A Special Gift

Hey, I'm on Christmas break.  Yesterday, I purposely stayed away from school "stuff" as much as I could. I have grading to finish and I need to send some resources to the student-teacher who will join us in January. I felt I needed it.  Ok, I admit, I read some articles that were posted by the amazing people of my PLN on Twitter. I interacted with some students through messages. But that isn't work. I love those activities. Today, I will grade a little. Or a lot. But first, I thought I would throw down a blog entry. It is a mixture of ideas that have not made it to the page or have not made it to a point that will allow me to hit Publish. Today, in the spirit of the season, I want to talk gifts.

All right, this blog post started out as a list of gifts I am happy to have already received this year. However, then as I read back through it, I realized it was getting a little long, so I have decided to cut this one down to just one gift. I will get the rest of the list out at some point, probably as a year-end list of some sort. But for now, let's just focus on one special gift I have received this year, and how it relates to my professional world. 

That special gift?

Dad is alive for Christmas.

I turn 47 in a few days, so I have been blessed with nearly 47 years of growing up with my parents. But that does not change the fact that it is a gift to be able to say that:

Dad is alive for Christmas.

Ten days ago, this was not a certainty. I will not go into a lot of detail, but it is truly a gift. Thanks to Dad being Dad and Mom being there with him, he survived a surgery that astonishes me. His surgeon, one of numerous people who played Santa and put this gift together, is incredible. He is a brilliant man who can hold life in his hands one minute and then take a knee to speak to a family the next, and do both with a calmness and humility Other doctors have told my parents that he is one of the most intelligent people they have ever met. Oftentimes, people of such brilliance struggle to communicate with "average people" or they are on a different level that creates a barrier between them and the people they work with. This is not the case with this doctor. He performed surgery that was extremely high risk, and at 1 a.m.  walked out into a waiting room to explain how things went. This was what I noticed first as he began to explain things: he took a knee.  This surgeon, one of the most intelligent men that intelligent men had ever met, a person who my Dad literally owes his life, looked at my mom and the rest of us who sat in the chairs of the surgical waiting room, and he took knee. He put himself at a level even with Mom, and looked her in the eyes, and he explained everything that he had done in terms that were understandable without being condescending. He patiently answered our questions, despite the fact that he had been in surgery all day and had others scheduled for that morning. He put us at ease with honesty and sincerity.

When I drove back to school later in the week after Dad's surgery, my teacher mind landed on this fact: that surgeon once sat in a classroom where he was impacted and influenced by someone. Maybe he was fortunate to have sat in several classrooms where that happened. No, let me rephrase that. My Dad, my family, and I are fortunate that he sat in such classrooms. Maybe it was a lockerroom, auditorium, concert hall, or lab. Did the teacher, coach, pastor, Boy Scout leader, band director, librarian, or whoever it was who sparked the imagination, fed the talent, or instilled the confidence in this man know the impact they were having at that moment?

Who is in my classroom that might one day be "that person" for a family? Who is sitting in your classroom? And what might each of is do that sparks or, regretfully, stifles, the inspiration that person needs. It might be a question, a conversation, a pat on the back, or a refusal to give up when that kid wants to quit. It could be something as simple as a greeting when someone feels invisible or a word of encouragement when someone feels like everyone is against them. We can never really know, and we cannot waste the opportunities we have each and every day.

That kind of puts things in perspective, doesn't it? It changes how that dreadful sentence sounds: "Well, just one more __________ and I'm done." One for day, one more week, one more semester, or one more year. I've heard it before. I am embarrassed to say, I have thought it and said it, going into a break, or nearing the end of the year. But we cannot let that steal away the opportunities that we have. When we feel that way, we have to take a deep breath, draw on those around us who lift us up, and remember why we are there in the first place. We cannot enter our classrooms with that "just one more" attitude. Not to sound bold, but what we do can be too important. If that is the attitude a teacher carries, then he should not walk through those doors. It's not ever "just one more year." It's 120 or more young people who walk through our classroom doors. We never know when that opportunity to make that positive impact might present itself for "that kid" who will eventually become "that doctor, that soldier, that writer, that leader, that builder, that parent, that teacher."

So, as I said, this post began as a Christmas list. We as teachers are given gifts each and every day. They are the kids who walk through our doors, who pass us in the hallways, who look to us for hope or help. Few professions are given these gifts. We are. Remember that, and in essence, that makes every day Christmas.