Thursday, September 19, 2013

Six Degrees

The other day a young colleague stopped me at the copy machine. "Hey!" she said, and it was clear that she had something she really wanted to tell me.

"Hey!?" I answered expectantly.

She took a breath. "Let me go back. How are you?"

I laughed in appreciation of her manners. I am, after all, her elder. "Fine. And you?"

"I was at a comic convention this weekend," she started.

"Oh yeah, I read about that," I told her. "How was it?"

"Fun!" she continued. "I was a volunteer, and I met another girl who was volunteering, too. We started talking and I told her I teach in Arlington. She asked where, and when I named our school she said that she went here!"

I nodded, following along.

"And then she asked if you were still here," she reported breathlessly. "She didn't even have to think about your name! She knew you right away!"

I gave a little ta da look. "Who was it?" I asked.

When she mentioned the name, I remembered this former student immediately, too. She was one of the kids from my very first year of teaching who used to hang out in my room after school that year. Later, she and some of her friends were volunteer helpers in my summer school classrooms for several years. I had lost track of her, but it was great to reconnect, even once removed.

Today I sent her a message on Facebook:

Hey! KB told me she ran into you at the Comic Convention last weekend, so you know I'm still doing

exactly
the
same
thing

twenty years later.

Fortunately, I still like it. Your class must have broken me in well.

I hope all is well with you! Stay in touch.


I hope she will.

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