Grateful Friday

Yesterday I felt all the feelings.  Mostly grateful though.

A few of my sweet students brought me gifts.  They gave me notes and hugs and told me they were going to miss me.  A few tried to persuade me to be a 4th grade teacher.  Some of my former students came in with their autograph books for me to sign.  One of my most earnest students said to me, "I'm going to keep learning during the summer.  My dad asked me what I want to learn about and I said dinosaurs." I asked him if he had ever been to Vernal and he said he had not.  I told him to tell his dad to take him there for a field trip about dinosaurs. 

We did the "6th grade clap out" and Mr. Dawson led the way and one of the 6th grade boys had tears streaming down his face and I almost lost it.  The last day of school is the most happy/sad day in the world.

At the end of the day, my class was seated with me in a circle on the rug, playing a game.  

Mr. Dawson made an announcement 5 minutes before the bell rang for dismissal.  He told the students how much he had loved being their principal and how much he would miss them.  Partway through his announcement, he said, "Sorry...I'm going to...sneeze."

It was a nice try, but he was clearly crying.  My students all looked at me in slight alarm and there I was with emotions already very near the surface.  I held it together pretty well.  I had to.  3rd graders don't want to see their teacher cry.  That is all.

When the bell rang, a few of them bolted out the door at a dead run.  Most of them lingered around telling me good-bye.  A handful threw their arms around me for big hugs.  

Happy/sad.

I had my "exit interview" with Jami.  He said, "Miss Thelma!  What can I do for you today?" (Every time in the last three years that I interacted with him, he would ask me that.)

I said, "Don't leave."

He told me that he appreciated that I was a good teacher and a good person and a pre-crastinator. (Which was nice of him to say because sometimes pre-crastinators bug people.)

I told him that I appreciated that he was all the things that make him Mr. Dawson.  Our school will sorely miss him as principal!

We gathered for the faculty party.  

It's a big group when you add all the staff to the teacher group.  I am on the back row standing on a chair and our head custodian who is up on all the OSHA things was not too happy about it, but he also doesn't love that I stand on my heavily water damaged and bowed counter to staple things on the wall.  He said, "You stand on a ladder right?  A sturdy one?  With three points of contact?"  

Um...

And I love these people!  And our janky school with water damaged and bowed counters.

I feel so blessed that I get to work where I do.

There were presentations for people who are leaving Bonneville.  There were made up songs and costumes and a drum solo and original poems and lots of goodie bags of favorite treats.

I have said it before:  elementary teachers are their own kind of people.

There were also a lot of tears.  In an act of self awareness, I took a box of Kleenex to the meeting.  And a lot of other teachers did too.  Every table had at least one box.  And we needed them.

As the first grade teachers were paying tribute to one of their team, who is retiring, I thought, "I hope that's never me."

That's an unreasonable thing to think, but I love my job.