fun in threes, sometimes fours
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The Boy is in bed, trying to fall asleep. The cat jumps onto the bed and begins pestering the Boy, who stands up and says, “No, Bida!” When the cat doesn’t listen, the Boy says sternly, “When I say ‘No,’ I mean ‘No.'”
He was hanging in a web spun between the handrails on our deck, an enormous guest whose body was probably two inches long, the span of his legs much longer still. He was impressive size, impressive color — and probably impressive eater as well. I didn’t know what kind of spider it was; I doubted it was dangerous, for only black widows and brown recluses are spiders of venomous note around here, and this fellow clearly wasn’t either. Still, a bite would probably be painful, especially for a child. So I did the logical: I gently knocked the web down, then pushed it off the deck.
Will he return tomorrow?
It's been over a month in the making, this project. The Boy got his own room, using left-overs from L's room, but the Girl got new everything. New paint, new furniture, new decor. New everything. And now, it's finally -- finally -- finished.
Dear Terrence,
I thought today was a lost cause. I thought you guys would never get it all back together. I was convinced that getting you refocused would be all but impossible. After two interruptions like you guys experienced, it would have been difficult for anyone to get back to the task at hand.
First, the fight. If you could call it a fight. I still don’t know why James attacked Bryce, and I don’t know why Bryce just sat there in the desk and took it. Disturbing on so many levels, not the least of which was the entertainment factor it seemed to have for most of you. A young man was getting pummeled, and you guys laughed. Such brutality is so foreign to me that I can only recoil, but you guys find it funny. Or was that laugh something else?
Then there was the verbal altercation with the girls while I walked the two boys down to the grade-level administrator. I know even less about that incident than I do about the fight, but I know they were angry, ready to fight themselves. I saw it in their eyes.
So when I tried to rein you guys in, I was doubtful about the ultimate success. I’ll admit that part of me was convinced class was a wash. But somehow, you guys pulled it together. And I have to say I was impressed. No side conversations about the fights. No comments when the girls came back (well, almost none). Well done. More promise.
With hope,
Your Teacher
Dear Frank,
The other day I did something I doubt you have ever done: I met your daughter. She's really something: smart, amusing, sincere, beautiful. Though she's only thirteen, she's got a maturity about her that is striking. Sure, she's an at-risk kid, but the difference is, she knows it. She's aware of it. And she wants to change it.
You could do a lot to help her, but she doesn't know where you are. Indeed, she doesn't know who you are -- she told me herself. I didn't ask. She volunteered the information. (Don't worry: your daughter is not the only one to share family secrets like that. In fact, she's not the only one to share that family secret. But that's a post for politicians and pundits.) You could help her, but instead, you left.
I think of my own children, and I try to imagine leaving them before they even knew me. What kind of a father would I be if I did that? The answer is simple. You know the answer. And statistically speaking, you know the answer on a firsthand basis: I'd venture your dad skipped out on you and gave you the example of how to be a "man" that led you to skipping out on your daughter.
Perhaps it's for the best. After all, what could someone who doesn't have the courage to accept the consequences of his actions teach a girl who's trying to learn how to do just that? You'd probably drag her down, and maybe you knew that, and that's why you left. But you see, here's the catch -- it's a real paradox. If you had stuck around and had tried, you'd have been everything she needs. Perfect? No way, but no one is. Still, being a father is just like anything else: the more you do it, the better you get. And it's not too late to start. Or is it? Would she want you waltzing back into her life? Certainly not: waltzing is not humble. How about contritely contacting her? That might work. Maybe a letter.
Let me start if for you:
Dear Daughter,
I don't even know your name, and for that I'm ashamed. I have done so wrong by you that it's hard for me to look myself in the face every morning when I shave. I hate what I've done to you, but I want to make it up to you. I don't know if you want this, though, so I'll leave it for you to decide. I'll let you decide all the boundaries, and I'll keep to those boundaries like they came from the mouth of God. And if you don't want to meet me, I understand. In your shoes, I might not want to meet me either. Still, I want to apologize for what I did to you, and I want to try, somehow, to make it up to you.
There. Simple. To the point.
Of course, if you don't even know her name, how could you send it?
Sadly,
Your Daughter's Teacher
In Mass, there are a lot of temptations every Sunday morning. It really begins well before Mass, when as is always the case, we’re running late. My temper flares, and I have to consciously tell myself that barking out orders won’t make L put her shoes on any faster. But once we’re there, the temptations only increase.
Inordinate pride is a big sticking point. I like to say that my children will be well-behaved in Mass because
In reality, it’s that second one that gets top billing: I’m just embarrassed because my kid isn’t as saintly as that kid, two pews up, just to the right.
Clothing is another area of temptation. Women come to Mass dressed like they’re going out for a night on the town, and men come dressed like they’re going to the beach or for a hike in the mountains. “Can you believe he/she wore that to Mass?” is on the tip of my tongue, and sometimes the temptation is just too great, and I point out to K the fashion offender. “Don’t they know why we come to Mass?” I always finish, then regret that I even brought it up, that I gave into the temptation.
Then of course there are the temptations of distraction:
Of course in the summer, there’s a whole new batch of temptations, most commonly about clothing selections. It usually goes like this: “He is a grown man, with graying hair and kids who appear college age, and he’s still wearing shorts to Mass? Does he not realize that there comes a time in one’s life when one understands that comfort is not always the be-all, end-all goal in life?” That thought is more often than not amended with, “And he’s wearing flip-flops for heaven’s sake! There’s not a beach within three hours’ drive of here, and even if there were and even if you were going to the beach immediately after Mass, you should be dressed like you’re going to the beach while at Mass especially when you’re a grown man!” Occasionally I can match it with another gripe: “She’s wearing that top to Mass?! Really?” And every now and then, I can tack on one more: “And their teenage daughter is wearing tight short shorts?”
Pride is truly at the heart of all sin.
Charter prevented me from keeping my streak going. So I’m counting this. So there. (Yes, I could have changed my DNS settings, but I don’t know any off the top of my head, and lacking an internet connection…)
Dear Terrence,
We had a fire drill this morning, and I knew it was coming — we always know, for the administration sends us emails about them — and yet it wasn’t the disruption of the actual fire drill that I was dreading. I knew it would, of course, break up the flow of a lesson, and it never fails that the class with a high number of Terrences and Teresas is going exceptionally well when a fire drill occurs. There is that to consider. But what I was more concerned about was what would happen when we came back in, because I knew you and most of your classmates would be worried about one thing: your shoes.
I could hear it before we got back to the classroom, thirty-some kids all asking to go to the bathroom to clean the wet grass clippings from their shoes. Instead, I handed out paper towels. I heard a lot of thanks, but it still ate up a lot of class time.
It was a judgement call, really. I could have simply told everyone to get over it, but I thought I might use the situation to win some points with you guys. Besides, when I heard you say, “Man, my mom paid $140 for these shoes,” I knew that it wouldn’t just blow over. You would spend all your time trying to wipe the grass from your shoes, and you’d likely mutter your displeasure at having to do so, and that would only drag your neighbors into the frustration, and soon the whole class would follow. So the paper towels were preventative.
Still, I’m concerned about your worries: they’re just shoes. Even if they’re a little dirty, they will come clean when you get home. And even if they don’t come clean, even if there’s a bit of green left on your perfectly white basketball shoes, they’re just that, shoes. They’re material objects, tools, bit of rubber and leather designed to protect your feet.
Or are they?
Of course that’s not all they are. To suggest that is to be naive, I understand that perfectly. They represent status. They represent some kind of success. And thus they represent respect to you, which I suppose adds to your sense of self-worth. And that, for me, is the real tragedy. You talk constantly in class. You’ve been to alternative school. You’re wearing a home-arrest ankle bracelet (that began chirping the first day of school, I might add). And yet what you’re most worried about is whether or not your expensive shoes are clean.
Don’t you see your shoes are meaningless? Don’t you understand your self-worth comes from being a child of God, created in God’s image, destined for so much more than hunkering over your over-priced shoes, frantically scrubbing them? Can’t you understand that it’s your heart, your soul, that you need to be worried about? Don’t you worry what path you’re on, what that heart of yours might look like? From here, it looks good. Not perfect, but good. But it’s kind of like your shoes: eventually, it can get so dirty that it’s all but impossible to clean but through grace.
Ever concerned,
Your Dirty-Shoed Teacher