That Which Was Lost

Yesterday, as I was putting up my October bulletin board, I found something I thought was gone.  It is the small Peter Rose raven I bought last year at Chimneyville.  I had looked everywhere for it, opened and emptied all my drawers where I hide things away during the summer, dug to the back of all the stuff I have in my big locking cabinet.  Every so often, I'd have a flash of some new place to check, but it was never there.

Every time I looked, my heart got a little sadder.  It seemed to be the last dose of crap from last school year, the last kick in the side, the last indignity.  I had loved that little bird from the first moment I saw it among its larger brethren in Jackson, and to find that it was gone was terrible.  The thought that someone would take it was of course a million times worse.  I couldn't figure out why anyone would take it.  It isn't flashy.  It isn't fancy.  Unless you know something about pottery, you probably wouldn't get it at all.  It wasn't like it was something electronic that could one could hock.

I had remembered that I had put away as one of the very last things I had done when I was shutting my room down on that terrible last day of last year, but it was in none of the places I usually kept things.  When I opened a random filing cabinet drawer yesterday, though, it was sitting there as if it were only waiting for me.  I picked it up and held it for a minute.  The feeling of finding it was sweet.

It isn't the only lost thing I've found lately.  I had lost something far more important than a mere object.  Last year, I lost the feeling of connection to my students and purpose for my job.  I felt bad all the time, off balance, struggling.  My relationship with my students is critical, and for whatever reason, it just wasn't as strong as it has been previously.

This year's class is different, though.  They are sweet and thoughtful.  Yesterday, we studied "Homage to the Empress of the Blues," and as a part of the assignment, they created their own
 homage to someone.  Four of the groups did teachers, three of my good friends and respected colleagues...and me.  I almost cried.

They say the relationship piece is the most important part of the teacher-student interaction.  What they don't tell you is how important it is on our side of the desk, too.  The amount of sheer internal power we have to pull every day to care for all the needs of our students, to be enthusiastic about our material even when we feel sick or weary ourselves, to ignore the outside distractions that constantly surround us, is something that I'm not sure people who haven't been in education understand.  When we feel that we're fighting our students, that sheer apathy reigns, it makes it extremely hard to refresh that inner spring.  Without something to breathe life into it somehow, it is only a matter of time until it runs dry altogether.

Which is basically where I was when this year began.  The events that closed out last year hurt me.     Even though there had been bright spots in that year, there had been so much badness that went with it.  I didn't really know what to think about this year, only that I had a hope and a prayer that it wouldn't be more of the same.  It really isn't.

That feeling when you find a thing that was precious to you and had gone missing is full of joy, surprise, and relief.  It doesn't matter if that thing is something you can lay your hands on or not.  When a loss is healed, when restoration comes, peace comes with it.