"Where do you see yourself in five years?" is one of those interview questions that is used to not only gain information about an interviewee’s ambitions, it’s also used to see what an interviewee looks and sounds like when he or she is, in a word, bullshitting. If you’re the one who has to talk, you know you’re not committing yourself to a five-year plan; certainly you are not committing yourself to this stranger. At best, you have a prepared answer that makes you seem thoughtful and reflective and not foolish. The truth is secondary; what you want to take care of is next Monday morning and maybe the next year after that.
When you’re middle aged, "Where do you see yourself in five years?" becomes about other people. I told a friend of mine that my theme today was about transitions; she asked what I planned to transition myself into. Funny lady. Hey, it’s not about me. I’m the guy walking towards a destination. The people around me, however, are caught in the winds that blow past me and occasionally at my back. Where will they be in five years?
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In a couple of months, my wife and I will have an empty nest. Our youngest is graduating from high school this week, which becomes impressive when you consider that she has no memory of the period from March to June of her Junior year. Literally, she has no memory. Two handfuls of doctors and tests could not figure out why daily, even hourly, she would lose memory of everything that had happened before. Think of all the possibilities and, yes, tests were done. She wandered through that time, going to school when she could and using her abilities as if every day were the first day, which it was. It helped to have a high school Principal firmly in her corner; I cannot understand the couple of teachers who were not.
Nevertheless, she recovered. She made up all of her second semester Junior-year schoolwork and aced her Senior year. She developed an ambition which led her to be the Stage Manager of her high school’s musical. I observed the awe, and a little fear, she inspired in other students. No one hesitated to do whatever she asked (go ahead; ask a high school student to do something immediately) and I witnessed two boys fooling around with some props. Another came by and said, "You’d better not let Rachel see you." They stopped.
In what seemed to be the blink of an eye, she applied for and was accepted into the college of her choice.
Our eldest daughter is home from college but only for a couple of days more. She’s leaving for Israel until the end of July. She’ll come home then, wash her clothes and head off to Washington University in Saint Louis to be trained as a Hillel representative. I suppose I get to see her in late August and early September.
My objective eye sees the transition she is making. She’s entering her third year at the university and what she will be doing outside of classes will be as important as what she does in them. In pretty much every way, she’ll be the face of the Hillel at her university. She has a job representing the organization to students, the Rabbi wants her to represent the campus group to the community’s "adult" congregations (let’s talk money) and she will continue leading the Friday night services for Reform students.
As the token Christian in a household of Jewish women (I never did build a sukkah- a temporary shelter- in the backyard to retreat into, though I thought about it), I admit that I see my eldest’s succeeding at something unfamiliar to me is like a strong gust of wind. I can’t grasp it; I can only feel it going by and see its effects. What I see is potential energy turning into kinetic.
It’s tempting, on this Fathers’ Day, to stop here. But others in my life aren’t stopping. The young woman Rabbi at the Temple is having her last service this coming Friday. She’s leaving to be closer to her family. I regret not getting to know her better; we had one really good talk about peace. I guess I always thought there would be more time. Recently, during the talk-time that follows a service, I came back to my table (my wife talks; I sit and wait) to find her waiting for me. I had bought a book from the Temple library’s discards and it lay on the table. The Rabbi pointed at the book and said, "There were two copies of that book downstairs. I bought one of them and I was curious who had bought the other. It doesn’t surprise me at all that it was you. I have no doubt that we have many of the same books."
A counselor at my school is being "displaced" (let’s hear it for tightening budgets) and she sent me a note: "Remember to talk more in faculty meetings. You clear up confusion. People understand more after you explain it."
I count six of my teaching colleagues who will be someplace else next year. They are also "displaced." Just how education is supposed to succeed...hey, makes no sense to me.
My wife has begun to talk to me about her volunteer job that she’ll start this coming fall. She will be an advocate and counselor for "at risk" ninth graders. Thankfully, she’ll be in a different district than where I work. I wouldn’t want to go toe-to-toe with her professionally. This will be good for her; her physical limitations won’t let her have a job but this will let her use her talents.
(She walked into the room while I was editing this and announced, "You know what? I’ve known you for almost half my life." Then she went to the store. She didn’t say it was a good or bad thing.)
My students have just said good-bye to me. Some scrawl "I’ll miss you!" on my whiteboards when I’m not looking; others leave me drawings (I really must start a drawing club at school next year); some yell- with a good nature- one of my nicknames; one girl came over to me and apologized for all the trouble she caused in class. During the promotion ceremony, there was a moment when the students who had earned all A’s, B’s and C’s with no low citizenship marks over three years were called out and given certificates. None- not one- were my students. This was even more surprising since I had two "regular" history classes this year on top of my low-performing math students. I guess they weren’t so "regular."
My wife says this is a compliment. I am the transition guy. Other eighth-grade teachers get the average and up. I get the students who have been wounded by math class and perhaps damaged by school in general. The Golds and Silvers pass me in the hallways; the Browns wait at my door.
On my walk to school recently, I noted that the name of my math class is officially changing. After ten years, it will no longer be known as "Transitional Algebra." From now on, it will be called "Algebra Essentials," a class for students who aren’t ready for Algebra I. That class awaits them and I’m no longer supposed to "transition" them into it. I’m supposed to shore up the essentials. I laugh grimly at this. In the fall, I will use the seventh different curriculum for the class in eleven years; it’s the eighth curriculum I’ll have used if you include the misguided attempt one year to have all eighth-graders take Algebra I, ready or not. The new curriculum has been written by constructivists, who believe in group work and students "discovering" methods. On the other side are the direct-teaching activists who won the first math war in the 1990s and wrote the adopted Standards. Going into my eleventh year teaching this math class, I know that none of the activists on any side have a clue how to reach these kids. Plans and methods written by mathematicians, or at least people for whom math is easy, are only tools. The students need a sociologist, a psychologist, an active and interested adult. Until they trust me, nothing else is possible. I give myself passing grades for that, which is not enough to satisfy my ego. I want to stop walking now that my bicycle is fixed (hey, it’s a metaphor).
Where will they all be in five years? Where will I be? Well, I have faith that I’ll still be here. I may not be famous and I may not be published and I may not make a lot of money, but it seems I am meant to be the steady force on the way to somewhere.
Someone has to be the first one into the crosswalk.
I guess that’s what being a father, or a father-figure, is all about.