I have a little guy in my class. He is very quiet. Very quiet. The first day of school, he stood in the doorway and refused to come in and would not tell me his name. He is more comfortable now, and actually speaks to me from time to time. His small face has very little expression, so when he smiles, I know I have hit a home run. He is smiling more and more with each day, but every once in a while, he gets his feelings hurt. Whenever he is upset, he either freezes on the spot and stands there for 10-15 minutes or sits and cries. Silently. Most times, he cannot tell me why he is upset and so we have learned to just wait it out and eventually, he will recover and join the class.
Last week, I was reading a story to the class and I happened to see my little guy with tears running down his face. I was mentally running through the events in the afternoon, trying to figure out what upset him while continuing to read. Then I was blessed to see a small kindness, a moment in time that was so very precious and fleeting, but so immensely powerful . The little girl sitting next to him reached over and carefully wiped his tears with her hand and patted his back. Then she leaned her head against his. He didn't look at her. But the tears stopped and a teeny, tiny little smile slowly appeared on his face. Moments like those are why I teach.
The Grey Ghost
In 1986, I began my teaching career in a musty portable at Anson Jones Elementary. When I walked into the room all I had were 2 file cabinets filled with papers from previous reading adoptions, a bookshelf filled with old games with half the pieces missing and my teacher desk and chair. In the drawer of the desk was stapler. It was old, grey, with some of the paint chipped off and the decorative pieces missing. I tossed it back into the drawer and picked up a nice new stapler in the office along with my other teacher supplies. Several months later, when I was in the middle of an art project, the stapler broke and so I grabbed the old grey stapler out of the desk to finish the job. Later that afternoon, I went to the office and got a nice new stapler and back into the desk drawer went the old grey stapler.
Thus began a pattern that would continue through the years and still continues today. Stapler after stapler jammed or broke or were borrowed and never returned, but that ugly old stapler just kept on working. And no one ever wanted to borrow it. I finally named it "The Grey Ghost" I'm not sure why I named it a ghost, but I think its because Grey and Ghost start with "g" and I am a primary reading teacher at heart and it made sense at the time. In the past 26 years, I have moved to 14 different rooms, changed jobs 4 times, and taught at 2 schools, but that ratty old stapler has managed to find its way into one of the moving boxes every time.
I didn't really appreciate the Grey Ghost until this year. Maybe turning 50 had made me value the things in life that are old and beat up but still work well, but when I moved into my new room, I took the Ghost out of the drawer and gave it a place of honor next to my teacher bell. Last week, my nice, new, made in China stapler quit working, so of course the Grey Ghost was pressed back into service. Someday when I retire, I'm leaving school with 2 things: my purse and that old, grey stapler.
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