The 2010 Senior Class of Lake Highlands High School is a special class for me. Among them, like drops of water in the ocean, are a few who were third graders in my first class as an intermediate teacher at Moss Haven Elementary School.
Some, due to life and families, moved on and I have no way of knowing where they are or what has become of their lives. For them I don’t, and possibly never will, know anything about the turns their lives have taken after leaving Mr. A’s class.
However there are a few who, due to younger siblings, church connections, parental friendships and just us staying in touch, I have been able to keep tabs on. If only from afar.
Matthew is one of these special individuals.
Matthew is very smart, internally motivated and just plain fun to be around. His father was in the Corps at Texas A&M and so naturally Matthew’s big post-high school dream (at least in the third and fourth grades) was to follow in his father’s footsteps. A fact which allowed the class and myself to be the recipients of daily reasons/reminders of why A&M is better than UT. (I mean TU…sorry Matthew!)
Matthew made it his mission in life to point out imperfections in my lessons. Since it gave him a chance to pipe up and correct the teacher, he was always carefully listening for any mistake I happen to make. If I looked over and saw his hand in the air and a smirk on his face, I could be fairly positive I had misspoken in some way, shape or form. But I loved it.
I had fun with Matthew in more than one way.
From time to time, I would purposely multiply or divide something incorrectly, or I’d misstate some trivial piece of information, just to see if he would catch the mistake.
Next, I would find some piece of UT paraphernalia and place it dangerously close to his “Texas A&M Zone.” This would usually result in either my losing the UT bauble altogether, or finding it on my desk mutilated a day or two later.
Sometimes I would hide pictures of Bevo, UT’s Longhorn mascot in his textbooks. I would know he had found the picture when I heard the sound of tearing paper accompanied by a tired voice groaning the words, “NOT AGAIN!”
And then there was the time I hung a poster of Bevo on the inside of the window to my office facing the entire class. To the poster, I added a speech bubble and made Bevo say, “I love Matthew!” That one made him cry…perhaps it was a bit over the top. I removed the speech bubble after about six weeks.
Matthew left my class 9 years ago and is about to graduate from high school. He’s in the to ten at his high school. Not the top ten percent mind you, but rather the top ten graduates. A huge accomplishment.
The district is having a luncheon to honor these top ten students, and each student was asked to invite one teacher to sit with them.
Matthew asked me.
He had to have had second thoughts as I stood there staring at him with the puzzled look on my face.
I somehow managed to blurt out, “I’d be honored.” And he gave me a hug.
Later, I burst into tears as I told Melissa.
I only hope I can keep it together at the luncheon.
Matthew, I’ve been teaching for 16 years…and you just made every bad day I’ve ever had all worth it.
Thank you.
