able to take.

I think perhaps one of the hardest things I have ever done was to pick her up and place her, still crying, back over the fence.  She clung to me, not wanting to face her failure.  I understood oh I so understood, but I also knew that she would have to learn that she could fail and come out alright and that Mommy does not know any other way to be.

So it was that my little girl trudged through the dusty ring, tears streaming down her cheeks.  She gathered up Cloud's reins and looked up at him for a moment.  Sniffling loudly, she patted his nose and with that small motion forgave him.  Then without another word or assistance, she lead him from the ring with all the dignity a five year old can muster - to the resounding applause of the other riders and the audience outside of the ring.

I hid my tears from her and told her how proud I was of her.  How everyone falls and that it is not the fall, it is how you pick yourself up after that matters.  What I could not say to her is that fence will always be there. That it will grow higher and harder to climb over as time and experience pulls her further and further into that ring.  That someday Mommy will not be able to reach her over that fence but maybe, just maybe, I will have taught her enough to get herself safely back out of that ring with grace and dignity.

Someday she will learn that being on the other side of the fence is the hardest place to be.

"If I should have a daughter -"

This is the transcript of the spoken word poem by Sarah Kay. 

If I should have a daughter, instead of Mom, she's gonna call me Point B, because that way she knows that no matter what happens, at least she can always find her way to me.

And I'm going to paint solar systems on the backs of her hands, so she has to learn the entire universe before she can say, "Oh, I know that like the back of my hand."

And she's going to learn that this life will hit you hard in the face, wait for you to get back up just so it can kick you in the stomach. But getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air.

There is hurt here that cannot be fixed by Band-Aids or poetry. So the first time she realizes that Wonder Woman isn't coming, I'll make sure she knows she doesn't have to wear the cape all by herself. Because no matter how wide you stretch your fingers, your hands will always be too small to catch all the pain you want to heal. Believe me, I've tried.

"And, baby," I'll tell her, don't keep your nose up in the air like that. I know that trick; I've done it a million times. You're just smelling for smoke so you can follow the trail back to a burning house, so you can find the boy who lost everything in the fire to see if you can save him. Or else find the boy who lit the fire in the first place, to see if you can change him." But I know she will anyway, so instead I'll always keep an extra supply of chocolate and rain boots nearby, because there is no heartbreak that chocolate can't fix.

Okay, there's a few heartbreaks that chocolate can't fix. But that's what the rain boots are for. Because rain will wash away everything, if you let it.

I want her to look at the world through the underside of a glass-bottom boat, to look through a microscope at the galaxies that exist on the pinpoint of a human mind, because that's the way my mom taught me. That there'll be days like this. ♫ There'll be days like this, my momma said. ♫

When you open your hands to catch and wind up with only blisters and bruises; when you step out of the phone booth and try to fly and the very people you want to save are the ones standing on your cape; when your boots will fill with rain, and you'll be up to your knees in disappointment. And those are the very days you have all the more reason to say thank you. Because there's nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times it's swept away.

You will put the wind in windsome, lose some. You will put the star in starting over, and over. And no matter how many land mines erupt in a minute, be sure your mind lands on the beauty of this funny place called life. And yes, on a scale from one to over-trusting, I am pretty damn naive. But I want her to know that this world is made out of sugar. It can crumble so easily, but don't be afraid to stick your tongue out and taste it.

"Baby," I'll tell her, "remember, your momma is a worrier, and your poppa is a warrior, and you are the girl with small hands and big eyes who never stops asking for more." Remember that good things come in threes and so do bad things. And always apologize when you've done something wrong. But don't you ever apologize for the way your eyes refuse to stop shining.

Your voice is small, but don't ever stop singing.

And when they finally hand you heartache, when they slip war and hatred under your door and offer you handouts on street-corners of cynicism and defeat ...

you tell them that they really ought to meet your mother.