I’m on the cusp of retirement.
After 31 years of teaching, I’m finally graduating to sleeping in and hanging out all day with my hubby.
I’ve spent the last week shredding all evidence of this long career, and I’m not going to lie, it’s a little weird. Why I’ve kept so much paper is probably a holdover from the years before digital storage, but it occurs to me that I’m going to have to do some heavy deleting on my laptop, too. Sigh.
I opened file after file looking for names and I.D. numbers that had to be destroyed, and I had a lingering feeling of loss, even a little bit of regret. Each batch of papers that went into the shred bin threatened to destroy memories, too. It was like I was erasing a whole generation of students.
But that’s not the case. I have a lifetime of memories — and they pop up every once in a while as stories. Mostly unbelievable vignettes of students who made me laugh, some who made me cry, and others who…astounded me in both positive and negative ways.
I pray I did right by them. That I taught those who needed to learn. That I loved those who needed love. That I corrected those who needed correction.
That I saw in each and every student a child of God entrusted to me for a brief season of influence.
I know I failed often. I’m confident I succeeded most of the time. I know this because they did right by me. I learned from them when I least expected it. I was showered in love when I most needed encouragement. I made mistakes and they showed me mercy.
I’m a better person for hanging in longer than I ever expected, and richer than the lousy pension promised.
You will find a new way to enjoy life and can be content knowing you’ve made a difference in a lot of children’s lives.
I felt the same when I retired and it took me a long time to get rid of those paper memories. In fact I know DH despairs that I still have notebooks with some memories intact I don’t think I could ever shred them. I still run into parents or their now adult children who remember me even when their faces mean nothing to me. Children change so much between the ages of 7 to 20
I teach adults in a small college, so that’s less of a challenge in recognizing them, but my time with the students is so brief I practically immediately forget names.
As a teacher yourself, you know I’ll remember a lot of the stories only other teachers know to be true. Doesn’t every teacher threaten, at least once in their career, to write a tell-all?
Enjoy your retirement knowing you did the best you could by each individual student. I am sure you can find other meaningful ways to devote your new free time that will enhance your life as well as the lives of everyone around you. How can you do otherwise. It is in the blood of all good teachers.
Thanks! I feel like I will, indeed, be doing some interesting things.
Very sweet, Maria! I went through this 5 years ago, but now it seems like 20. Except at least 5x a week I have teacher dreams. Watch for those.
To quote someone whose name I can’t recall at the moment: “A teacher touches eternity.” Happy Retirement!