I had another experience of the unicverse balancing itself out today, so I thought I'd share.
Two years ago I received the most hateful letter abdout how horrible I am in the eyes of my students. It was put in my school mailbox by a student (I know who it is, but had no proof to cause trouble for him) on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and it was so shocking, I didn't even know what to do about it. I let my administrator know and nothing really happened, but I left school in a dark mood.
I needed an oil change, so I went to a Jiffy Lube right after school, and while there recieved a phone call from a friend telling me that another friend was just told she had cancer. (She's fine now). And so the dark mood continued until I was called to pay for my car.
A former student was working there, so he called me to the window saying "Miss An-der-sen" and I recognized him, but couldn't remember his name. He found a coupon someone else had used and gave me a discount, and then gave me free windshield wipers. So, that former student renewed my faith in humanity on one of the darkest days I have known.
And it's happened again.
Yesterday was a bad day at school. I had to kick out two people from my honors class, that's how bad it was. Then today I had to kick out one of the two again, since he would not acknowledge his error in calling me profane names yesterday. While he was waiting outside my door, he decided to etch "F U Miss Anderson" (only he spelled it all out and spelled my name wrong, that poor Miss Anderson whom he hates) onto my classroom door. Not the first time that's happened. That doesn't bother me as much as the confrontation with a 15 year old who thinks he is acting like an adult. I laugh at the tagging, especially since it's clear he did it. Silly boys. So then I left school, not it a dark mood, but it weighs you down, you know?
I went to Taco Bell on my way home for the first time in awhile and the boy working at the drive-thru was a former student. Usually this makes me cringe, but he just kept staring at me like he knew me, and then looked at my credit card to see my name and he was like "Miss Andersen, I thought I knew you!" I didn't remember him either, but he said he was in my summer class years ago, which explains to me why I don't remember him, it was only 6 weeks. Then he told me that he still remembers a book I had him read in that class, one of the only books he has ever read and that he loved it. Those are the moments that make it worthwhile and put the universe back in to balance for me.
Oh, and now there are 2 Wendy's and a Taco Bell that I can't go to because former students work there. Blast it all!
