The older teacher arrives at school, a tad bit late, but before the bell. She moves slower these days and either cannot move fast enough to get out of the house on time, keeps going back for things she has forgotten like her i.d. or car keys, or simply doesn't care. Making a cup of coffee for the road outweighs the expectation of a prompt arrival by a landslide. Besides, she ponders, what are they going to do, (while we are in this era of teacher shortage) fire me? She giggles to herself at the joke based on a reality of after having spent the entire last year mentoring a brand new English teacher and creating sub plans for the constantly rotating substitutes for the other four classes.
She places her car in park and leans across the middle console to grab her puffy lunch bag overflowing with extra cookie filled containers for her co-workers, a Walmart bag of Jolly Ranchers and Dum Dums for the Kahoot game, and her giant purse jingling with a collection of keys carabiner-ed on and dangling off the side. It is also filled with candy: Smarties and peppermints for her own consumption.
She pulls, and it tugs back.
Somehow the strap has gotten tangled around the head of her umbrella and no yanking in the world will release it. So she gracelessly hefts her body across the console and around the tall cup of piping hot coffee in the center cupholder daring her to make a wrong move. Her legs jut outside the car. The cold rain splatter her bare ankles. She stretches and scootches until her finger tips finally reach the umbrella and free it from the space between the door and the seat. Could she have easily gotten out and walked around the car to free it. Yes. But why when you can start the day with yoga-like stretches to get the juices going.
She climbs out of her car, situates the bags and the coffee, and lifts the umbrella as she starts to traverse the parking lot in the cold dismal rain when she spots a young girl off in the distance "nakedly" clad in a cropped top and short shorts. There is no umbrella, no jacket, no hat. She has her arms wrapped around her mid area protecting or warming herself as she trudged slowly and miserably along. The teacher realizes this student, who is not hers, still has to walk the length of the building to the student entrance on the other side. She runs over, careful not to drop the coffee, and gives the child her umbrella.
"Thank you, Mrs. Smith," she says with a genuine and very grateful smile. They all seem to know her name, though she only knows those of her own.
"You're welcome. Just drop it off in the office," she calls over her shoulder as she sprints for the nearest door, which happens to be the morning holding area -- the gymnasium where the other 300 or so sixth graders are waiting to be released to the locker area.
She weaves between bodies, bumping a few with her bags before hearing a boy pleading with some young teacher to be allowed to go to the lockers early to drop off his cardboard. Upon reaching the doorway, she sees him. The tiniest little fellow, a sixth grader whose body has forsaken him by taking its own sweet time to grow, is holding a display board taller than him by an inch and triple his width. Where do you even buy anything like that? she wondered before approaching him and prying it from his grasp.
"Who is your teacher?"
"It's Mr. K.," a relieved munchkin. "Thank you."
"Ok, I'll put it in his room."
She, now, with the skill of an acrobatic juggling act, balances in one hand the three bags and the coffee, (careful not to spill a drop) and carries the huge display board down the hall before pausing to shout back, "Hey, what's your name? I will put it on the sticky note for your teacher."
"Cayden!" he shouted back.
"Okay."
It's always "Cayden." They are always busy, needy little fellows she thought.
After dropping off the board with Mr. K, and then stopping to open up her own room while carefully setting down her coffee, she heads out into the locker area to yell at children: "Keep it moving." "Keep your hands to yourself!" "Stop running!" "Hey, you dropped something!" "Get to class!" No, it is not her duty; hers is in the afternoon, but the dean needs help, and the 300 plus will never make it to class without the supervision. The teachers whose duty it is to be there are never anywhere to be seen. They don't have the stomach for it.
As she stands there barking orders at those who need the cattle prod and giving greetings and acknowledgments to those who need the love, all the while getting bumped and stepped on, a new young teacher creeps out of her den to make a last minute dash to the restroom (their bladders are still in training). Suddenly, the crowd goes wild and the students come alive and are screaming and yelling "Hi Ms. - (pick a name)" like she is a superstar celebrity, and they are paparazzi.
It's okay though. The seasoned educator is not jealous. The neophyte needs the love to make her feel good and confident as a new teacher. And the older teacher revels in the fact that she secretly knows it is only because the newbie will play Roblox and Blooket against them, and understands their slang, and their jokes, and has more patience for noise, and will tolerate more tomfoolery. Heck, she would have been the vet's favorite teacher ,too... if her teachers behaved that way -- they didn't.
She knows she's loved in a different way. All she has to do is miss one day of school for a doctor's appointment, and she is suddenly interrogated by 75 nosey 11 year olds to ascertain why she was absent. And,... it helps that know her grades are always a little bit higher on assessments.
