I ran into one of my students at Target this afternoon. We had that little moment when our eyes met across the checkout lanes, and then his face broke into a gap-toothed grin and he tugged at his mom's sleeve and said, "Mom! It's Mrs. Mayhew!" He was so excited to see me, and I was so touched that it took me a second to realize that I was excited to see him, too, and that I was smiling just as widely. I abandoned my place in line so I could go talk to him and ask about his summer and give him a hug - he and his mom proudly reported that he was reading every day and getting ready for third grade. We chatted for a minute more, and then wished each other happy-rest-of-the-summers and went our separate ways. (I was buying dishwasher detergent and REALLY needed to get it home - but I digress...)

I believe that everything happens for a reason - and I don't think it was a coincidence that I saw Christopher and his mom today, because I needed to see Christopher and his mom today...to solidify and bring home to me some of the premises of The Queen of Education.

That little boy came to me in the fall very clearly in need of substantial reading support - but energetic, optimistic, and one of the hardest-working guys I'd ever had the pleasure to teach. He never missed a beat, and never missed a day, and he made a LOT of progress in the first few weeks. Then at parents' night I met his mom in person for the first time, and she started thanking his classroom teacher and me for our work with him and telling us how much he loved school. We didn't really think anything of it - we were both in agreement that he was a sweet and compassionate little boy who was really working to make a success of second grade. Then his mom started to get teary-eyed, telling us that he had such a difficult time in first grade (different building) - his previous teacher's consistent message had been that he was 1. "so far behind" and 2. he was a discipline problem (!) - and he had hated school and never wanted to go. His classroom teacher and I both had to scrape our jaws off the table - whoa! - we had had no idea, and never would have if his mom hadn't shared that with us. Talk about the magic of a "clean slate!"

Add to all that that his mother had a serious medical condition that required her to be hospitalized for long stretches of time multiple times throughout the school year...we could always guess from Chris's demeanor when she was in the hospital and when she was coming home - it was like night and day in terms of his attention/distractibility and his ability to complete tasks, as well as his interactions with other kids. I think now of the days he walked into my class with that frown on his face, eyebrows drawn together, unable to follow the most consistent of routines...sometimes it caught me off guard, and it would take a few minutes before it clicked - there's a reason for this child's behavior! I wish I could say that I was patient all the time and realized the reason before I reacted to the behavior - but I wasn't. Sometimes the best I could do was to backtrack, pick up the pieces, get him alone for a few quiet minutes so he could talk about it, and move on. God bless Chris - he never lost patience with me and he always bounced back, even when I felt like the most dismal of failures for not seeing his need soon enough. I hope, I hope I learned well enough from him that there is always a reason, and to be the kind of teacher who looks for it carefully and ceaselessly in all my students...

In the end, it was all OK - better than OK, really, for both of us. I was so glad to see him today...truly, genuinely, unselfconsciously glad...and when we had gone our separate ways, I had this last, enduring thought: I hope that next November, or February, or whenever, when we're both inundated with schoolwork and used to seeing each other every day, that we will both (along with all the other students who pass through my doorway) still have those moments of true, genuine, unselfconscious gladness to see each other and that sense that in the big picture, all is right and safe with the world.