Pardon the bumper sticker title. I hope this diary's content will be better than the headline.
I have so many stories to tell on behalf of my wife, the teacher. I've told her before that she should come here and tell them herself, in her own words, but her job is more demanding than mine, you see.
She literally has no free time to spend on a novelty project like writing a DKos diary. And after work, well, it's all she can do some days to pick up her own son, so much does she give to the children of others.
This may sound harsh, but it's a reality of our education system's current arrangement that no one teacher can reach everyone she wishes she could. My wife learned this early on in her career, where she taught English literature to teenagers in a decaying building in an urban part of town.
In a hot, smelly "annex" building -- meaning a building plopped heedlessly next to the main one when it became too full of bodies -- she cut her teaching teeth.
The children were earnest in their youthful disorientation. Each one of them was searching for direction. Some, having reached a seeming dead-end, lashed out at those around them. Others struggled to emerge from the protective shell that had shielded them thus far in life, hoping others would -- finally -- embrace them.
Later in her career when she'd moved on to a better-funded school -- or at least one with new buildings, mostly given over to athletics -- she found a different set of problems, but the same kinds of kids. They had different motivations, yes, but they were the same at heart as any.
Realizing what she realized, that no teacher can save the world entire, she crafted a stratagem for working against the way things were stacked against the teaching professional. Select two or three kids per class -- keep in mind this number was multiplied by her number of hours in a day -- to really focus upon.
Sometimes these children reminded her of herself at a young age. Aware of some vague talent, but unsure of what to do with it. Beset upon by an array of personal problems. Plagued by generational poverty. Dogged by the financial woes of the family. The products of broken marriages. The end results of layers of abuses. She'd find them, like rare metals in ore, and refine them. That was the plan.
My wife, she of the tenderest of hearts and the fieriest of talents, reached into the minds of many over the years. She revealed to them not just knowledge -- priceless though knowledge is -- but possibility. Possibility thus far unrevealed to them by anyone.
Children of promise and no direction woke up suddenly to the great big world and their place in it -- with wide, hoping eyes. They looked into college scholarships with her help. They learned to express their deepest thoughts on a blank page. They found stories that shed light on how they felt about themselves and the world around them.
I remember once she was talking to the mother of one student on the phone. She'd formed a real connection with this student -- who was also a new mother. As she spoke with the mother of the mother on the phone, talking about grades, the woman had to pause and take an order for a Big Mac and large fries. Here was a woman working drive-thru, still taking time to talk with her daughter's teacher about grades.
The daughter herself was determined. My wife had opened up the possibility of a college career, something that scholarships could put within her reach. Then it happened again. She got pregnant again, and dropped out. As far as I know, my wife hasn't heard from her again.
My wife kept up her strong face, leading classes -- sometimes 35 at a time -- through crucial parts of their lives. Some nights she'd come home, soul shaking, telling the saddest of stories. Children aching from their abuses.
Did you know there are kids who ask each other not "where do you live," but "where do you stay?" As in: "I'm staying with my grandma now." Their lives are transient. Scattered. Unstable.
Another student, a young man known as a joker, would sit in my wife's seat in front of the class and do impressions of her. "All right class, today we're talking about this dumb book by this dead guy. Then I'll tell you about my baby, and my husband who's a writer!" Laughs all around.
This young man -- and I say he's that, a man in his youth -- stood up to the pressures around him. He refused the gang that wanted him. Knew the danger. My wife had great hopes for him and kept in touch with his teachers as he worked toward graduation.
He'd just made it to the end of high school when he was struck down. After turning his back on a car full of thugs, they shot him in the back of the head.
Teachers hear so often about their influence. These kids, sometimes you're all they have, they're told. You can't overestimate the impact that you have on their lives, the ability that you have to make things better for them.
Sometimes all this hype cuts both ways. When tragedy strikes, good teachers always torture themselves. Couldn't I have done more? Why did he make the choices he made? Couldn't I have helped her make a different decision?
It's a small thing to say that teachers care. It's a sentiment small enough to fit on a bumper sticker. But don't underestimate the depth and the breadth of that care.
They frustrate, oh yes. I've had to talk my wife down many times when her kids mistreated her. We've even had to call the police once after a student threatened her life.
But still, teachers always go back to class. And they couldn't do it if they weren't fueled by compassion.