“I will give each of you an answer document. Do not open it or mark on it until I tell you to do so. Be careful not to fold or bend your answer document.”

I say these words and begin passing out the answer documents for the 2014 SCPASS writing test, part of the required state testing for No Child Left Behind compliance. I look at each answer document, glance at the student in front of me to confirm that I’m about to hand the correct document to the correct person, and it hits me once again, the little miracle that of being a middle school teacher.

Just months ago, these faces were strangers, a room of twenty-nine kids that I knew virtually nothing about. Since they’re taking ninth grade English in the eighth grade, their intelligence and perseverance were an obvious-enough inference. Still, beyond that, there was nothing. Just faces. Now each of those faces tells a story. I’ve learned so much about these kids in these few months that I’m certain I know them in some ways better than their parents. Certainly I know a different side of them, and without a doubt I know them better than almost any other non-family adult. I know this one’s mother died just a little over a year ago yet he holds it together more bravely than I could imagine. I know that one feels tugged between divorced parents, and does that clever one in the corner. I know which have bad habits they’re trying to break, which kids have bad habits they’re letting linger, which kids feel terribly insecure and put a brave, almost aggressive face on as a defense. I know their dreams, their fears, their loves, and even some of them, I know their crushes and heartaches.

What other job lets you see so deeply into so many people’s hearts? Why would I want to do anything else?