It wasn’t a question I anticipated. In truth, I don’t suppose that I’d ever really hear it. The emphasis being on the word “I”. I never thought that I, Kelly, would ever hear this question. Not because it’s a stupid question and yes, there are stupid questions. There are also ignorant questions. There are ridiculous questions. This one topped all three of those.

In the context of someone actually asking the question it must also be said that there really was no context. There was no reason for someone to ask this question because it wasn’t relevant to what we were discussing at the time. We meet, as teams, each week to discuss teaching and learning and part of the reason I’m there is to frame the learning for teachers. When I work with educators outside of my building it is sometimes in the role of consultant. For lack of a better term I guess I would say that I facilitate meetings. Each week I work with the Teaching and Learning team to determine the professional development for teachers so that we can stay abreast of scientifically-based research practices, introduce them to the teachers by providing examples and defining the expectations, and help their own learning to become skillful and proficient in teaching.

This question came out of nowhere.

Speaking to the group as a whole this teacher walked in our meeting and asked this seemingly arbitrary inquiry.

“What are we gonna do with all these pregnant girls?”

She sounded exasperated when she asked it, like she’d been irritated by it. Like she was weary of these pregnant girls. As if we’d had a rash of girls who had just come forward en masse to exclaim that they were pregnant.

When she asked it she was looking directly at me. AT ME. As if, because of my title or position, I was to answer this question for the entire group of teachers sitting together because I was leading the group and could offer some insight as to what we would “do” with all these pregnant girls.

“Other than, um, educate them with the free public education we offer?” I asked her.

“Well, there are just so many it seems. They can’t fit in my desks and…” she sighed and her voice trailed off as if I didn’t give her the answer she wanted. All the while she is talking I can feel my veins exploding and a twitch forming in the left side of my body and then I lost control of my bowels and my head just popped right off my shoulders and rolled onto the floor while my brain silently and slowed screamed, “WHAT. THE. HELL?”

Perhaps it wasn’t really the word “hell”, but you get my drift. It cut me off at the knees, this question. It struck right at my heart and the aim was true. Instantly, I was 15 years old and I got a glimpse of what teachers, when behind closed doors from students, said about me.

Oddly enough, I have the answer. I mean, I suppose I already gave it to her, but she didn’t like how I responded.

I know exactly what to “do” with these pregnant girls. How about we teach them? How about we educate them so well that we encourage them to go off to college with their babies? What about encouraging them to be responsible parents that can work and be productive citizens that contribute to society? Then, we could embolden and stimulate their knowledge and get them to further their education by getting a Master’s degree in education. Would that work? Is that okay with you? Because if they do really well and work hard at that then maybe, just maybe, they could work their way up and find themselves leading YOUR professional development.

That’s definitely the right answer.

There’s not much that stumps me in my job and I’ve embraced humility enough to know that I don’t always know the answers to the complicated messes that introduce themselves to me like a stranger at the grocery store. “Oh, hello. I’m the awkward beef cow tongue sitting in plastic wrap in the frozen meat section. What would you like to do to me?”

You know, that sounded way less disgustingly lurid and suggestive  in my head when I started writing this.

But there is something that comes up increasingly more often than I thought it would. Some students are comfortable enough with their homosexuality to talk to me about it. It’s usually in passing as we’re discussing other things or sometimes when they tell me who they’re bringing to the Prom or just about dating someone of the same sex as a general topic of conversation. But what I am never clear on is how much their parents know or what I am allowed to say to their families. Sometimes, I know about their sexuality before their parents and other times it’s as comfortable a subject matter as their algebra test scores or their AP History class.

When I’m unsure of is how to mention it to parents (if necessary). What do I say? How to I talk about it? What if they ask me about it?

What are your thoughts on this?

It was a whirlwind day and yet it was entirely typical of what happens at our high school. In most high schools, probably. I just thought it was worthwhile to put this day down as an official mark that this is what regularly happens.

First thing in the morning my secretary called me on the radio to tell me that I had a visitor. This could be anybody. Former students, current students, teachers in other buildings who are visiting and wanted to drop by to say hello. It was Janelle. Janelle graduated early this year so I never get to see her (or her growing belly) (which has completely shrunk, that little stinker). She brought her month old daughter and wanted to show me that she had all ten fingers and all ten toes. Of course, I said, “You know I’m going to hold her, right? And smell her? And kiss her? And then I’ll steal her.” She laughed and looked at me sideways. I’m always joking with her. She never takes me seriously but man, did I want to put that sweet baby in my purse and take her home.

While Janelle was there, Dakota walked in. He’s been gone from high school for almost two years now and when he left he was carrying around an extra 60 pounds, but he went into a military program, shaped up, got a job, and also has a new baby. When he left us he was a mess. He’s getting it all together now. He knows I’m proud of him so he keeps coming back for reinforcement. I’ll give it freely.

As I’m walking out of the office after visiting with them both I see Annie. She’s been my office assistant in the past and I never get to see her anymore. “What are you doing in here?” I ask. She tells me that she got kicked out of class for no reason. It’s always NO REASON to hear the students tell it. “There’s more to that story,” I say. “No, there’s not. She kicked me out for saying ‘crap’ so here I am.” This doesn’t sound like it’s going to end well and I can see that I will probably work for at least 20 minutes to get the full story out of her. “Come on, Annie. Just saying ‘crap’ doesn’t get you kicked out of class.”

I put my hands on my hips, look at my watch to indicate that I don’t have time for all this, and she caves.

“All I said was that this class was crap and she told me not to say that word and I’m like, what! It’s not a bad word! And she’s all, oh yeah it is, and I’m like fine, then crap crap crap crap crap.”

I turned on my heel and walked out of the office, sighing loudly to voice my displeasure at her silliness.

In the hallway, Drew stops me to ask if we can have a Jedi Day at school. “What for? What’s the purpose?” Drew tells me there’s no reason. He just likes Jedis. Drew is the best kind of student. He’s funny and always joking. I can’t imagine where he’s going with this. He says he wants to use Jedi moves on the teachers, too. “This is not the grade you’ll give me,” he joked. “See how awesome this could be? LET’S DO IT.”

I turn on my heels again and keep walking down the hallway, but I’m chuckling at him.

By lunchtime, I’ve written four letters of recommendations, visited six classrooms, dropped off an evaluation to a teacher, and loaned money to a student. I’ve also been roped into buying raffle tickets for some sporting events and one chicken dinner. This is why I’m always broke. While I’m in the lunchroom, I see a girl that I’d noticed earlier in the day and I wanted to tell her how much I liked her outfit. She has on green earrings. As I’m wandering around the cafeteria monitoring students I see her and saunter over to her lunch table. Her friends see me approach and get that nervous AN ADULT IS COMING THIS WAY look so I quicken my step and see that she’s texting on her cell phone (a no-no) so I smile wickedly and say, “Well, I was going to come over here and give you a compliment, but not now. Nu uhhh. Nooooo way.”

“Nooooooooooo. Please? Give me the compliment. What were you going to say? Please?”

“I was GOING to say that you’re just the perfect student and you do everything right, but not now.”

“Come ON. Tell me tell me tell me.”

I determine that she needs a compliment. I give it to her. Then she tells me she won’t be on her phone ever again. I ask what grades she’s getting in class. She says, “Oh, you must already know about that C- I’m getting in Chemistry. I’m working on it. I promise. It’ll be a B before the end of this quarter.”

After lunch I watch the coordinator of a Teen Parenting group walking upstairs with three girls. One of them, Elyse, has come to my attention recently because she’s normally a hall wanderer but I have taken an interest in her now that I notice her growing belly. Her records state that she’s missed upwards of 50 days of school this year but she’s managed to pass 4 out of her 7 classes. How does that happen? I shake my head at trying to come up with an answer to it.

Elyse and I connected last week when I casually asked her why she’s still here in high school because she doesn’t appear to want to be in school. Most of the time the profile for students like her (not the pregnant ones, just the apathetic ones) end up in an alternative program. Defiantly, she tells me that she is NOT an alternative kid.

“I don’t need to be frisked every morning before school. I just can’t seem to want to get to class.”

It broke my heart when she said that, so I confided in her that I was really pulling for her and would do what I could to get her the help she needed. There’s no way she can trust me enough yet, but the interest is there. The seed is planted. I’ll water it when I can.

Elyse and two other girls (the other girls are already parents, but are no longer pregnant) need to get passes back to class and since I’m heading in the direction of my office I offer to take them, get their passes, and send them on their merry ways. As I’m writing passes for them I say, “Boy, I wish I had this kind of program in high school where I was encouraged and taught to be a mom. Know what my counselor said to me?”

“What?” they all ask in unison.

“She told me I should probably go to cosmetology school since I made a “mistake” and would need to get a job and wouldn’t amount to anything.”

They all gasp. One of them pouted and cocked her head to the side. “Awwww,” she says. “That wasn’t nice.”

“I know. It’s ok. Guess how old my Mistake is now?”

“How old?” they all ask loudly. By this time, they’re excited by this conversation. I’ve got them hooked. They want to know how it all turns out, like watching the beginning part of a movie and wondering what the end brought.

“23, almost 24. And guess what else? I went to college WITH my kid and then when she grew up she went to college. Don’t lose sight of what you want, ladies. You can have it, but you have to work for it.”

I’m finishing up the passes that I’m writing for them and they’re desperately searching all the photos on my desk and the degrees and certificates I have plastered on the walls. That’s purposeful because students think that we’re all just magically here at work in education as if we didn’t do anything to get here. Whenever I’ve mentioned teaching English in the past they exclaim, “You used to TEACH?”

All my time could be spent talking to students and checking in with them and being there for them on an intermittent basis. It’s not all I do, but these stories can’t really be told by anyone who isn’t here to connect with them. These things don’t exhaust me all the time and I was, in fact, energized by my interactions with students. They might come back someday and bring their babies to me and show me their degrees and tell me what kinds of things they’re doing. They might go off and I’ll never see them again. There’s a lot of uncertainty in the waiting and a lot of hope, too. I don’t know the answers to what they’re dealing with now nor will I be able to fix anything. It is what it is and in the meantime, we all work, never knowing the outcome.

Crap crap crap crap crap.

Just when I think I can wrap my brain around the understanding that divorce is, in fact, here to stay then I get a call that it’s happening to someone else I know.

Do you have any advice?

No. I’m not expert at this. I barely get it myself. I just waded through some dark waters not long ago.

Hell. I’m still wading. Sometimes I’m flailing my arms about and trying to get this down so it doesn’t gnaw at me, but it comes, like a labor pain, in waves. There is an ebb and a flow. At times you’re coming down off the tongue-biting pain and other times it’s on the rise again and you hold your breath for a second to wait for the pain. I’ve watched friends like Jess and Jenn write their way through it and I’m far more comfortable reading about their experiences because they’re truer than anything else I’ve read. All that stuff is trite and, ultimately, not very helpful. I’ve tried to read it and all I want to do is make it stop.

If a spell could be cast in order to make it all stop I would have searched for a voodoo lady long ago.

When it comes in a giant wave it happens at an inopportune time.

Do I have any advice?

No. Not really.

This is my nephew Kenny. Yesterday was his birthday. This picture is two years old, but it’s my favorite picture of him.

He gave me my one and only Valentine’s card this year. He used to steal my laptop from me when I visited his mom (my sister) and then he would write lovely, long letters to me. He can play chess, football, and still kick your ass at being warm and loving and he has the best laugh. Ever. In the History of Man. He’s so smart that it hurts my head to think about it.

He is made completely of awesome.