When I graduated high school I was accepted to my state’s university as an accounting major. Yeah, accounting. I had taken an accounting class my senior year of high school, and it seemed like something I could see myself doing, so why not?
I had always babysat and worked lots of camps growing up. I loved kids. They were my happy place. So when a new family in my neighborhood called to ask me to babysit, I was happy to. They came to pick me up, and as I walked to the car to meet the dad his middle school aged son popped out of the other side of the car. He looked at me, smiled a huge grin, and said, “You go home in a car?” I new right away that something wasn’t quite typical. His dad looked at me and said, “I guess I should have mentioned that he has special needs.” I shook my head, said it was fine, and off we went.
I spend the evening with “Josh” and and his 2 siblings. They were all awesome. After that I spent many evening babysitting them, and ended up nannying for the family the rest of the summer. I fell in love with that family, but especially Josh. We went all over town that summer. Played games, swam, movies, Putt-Putt. We did it all. And at the end of the summer as excited as I was to go to college, I knew I would miss my time with them.
I was lucky enough to have a major university in the town I grew up in and ended up attending. I continued to babysit for this family on the weekends. I was weeks into school when I knew I didn’t want to be an accounting major. I changed my major to special education and never looked back.
I love my job. I’m not gonna lie and tell you it’s all magical pony rides, but I love it. It’s my passion. Being around kids and watching them learn and grow feeds my soul. And I worry about them when I’m home. I’m thinking of ways I could help them more. They have no idea of the impact they have made on my life. I wasn’t always the greatest student, and the truth is that makes me a better teacher. I look at each kid as a maze and I want to do all I can to help them get through it. Every kid is different. If a teacher ever tells you they can teach every kid exactly the same they are full of crap. Or lazy. Or both. And the people who learn everything the first time they see it (yeah those people can really suck sometimes) don’t learn important lessons. They don’t always learn how to get past adversity. They don’t always work as hard or know how to be as compassionate. That quirky kid. You know the one. The annoying one that drives the class crazy beacause he can’t hold still and doesn’t know what everyone else is doing. The one that makes jokes to distract from the fact he’s lost. The girl that hides in the corner so you won’t call on her because she had no idea how to work the problem. Those are my kids. Those are the ones I want. The ones I love. Because if you unlock the door for them they will run through it and take over the world. They want to succeed. They just want someone to believe in them. That’s my kid. My passion. It’s as much a part of me as the air I breathe.
Education is a mess. But it’s my mess. I work in a field that is thought of by many as what you do when you can’t do anything else. The pay is crap. The benefits are worse. And I’ll probably do it until I just can’t physically do it any more. I’ve said this a million times, but just because you know how to do math it doesn’t mean you can teach it, and especially not to the kid that needs you to break it down again and again and again. I’ll do it 7,000 different ways until you get it. Stick with me, we’ll figure it out. And don’t worry if you forget it tomorrow. We’ll start over again. I promise.
One chance meeting. What if I couldn’t babysit that night? What if I didn’t nanny for them? I’m a firm believer in being put in the right path. I was put on this path. I made the choice to stay on it, but I don’t doubt for one minute that I was put here because God had a purpose for me. Working with Josh changed the direction of my entire life, and it’s shaped who I am today.
Knowing this may seem like just another detail about me, and it is. But what you don’t see yet is how my passion impacted who I am and the decisions I’ve made throughout my life. Both good and bad, much of me is wrapped up in this.
No comments:
Post a Comment