Today I graduated.

Today I graduated. And nobody came and nobody saw, but I met a huge milestone. It was a strange feeling, to celebrate just inside of myself and not with hugs, and frosted cakes and throwing of caps, but I certainly celebrated. Four years ago, I looked around at my house and my family and our busy life and I said , I want to add something else to the list, something just for me and with a little coaxing, I contacted Thomas college and whispered into the phone that would someone sign me up for courses. What kind of courses the someone answered back. The kind that lead me to a Masters Degree in education I told the Lorax voice. Ohhh well, do you know what ed degree you want? Literacy, I said a little louder to the voice, this time more sure.

It was a strange drive that first night to class with my two co-workers. It was strange to do something for me after eight years of working the same job, raising two babies, and poorly maintaining a home. I felt like I was breaking all the rules. As we drove onto the campus, I looked around at the twenty something’s and felt a little out of place. This was not the land of the undergrad, where you could eat cafeteria lasagna and fall asleep watching reruns of Greys Anatomy with your best girls. This was the kind of class where you go and sit for three hours and no one fixes you supper or lazy lounges with you after and then when you get home there will be dishes and then a whole other workday in the week. This was. The. Real. Shit. Dig your heels in.

My first class I got lost, which is the only way I start something. I like to really feel stepped on before I start something new. My girls and I blew into that room where everyone was already seated and settled, dripping in judgement and brains. I reached for the Santa length long syllabus, and wondering what to expect for those who had been on the bad list. Gayla, our professor, had a last name, but I don’t need to use it here, because she preferred to be called just by her first name, and I was in awe of her and also terrified so I didn’t want to mumble anymore syllables. I would take several more classes with Gayla, but that first class I was running on intimidation overdrive. We had to give a presentation at the end of the class and she didn’t want any disfluencies. She was real big on the disfluencies. So that means no ummms, uhhhh and wtf while speaking. I practiced 32 times in my bathroom mirror, making SNL cue cards and trying not to be a joke. I continued to feel like everyone else in the class had my number and knew I was a complete fraud and should head back home and continue my life in the way I always had. They all had just the right things to say, they had read the books inside out, and even relayed that they sometimes “skipped” the readings when it got busy. Skipped the readings, I would think to myself? The reading is the only way I am hanging on by a thread. When my grade was posted after the first class, I was floored with relief when it was an A. AN A everyone. In a class for grownups. I went on to take several more classes with Gayla and found that beneath that hard exterior, she had a Mr. Feeny quality about her that made me both committed and in awe of her teaching. It didn’t hurt that she loved to lecture on writing and that was basically the only thing in my bag of tricks. I soon met Wally, as he is affectionately known, in a huge lecture course with educators Pre-K to 12. I was AlWAYS paired with the high school teachers, who seemed to understand and infer the text in ways that I could not. I would say things like did you guys watch Dateline last night? and they would observe me fondly, like someone does with a small innocent child and then continue on in their intellectual conversation. I would try to insert things like, how bout them Patriots, which were met with the same stares. It was only because I hadn’t met all my girls yet. The girls I would come to know and share in stories and witty sarcasm, and frosting filled cupcakes. When you are going through a life altering journey, sometimes it takes a bit to find your people. I had my Gardiner, or Richmond girls as Todd affectionately called us, but I also met so many more. Last summer, we finished a month long class working one-on-one with struggling readers and although I bitched and moaned every interstate drive to Waterville, it was an experience I wouldn’t change for anything. I have used so many of the techniques this year with my readers, that I otherwise wouldn’t have had and it made such a difference in their reading. I still use it on my google meets with them and I am surprised at my power through the computer screen. My favorite quote from my four years at Thomas came from our professor Todd,

“If you don’t love working with kids and watching them succeed, please do something else. Kids deserve a lot more than your indifferent attitude. This is too important of a career to do a shitty job at it”

That really stuck with me and always will, because I don’t think anyone goes into teaching, thinking I am just earning a paycheck or going through the motions, but it can happen. I have seen teachers who don’t want to be there (not very many) in my teaching years and this quote really hit me like a gong. I always try to be present, do more, solve the puzzles and feel the feels.

Today when I reflect on this journey , I realize I had already been following all those self help quarantine books I have been reading. That I started following them four years ago when I made that uncomfortable goal, when I surrounded myself with people who would help me achieve it and I stuck to my four/five year plan. Go ME. Happy Dance. But I was wrong on the front that it was just a leap for me, that it was a goal that would only benefit myself. I see now all the steps this one phone call has led me too and will continue too. 20 second graders reaped the benefits this year from my four years of school, and 20 more will the next year. So even though, I don’t have the overflowing goblet glass, even though no one is saying my name as I walk across the stage, even though I am not getting that selfie with my friends and my family, it still feels all the things it should, and more importantly it makes me want to make another phone call.