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.
