One of the things I want to do this Lent is to focus on learning to forgive people from my past and to pray for them. I was thinking of this as a way towards healing and practice in humility.
So I wrote out a list of people and one of the first to pop into my mind was my kindergarten teacher! I shared this with a friend of mine who I think was kind of surprised that I even remembered kindergarten! But as I mentioned before, I’m wired that way.
Mrs. Foster was her name. She was a slight woman, and I’m guessing probably in her late 50s or early 60s when I came into her classroom. She didn’t weigh more than 115 pounds, or at least that’s how my mind’s eye sees her.
And I think overall she did a good job. I learned how to stand in line and wait for my turn in her class. I learned to sit down and follow directions. And she taught us the alphabet and how to count. She also let me recount the movie Mary Poppins for my classmates and I remember that they laughed when I told them the funny parts. That was my first foray into public speaking. She also made sure that when the fire department came on the last day of school, everyone sang happy birthday to me! That was thrilling.
But I also remember that we had “under paper” that we were supposed to put under our regular drawing paper. There was a slight color difference between the two sheets, like beige and eggshell. It’s hard enough to discern that as an adult, but we were supposed to do it at 5, which most of the time I could. But one day we were drawing pictures of little chickens and I did mine on the under paper instead of the regular paper. I also made the mistake of drawing it in portrait instead of landscape mode. My little mind was so intent on drawing the chicken that the other stuff just didn’t matter to me in the moment.
It mattered to Mrs. Foster though. When she walked by my table and saw my work she screamed, “Elena, what are you doing!” I froze.
“It’s not on the right paper and you even have it turned wrong! Well, there’s not enough time to re-do it. It’ll have to go on the board this way but everyone will see that you did it wrong.”
I was mortified.
That week at the Parent/Teacher night, I tried to steer my mom away from the bulletin board and my drawing disaster. I’m pretty sure she saw it. I don’t think it registered that mine was wrong. I don’t think it mattered that much to her in the broad scheme of things.
All these decades later here’s what I get from that experience.
- When we say something in anger or frustration at little kids, it can hurt them deeply. It can be about something that we don’t even see as a big deal. But it’s a big deal to them. I hope that I never hurt a child with my words, but I probably have. If I did, I’m sorry.
- Older people have a lot on their minds. I didn’t get that as a 5-year-old. Maybe Mrs. Foster didn’t feel good. Maybe she was having problems at home. Maybe she was going through menopause. Who knows? But I look back and think it couldn’t have possibly been my drawing that ticked her off so much. Yelling at me was the symptom of something bigger.
- Maybe from that, I learned to be more careful, to check and double-check directions. That’s an important lesson learned.
- Maybe most importantly I learned some perspective. It’s not the end of the world if your duck drawing is vertical or horizontal. And years later does it matter what paper it was on? That was the worst thing that happened to me that year and considering things that happened years later, I was truly blessed and didn’t realize it. And for that, I am really sorry for being so blind and unappreciative.
- Just thinking back on it all reminded me of a lot more good than bad things too. Maybe Mrs. Foster in the next life can forgive me for not being grateful enough for all of the great things I learned that year and the opportunities she gave me. So Mrs. Foster, I’m sorry!
So how are your Lenten introspections going?