Saying goodbye...

The first time that I said goobye to a child, I cried.
I tried not too.
The mom looked at me funny when I asked her to please call me and let me know how he is doing. She snorted as they left.

His name was Ryan. And he was was 2. He wore the most awesome shark shoes ever and his feet were adorable.
I have never seen feet that cute to this day.
He had a laugh that was infectious and he is now 8 years old.

As he walked away, looking over his shoulder at me with tears in his eyes, I knew that I had a problem in this field.

My Kindercare co-teacher at the time was horrible. She was a fucking bitch.  I felt like I had to constantly save the children from her. And for the first entire month in there, I had laryngitis. SO I could only whisper.

My first day in that class I watched her tear Ryan's blanket out of his hands.
He screamed and fell to the floor.
His heart was broken. He wanted his mommy and then the bitch took his blanket. How sad.

"Stop it. Go sit down, you are fine." she said to him and walked away.

I walked up to his cubby, grabbed the blanket and gave it back to him, smiling at her the whole time.

"What are you doing??!!" She yelled. "They want to carry those around and they get dirty! THIS IS A BUSINESS!  IM GOING TO GET IN TROUBLE!"

Ryan had grabbed his blanket, stuck his fingers in his mouth and placed his head against my leg. squeezing it as she yelled.

I walked up to her and had to whisper "This is not a business. This is a baby. Do not yell in this classroom again."

She laughed. "This is my class."

I whispered back "This is their class."

I knelt down to Ryan. "When you are done with your blanket. Will you put it away in your cubby so boogers don't get on it?"

He nodded. Released my leg and sat down for snack.

5 minutes later he brought me his blanket. "Okay Beanie, I am done." he whispered.

After that, the teacher would not help me with anything or speak to me in anyway. Which was fine. She sat there in the corner on her cell phone and I took charge.

Soon enough that bitch got fired.

Then Ryan left. I cried and told myself It was only because it was my first child.

Nope.

An older teacher once told me "You have to get that under control Beanie. It is the name of the game here. We teach, they leave. It always happens. You cant let yourself love them like that."

6 years later finds me in the same predicament only on a larger scale.

How can I spend every single day with a child and not love them? How can I hold them when they cry, help them when they cannot write and not love them?

How can I ask them to trust me and open up their hearts to me, without doing the same in return?

I cannot.

When I look at my sea of children that are sitting at my feet in circle time I do not see a class. I see individual children who have grown in individual ways. I see a child who could not even sit in class, folding his legs and sitting "proper" I see a boy who could not keep his hands to himself telling another one "I do not like that. No thank you!" and moving away.

Every day, over and over it happens.

"Ms.Beanie! That is an exclamation mark!"

"Ms. Beanie! I found 25cents. Its a quarter so that's 25 cents. Do you want it or can I take it home just this once?"

I see children that I have helped empower, teach and laugh waiting with baited breath to unveil their magical qualities to the world.

I am proud of them.
I love them.
They have become mine.

Every year, I also have children that do not want to leave my class.
"Can you talk UP kindergarten?" Parents ask

I always say yes.
I always do.
I talk about what amazing teachers they are, and of course I personally KNOW all of them. They are my friends who cannot wait to see them!

Yes. I lie. But whatever....

As much as I am going to miss my babies. My job has a purpose. It is to ready the lucky students of Buhach for kindergarten.

And they have to go. So Id rather they do it confidently then sad.

And there Is only one child who has seen through my facade.
One child, who no matter what I have said, promised or coerced...manages to yell "NO!" at every discussion of Kindergarten.


On Thursday, before graduation, I was stressed to the max.

The slideshow that I had made for the parents had disappeared from the computer and I knew that what I needed was a squeezie.

(A squeezie, incase you do not know, is a hug with your whole heart.)

I walked into my classroom at naptime, and promptly lay down beside Mason. He smiled and lay his head right over my heart. "Are you freaking out?" he said.

"yep."

"You know that my birthday is not for a long time away...almost Halloween." His eyes had that far off look, like his mind had skipped ahead over all of the months, peeked into October, and to him that seemed to be forever away.

"I know."

Then he got shy. Which Mason doesn't usually do with me. "I'm going to have a StarWars party, so you will come."

I could have told him that I will go to his party whether it was star wars or not. Instead I said "Cool. I'm totally ganna steal a goodie bag."

"Yeah." He smiled "So why are you freakin out?"

" The movie I was working on disappeared. It's FREAKING me out." I said

"My mom says if things get broken, like my leggos. Then I can build it again and not get mad."

"Yeah. Your mom is wicked smart. So you think I should just build it again?"

"Yeah. My mom says so and she is right a lot."

"Okay. Beijo?"

He kissed my cheek and I stood up.

Four year olds (and their moms) are smart.

They come, They learn, They leave, only now it is better because we have loved each other as well.

And they walk away leaving us both better because of it.