I am sure that many of you will stop reading this as soon as you realize I am not focusing on pornography in this post, although it is in a story. Keep reading and you will laugh. Guaranteed.
All of us have memories of times in our life where something has gone dreadfully wrong and was not funny, only to brew itself, over time, into a great story. Sometimes people, usually older people (I mean people a generation above
you), or acquaintances that don't know what else to say, will try and
help ease your stress when you are in a tough situation by looking at
you in the eye and saying, "Oh well, this will be one of those things
you will laugh at someday, right?" Depending on your perception of how
far along the "things are going to turn out O.K." continuum you are,
you may either agree with them, or, you may just want to punch them
right in their annoying eye because you aren't even close to wanting to
laugh about it yet.
I think the two factors involved in how quick we can "laugh at something" are time to resolve, and the level of "everything turned out O.K."ness of the situation. In terms of time, some things need minutes, some, months and some, years, to get worked out to where we consider them O.K.. Usually the laughability level of a story is due to the linear relationship of the amount of time, to the amount of O.K.ness a situation ends up with. Basically, the faster things work out for the good, the less time there is needed to be able to laugh about it. When things go really wrong, but quickly resolve themselves to be O.K., the story is usually really funny. (Ask me sometime about saying "I'd teach for free." It's a funny story, but only because it worked out sweet.)
I think we can all agree that when things go bad and stay bad they aren't funny. When things go bad but turn out alright, usually we can laugh at them.
One story comes to mind immediately when I start thinking about situations like this. Krista's first job was teaching Grade 8 at Wilson Middle School in Lethbridge. Now for those of you who haven't taught middle school, it can be a challenge. All teaching is a challenge in different ways and I think all teachers who are being honest can agree that teaching has approximately the same workload although it is completely different from Grade 1 to Grade 12 in the duties and the way those are distributed throughout each day, night and weekend. All teaching is hard, fun, devastating, stressful, hopeful, joyful, time consuming and a whole bunch more other things that I don't feel like describing anymore because they aren't the point of this blog. In particular, middle school teachers have to deal with kids who are hitting puberty, figuring out who they are, how they want to express themselves to develop an identity and other things relating to behaviour and identity that make junior high especially challenging from a classroom management perspective.
Krista taught a group of grade 8's that were sometimes a handful, and she would come home exhausted some days just from working out the best ways to present students with the opportunity to learn, while managing those students who made that a hard goal to achieve. I want to be clear that Krista liked all those kids, but some days pushed her patience. Like this one...
Krista had been teaching a lesson, (I can't remember which one) when she noticed a small crowd developing at the desk of one of her students at the back. She approched them with an, "O.k. guys, what's going on?" As she got closer, she assessed that the focus of their attention was a magazine. A magazine with naked women in various poses.
She proceeded to tell them, "Guys you need to give me the magazine." "No.", was the response. "GUYS, give me the magazine." "NO!" Krista proceeded to grab the magazine, but the student would not let go. Now I forgot to mention that the student was a boy about my size. Literally. The kid was in grade 8 and was about 6'4" and I bet he was 180 to 200lbs minimum, no joke. Grade 8.
Krista grabbed the magazine with both hands and a tug of war began with Krista yelling, "GIVE ME THE PORN! GIVE ME THE PORN!" Well, the kid wouldn't let go, and as Krista looked around she saw a student at the front of the room with scissors ready to cut the hair of the girl in front of him, as well as across the room another wonderful little child was preparing to stab another kid in the arm with a pencil. The way she described it was nothing short of brilliant. She said at that moment she had a sort of "out of body" experience. It was like everything went to slow mo as she saw the disaster brewing and she thought to herself, "Is this really happening? Am I tug of warring (word?) with a huge 13 year old while yelling "GIVE ME THE PORN!!!" right now? This is not what I signed up for as a teacher..." Well she got the porn, she settled the class down, I can't remember what discipline she used on the kids but she worked it out, and although it wasn't funny at the time, it was FRICKIN' hilarious once it was all worked out and she told me the story that night. Oh man we laughed hard about it that night. We laughed multiple times about that story. Man I miss her laugh. I really do. (Ah crap I was just laughing and now I have tears in my eyes, and I am in Moxie's, hide face...)
I ended up teaching some of those kids a few years later at Churchill, and I could tell that they had always liked Krista. I knew they respected her. Kids just do some dumb things sometimes, sometimes they don't mean anything by it. Krista cared for those kids, and they knew it. She was undoubtedly one of the lights in those kids' lives. As a teacher I feel honored that I can do a job where I get to hang out with kids and maybe be an encouragement in their day. Some kids have some serious garbage that they come to school with. Divorce, alcoholic/druggie parents, no food, physical/sexual abuse, illness in the family, illness in their own bodies, self-image issues, identity issues, pressure/fear of what the future holds, academic pressures. Man there's a lot.
For a teacher, I think there's nothing much better than seeing a kid smile because they're having a good time and learning. Krista loved that and when she taught she tried to bring joy to a kid's life. Krista taught in elementary as well and her favorite position was when she taught Grade 1 at Mike Mountain Horse Elementary. I know she touched the lives of the kids there too. I was so encouraged when I received a letter after she passed away from a parent of twins that Krista had taught. They couldn't say enough about the role she played in the lives of her daughters. Krista was a light in the lives of her colleagues as well and those people at Mike Mountain Horse Elementary did so much for us after Krista passed away, I didn't really have words for it. Thanks to any of you who may read this.
To be a light in someone's life is an honour. I sometimes forget that. I sometimes get wrapped up in my own things. Krista wasn't perfect, she wasn't always happy and all that jazz, but I think you know where I am going with this. She was definitely someone who people would define as being a light in their world. Being an encouragement to others is something that we should all strive to do more of. Everyone can be an encouragement to somebody. I honestly believe that. You are the only one like you on this planet. You have a role to play in this place that no one else can perform. You sometimes may not feel like you are special, and I know it's frickin' cheesy to say this, but you are special. You really are. Try and make someone else feel that way and you will see your purpose more and more. I believe that.
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