Alpha and Omega: the beginning and an end

I start my student teaching tomorrow at Vista High School.  I have no idea what class I will be placed in, and until ten hours ago, I thought I was going to be at Orange Glen High School.  I had helped the English department at OGHS set up their classrooms as I became acquainted with the school, its goals, and its values.  The sudden change was disappointing, but I started getting excited after I received a welcoming e-mail from the on-site liaison for VHS.  I realized, at that moment, that I’m blessed beyond all measure.

This summer I ran a tennis program, taught swim, and met the most amazing coworkers.  Summer ended and I had to leave the town I’d lived in for seven years while I completed my Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees.  I left behind friends, sorority sisters, a fraternity I am Sweetheart for, a job I was obsessed with, and a church I had come to call my home.  I hate goodbyes and I wish I never had to say them.  I overuse this quote, but Jack Kerouac said it best:

“What is the feeling when you’re driving away from people, and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? -it’s the too huge world vaulting us, and it’s good-bye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies.”

I feel empty without the familiar faces and places, but I’m leaning forward.

When I walk onto VHS’s campus tomorrow, I know I am going to fall in love with those students. When the semester ends and I move to a different school, I know I will be back to this empty feeling.  But this is my joy—to positively affect as many students as possible.  The purpose of education is to lean forward against adversity, challenges, and preconceived notions to recognize the brilliance each student has within.  As an educator, it is my responsibility to never stop leaning, learning, and networking to give all students a chance to succeed.  We’re in this together, my students and me, and we’re leaning because school and the future is a crazy adventure.  I can’t wait to meet my students tomorrow.

Since it was their last day of morning tennis, they had a water fight complete with squirt guns and water balloons.  I love summer.