Farewell Tour

I met my friend Mary for breakfast this morning before we headed over to our old school to sign a retirement gift for a former colleague. It was a delightfully civilized morning: we enjoyed egg sandwiches, split a muffin, and talked about books before wandering over to school. 

Today was the end-of-year activities, so only the sixth grade was on campus, and the building was eerily quiet when we walked in. Our first stop was to pick up the book, sign it, and take it around for others to sign also. As Mary transcribed her message, a student challenged me to a game of Taco, Cat, Goat, Cheese, Pizza, which was a fun way to spend a few minutes. 

It was also fun to see everyone greet Mary-- she hasn't been back since she retired last June, and everyone we met was so pleased to see her. 

Upstairs, I excused myself from a conversation to drop off the book with a teacher in another room where the students were doing karaoke. Once again, I got to play while she signed, grabbing the inflatable microphone a student offered and singing along to Taylor Swift's "Romeo and Juliet". 

"Look at you!" Mary said when she found me, "doing all your favorite things at school. If it were always this fun, we never would have had to retire!"

Class of '26

I couldn't resist clicking on the recordings of the high school commencements when I happened to see them on the district website this afternoon. The kids who were graduating were in my sixth-grade class when we shut down for COVID six years ago, and, with few exceptions, I hadn't seen many of them since that day. The beauty of a recording is that I could fast-forward to the students I wanted to see, but I ended up wiling away a couple of hours watching hundreds of seniors cross three stages, just waiting for a name or a face I recognized. 

As always happens, some were so changed I would have passed them on the street without another look, but most were just slightly grown-up versions of their 11-year-old selves, perhaps a little more serious and poised. Like graduates everywhere, they seemed happy and proud, and I was glad to see that they made it through the turbulence of the last six years, even ending their school years on a pretty traditional note.

It's hard to believe, but the students entering kindergarten this fall weren't even born yet when the pandemic struck, and in another six years, almost all the kids whose schooling was directly impacted by the shutdown will have graduated or moved on from school. Something that had such a profound effect on all of us will be history to them.

Time is crazy predictable in that way.

Fifteen Years Later

Back when I was in my late forties, I used to think it was funny when I started receiving invitations to join AARP.  It seemed impossible that I was that old, and I felt as fine and well as ever, so AARP seemed like a humorous mistake.

My reaction was different this morning when I went to get the mail and received a large-format postcard reminding me that Medicare is only one year away and that it's time to prepare. I didn't think that was amusing at all; in fact, if I had to choose an adjective for that reality, it would be terrifying!

The Shoe Fits

"More testing?" one of my colleagues asked this morning.

"Yes, but it's the last day," I told him.

"What a joy it must be to lock up kids in the library and force them to answer questions for hours," he noted acerbically. 

"You know I love that stuff," I laughed with equal irony.

"Well," he sighed, "I guess you're just like everyone else--" He paused and shook his head sadly. "Selling out for the almighty dollar."

"Ouch!" I yelped. "That stings!" We walked silently down the hall for a moment. "But, it's kinda true," I admitted.

Shhhhh Nanigans

There was a mysterious whistle softly piercing the quiet of the library as 60 students tested late this morning. It would have been nothing except that everyone was willing to be distracted by it, including the adults in the room. So much so that an assistant principal was eventually called in to threaten the students with invalid tests and other such dreadful consequences. 

To be honest, my aging ears could only pick it up occasionally, but when I passed a rather impertinent young man whistling under his breath to the amusement of the others at his table, I pulled him aside.

"I was just trying to see if I could do a whistle," he claimed impudently. "I didn't know I could."

'Why don't you try to see if you can do math?" I suggested with a bit of a tone myself. "Since that's what we're here to find out!"

Not So Small Talk

"How did you decide you wanted to teach art?" I asked a young woman at Emily's retirement party.

"That's a complicated story!" she laughed.

"I don't mean to be nosy," I told her. "Skip that question if you like!"

"I'll give you the quick version," she answered amiably. "I studied video game design in college with a minor in Japanese. After graduation, I moved to Japan to pursue a career in games, but my entry was teaching English. I decided I liked teaching better than game design, and here I am!"

I nodded appreciatively. 

"How about you?" she asked. "Are you from this area?"

"That's a complicated story!" I laughed.

Duty Calls

I was standing in the library of my old school this morning, waiting for the next round of testees, when my phone chimed with a text notification. The screen displayed the former assistant principal's name and a message asking whether I was free to talk briefly. I was, and as I waited for her call, I looked around the room. It was practically unchanged in the decade since she retired, and I thought of all the meetings we had sat in there over the twenty years we worked together. My phone buzzed, and I smiled to hear her voice. 

The business at hand today was not educational in the least; she needed a sub for her summer bowling league and wondered if I could do it. "Yes, ma'am," I said, since after all, she was the boss.