life lesson

The video screen is dwarfed by the space, hard to see, but I'm not watching it anymore, anyway. My eyes are scanning the crowd. I spot my newest arrival, regret for a moment she has no neighbor to translate but am ultimately glad her friend's attention won't be divided. It's realistic rather than cold--isn't it?--to think that she's accustomed to floating on a sea of language. Rows North is Josh. Alone? Maybe. Probably. Attentive, it seems, but I want to rush the stage, tug the sleeve of the presenter. Slow down, please. It would make such a difference.

Everyone else is lost in the dim light. I'll have to catch up with them later, when all the explaining begins. What must they make of all these newsreels, video. 911 calls. This pretty girl. At nearly nine years ago, Columbine is not a first-hand memory to many currently in high school, but it's modern enough that the entire student body is rapt with attention. We're killing them, this week, with all the ways they could die. I very much wonder what our new transplants must think of the American phenomenon of shootings in schools.

Mostly, it seems, they're calculating their odds. Does this happen often? Where? When? Why? How? Easy to ask, not so much to answer. And oh, by the way, have I explained how the lock-down drill works? They must wonder what they've gotten themselvs into, especially given that the more subtle points of the assembly, the main purposes, are harder to catch; abstract language comes after concrete.

My old-timers do get it, back in the gym, during the come-to-Jesus moment. "Close your eyes and think of the people who mean the most to you," instructs the presenter. "And sometime in the next three days tell them what they mean." Just in case, he says, in so many words, you don't make it home alive.

As the assembly ends and the students spill out, one of my original students strides through my door, calling to me as she does:

"Ms. P, I love you, and if I ever did wrong, I'm sorry." It's like church camp after the sermon. "Did you know I never tell my parents I love them?"

"I wouldn't have guessed that," I reply, as I return her declaration and watch her pass out hugs. I do love these kids, all these years later, knowing them so well, and thus I wonder if her fervor will last until she gets home.

Behind me, someone in the doorway hears an opportunity. As I turn, I see it in his eyes.

"Ms. P."

"Yes," I say, with a whole different tone.

"I love you."

"Go to class, Maxi." Some things may change today, but other things? Never.