The gospel in your belly

I don’t think I expected every day of teaching to be so tumultuous. It’s a constant game of Chutes and Ladders, and usually, usually I’m winning. When I’m losing, I’m losing hard, and it takes a strong dose of deep breaths and steady footsteps to let the game go, to remember how great this is. And ya’ll this is the time. This is the only time that matters.

During morning recess, if I don’t have recess duty, I usually take some time to relax. Not today, though. Today three of my students came in to prepare a birthday present for the twins in the fifth grade. The fifth graders are so strange. They brought two, small black bricks over to my desk.
“Ms. Davis, will you hide these for us for a while?”

Slowly all of the fifth graders filtered in and out of my classroom, signing the bricks. We ate ice cream fluff, we listened to music, we gave bricks out... a pretty good birthday.

If you would have asked me a year ago if I would be teaching fifth grade (or sixth through eighth grade) this year. My answer would have been no. Absolutely not. In fact, I probably would have told you I wouldn’t have been interested in Magis if it meant I had to teach middle school. I was so stupid. I get a little weepy when I think about it, and the tears come a little spattered at the edge of my eyelids as I work to hold them back. This is a silly thing for tears. But, honestly, I could spend all day, every day with the those squirrely fifth graders.

I couldn’t do this every day if I didn’t love it. I’m not one for working this hard. I like these that come easy for me. I mean, who doesn’t. I like a challenge, but I like that challenge not to get in the way of anything else I might want to do. But this... this is perfect. This is what I want to be doing. And I’m loving every minute of it. Even the minutes I hate, even the minutes that feel like nothing should be this hard, I love. If that makes any sense.