Today I left home at 6:30 to visit Joe at school. They were having an open house, so I spent the morning meeting most of his teachers. Joe joined me at lunchtime for Chipotle and a haircut. We walked around the grounds and talked and caught up and played a ridiculous game of ping-pong. We are both bad at ping-pong but we are an evenly matched kind of bad. He beat me 21-19, entirely because I cannot return his serves from the left side of the table.
You guys, it was so good to see him. I just wanted to feast my eyes on his face. This time I didn't cry when I left but I am definitely a little teary at the memory.
BUT ANYWAY. It is a great place. He is really happy there -- he misses us, but in a manageable way.
Here is a weird thought: in some ways, his entirely secular school seems more Catholic to me than our local Catholic high school. This is partly because of its diversity. It feels strange to me to be in an ethnic minority, but that's the way it is at his school. In the first class I visited there were 14 sets of parents represented. Only 4 of us appeared to be of European descent. It's also because of the value they place on curiosity and on learning as a lifelong unfolding -- not a set of hoops to jump through or boxes to tick off. Another issue is the socioeconomic climate. I am certain that there are plenty of wealthy families sending their kids there, but I asked him about how the vibe compared. At the local high school there's a troubling set of expectations: which subdivision you live in and which car you drive and where you go on vacation carry more weight than I wish they did. "It's nothing like that here," he said. "It's, like, the opposite of Gladlyville Catholic in that way."
The last time I mentioned the local Catholic high school I was grousing vaguely yet again -- that was really just about one teacher. They've given most of the advanced literature classes to a woman who seems to be lukewarm about literature. I wrote about her here. When she took attendance on the first day she said to my 17yo, "I haven't missed you," a pronouncement that sparked my ire last month. Most of the teachers there are trying hard to teach subjects they love. They are certainly not in it for the money. The trouble with a small school, though, is that it's hard to avoid the few bad teachers. And when you couple that with the money thing, and the political climate in which social justice is regarded with suspicion-- I don't really see us sending the younger kids there.
Today's trip was possible because Elwood agreed to cover everything at home: soccer + one-car kid-wrangling + Saturday housekeeping jobs. One of the few areas of friction in our marriage is that he doesn't do housecleaning. Today, though, he covered my jobs and made sure the kids did theirs, so I was free to luxuriate in my time with Joe. I miss that boy.
Oh, I just went and read the post about THE SPONDEE (which I would talk about at dinner too), and I want to know what kind of teacher says something like that to a kid.
If it's not HER definition, that's fine: so what IS? Be responsible for the material you present.
Also, when she's wondering how your kids spend their time...doesn't she have anything better to do with HER time than rag on other people's dinner conversations? Out loud? To their faces??
(And hold on. You teach literature, and you DON"T get fired up with joy when a student digs in like that? You don't also fall over with joy and gratitude when you hear that a family thinks that THE STUFF YOU TEACH is worth discussing over dinner?)
But I really want to know what kind of teacher -- or person, for that matter -- actually vocalizes a thought like "I haven't missed you" to a student. A kid. Other human beings.
You don't have to love everybody, but common courtesy still applies.
When our students come in and say things like, "I was talking about spondees with my parents last night," I say things like, "Huzzah!" and then I go dancing down the hall to tell my colleagues all about it.
Posted by: Kristin | September 17, 2017 at 03:55 PM
I know, right?!?!
Posted by: Jamie | September 17, 2017 at 09:00 PM
I was agog that she would say that to a student with her actual mouth. I mean, I get the sentiment. There are very occasionally students about whom I might think such a thing. But I would never want them to suspect that such a thought was even in my mind. To say it in front of a class full of his peers, too-- yikes.
Posted by: Jamie | September 17, 2017 at 09:02 PM
I cannot imagine saying such a thing to a student. It's unconscionable. And if a teacher had said it to my child I would have been in the principal's office about it. (But perhaps I am overreacting. We are currently dealing with my fifth grader having the same teacher who clearly doesn't like him for three of the past four years because the principal enjoys moving teachers around.
Posted by: Jennifer | September 17, 2017 at 09:10 PM
"I haven't missed you." Wow, what on earth is that supposed to mean? A valuable lesson in maturity is that one doesn't have to say everything that pops into one's head.
Posted by: MrsDarwin | September 18, 2017 at 08:37 AM
At my nerd boarding school I had no idea who was rich and who wasn't. It was the early to mid 90s so everyone dressed thrift store grunge and very few people owned a personal computer they were allowed to bring to school. No one was allowed to have a car there. When I attended my 20 years reunion we talked more candidly about that a when one woman said she went to Ben & Jerry's EVERY WEEK for an ice cream cone and that seemed like the height of indulgence to me. I had $5 a week allowance from my folks and the only time I got Ben & Jerry's was on free cone day. ;) I'm very glad Joe is having a good experience. Most of the best people in my life are holdovers from nerd boarding school.
Posted by: Rayne of Terror | September 18, 2017 at 10:03 AM
NO housekeeping!?!? Do you have a fleet of fairies who do the housekeeping? That's the only way in which I think people who live in a house could be released from the obligation to clean said house.
Posted by: Andrea | September 18, 2017 at 01:01 PM
She said that to a student in front of the class? Excuse me while I lift my jaw off the floor! That is completely inappropriate! I'm glad Joe is feeling good about his school. It doesn't stop you from missing him but at least you can feel good about where he is.
Posted by: Pippi | September 18, 2017 at 06:38 PM
I want to fly over there and give that teacher a piece of my mind. I can't believe a teacher could say that to a student. What a miserable person she must be.
I'm glad to hear Joe has sound such a good place to be.
Posted by: Melanie B | September 18, 2017 at 10:07 PM
YES! How in the world could his teacher say that? Horrible! I also LOVED re-reading the spondee post and my funny comment written close 4 am here, nearly 3 am there. And I never mentioned anything about being THE BIGGEST FAN of the Little House books growing up. I was able to get my youngest to read three books and then he didn't like it anymore.
As for this post, I'm glad to hear the trip went well, but I must say... wow, our house would be the most horrible disaster if my husband didn't do housecleaning! He does MOST of the housecleaning here, I'm pretty bad at it! I do all of the laundry, a lot of the grocery shopping, most of the cooking (though my husband feeds the boys breakfast every morning and gets mad when I say he doesn't cook!)... in any case, I'm glad he stepped up to the plate so you could visit your son!
Posted by: L-Mama(e) in Translation | September 25, 2017 at 10:27 PM