Maybe to those who love is given sight.
(“After the Rain” Bruce Cockburn)
(“After the Rain” Bruce Cockburn)
This pseudo-hippie retro phase that we seem to be in is beginning to get to me! Every time I turn around I run into some image of my childhood, nostalgically updated and sanitized by the advertising industry for consumers in the new millennium. It makes me feel like I’m looking at pictures from a bad vacation.
The other day, I was passing through the living room and a commercial on T.V. caught my eye: there was a little girl standing in a sun shower, her long straight hair was flowing like a waterfall down her back as she looked up to the sky, catching raindrops in her open mouth. Her arms stretched out from her sides as she twirled. The loose fitting, cotton print dress that she wore was splayed – like a Christmas bell, with scrawny legs and bare feet where the clapper should be.
She was the picture of abandon. Her image made you think of the pure, carefree days of childhood that this particular brand of laundry detergent was supposed to bring
to her and her family. If the ad designers had put some mud stains on the face and dress, a few knots in the hair and beads around her neck, that little girl could have been me, as a child.
But far from invoking a feeling of youthful abandon, the image brought back a sense of watchfulness, almost panic. I wanted to tell her to stop twirling, that she would get dizzy and fall. I wanted to warn her how hard it is to regain your balance when you let go. I wanted to understand why I had to swallow so hard to keep back the tears.
I seem to be doing that a lot these days, fighting back tears…
Yesterday at school, a little boy named Shawn, with his crayons and paper – as precisely as if he were a surgeon – took my heart and squeezed with such force that I cried.
I was working at the library table with a group of four boys from the early grades who have problems with their alphabet/reading skills. I was beside Shawn, helping Tyler with his block letters. Shawn was being wiggly – perhaps “agitated” would be the more adult word.
“Miss, what can I do, Miss?” he whined repeatedly, in an amazing sequence of tones.
In my most deliberate teacher way of modeling behaviour for my students, I said: “Excuse me, Tyler, but I must help Shawn with his work for a moment.” I shifted in my seat, looked directly at Shawn and asked him what he needed.
“What can I do Miss?” he repeated, in case I hadn’t heard him the first thirty times. I patted his unfinished worksheets with their large traceable letters, I pointed to the wooden block letters and the felt shapes on the table in front of him.
“I’ve done all those Miss, what can I do now?” he said, scratching his patchy hair and playing with a small tear on the thigh of his jeans. I slid the container of crayons closer to him and said: “How would you like to draw a picture for me, Shawn.” (The teacher’s fall back: “Draw me a picture.”)
“What do you want me to draw, Miss?” he asked, lifting a dirty sneaker to rest on the chair.
“Let’s see,” I said. “You could draw a picture of an animal. Do you have a pet?”
“Yes Miss, she’s called Misty.”
“Good,” I said, thankful to have found a focus for him so quickly. “You draw a picture of Misty for me. I’m going to help Tyler a bit, then you can tell me all about your picture.”
He chose a crayon slowly - more slowly than Shawn does most things. I worked with Tyler, checked on the other two boys and came back around the knee-high table to where Shawn was sitting, quietly adding detail to his picture. As I knelt down to observe his work, he stopped drawing. He didn’t look at me with his usual eager eyes.
“Tell me about your picture, Shawn. Is this a picture of Misty?”
Shawn’s fine motor skills aren’t very good, but I truly couldn’t make out what his picture was supposed to be. There were lines, black, brown, and tan in an oval shape in the bottom left corner, and an outlined square with a stick at the bottom that reminded me of a protester’s placard in the opposite corner of the page.
“That’s Misty,” Shawn said, touching the oval shape on the paper. “She’s my cat.” I pointed to the square and the stick on the page and asked Shawn what it was.
“That’s the shovel my daddy used to hit Misty,” he said without looking up from the paper. “He stepped on her paw and she scratched him so he said that that was the last time that bitch cat was going to scratch him - so he got the shovel and hit her with it in the backyard ‘til she stopped moving.”
My breath was gone as if the shovel blow had been delivered to my mid-section, pushing out all the air and not letting any back in. I felt my eyes burning only a second before I felt the wetness on my cheeks. I couldn’t believe that I was crying in front of the kids.
Not one to miss a teachable moment, I quickly wiped the tears and said: “Shawn, that’s a very sad story. You must miss Misty.”
He looked at the drawing as if he were looking at Misty herself then said: “Not yet, Daddy hit her last night…I didn’t notice that she wasn’t on my bed this morning.” His voice became smaller, softer as he admitted his guilt: he had not been aware enough of her presence to notice her absence right away.
Two things about this incident surprised me. The first was how close the tears were to the surface, overflowing before I even knew that they were there. It’s been happening to me so often lately. I’ll cry for no reason at all: watching a stupid movie, or hearing an old piece of music that doesn’t even bring up particularly sad memories. It just seems like everything is making me cry.
The second thing that I realized was how long it takes children to process the reality of a loss. Shawn still had a pet cat. She belonged to him and she was called Misty. At some level, this reality was still true for him despite the fact that the shovel that killed her – in front of his five-year old eyes – and had scooped her up and dumped her in a green plastic garbage bag before she began to smell, was probably still standing beside the back door of his house.
Why am I crying so much lately?
The other day, I was passing through the living room and a commercial on T.V. caught my eye: there was a little girl standing in a sun shower, her long straight hair was flowing like a waterfall down her back as she looked up to the sky, catching raindrops in her open mouth. Her arms stretched out from her sides as she twirled. The loose fitting, cotton print dress that she wore was splayed – like a Christmas bell, with scrawny legs and bare feet where the clapper should be.
She was the picture of abandon. Her image made you think of the pure, carefree days of childhood that this particular brand of laundry detergent was supposed to bring
to her and her family. If the ad designers had put some mud stains on the face and dress, a few knots in the hair and beads around her neck, that little girl could have been me, as a child.
But far from invoking a feeling of youthful abandon, the image brought back a sense of watchfulness, almost panic. I wanted to tell her to stop twirling, that she would get dizzy and fall. I wanted to warn her how hard it is to regain your balance when you let go. I wanted to understand why I had to swallow so hard to keep back the tears.
I seem to be doing that a lot these days, fighting back tears…
Yesterday at school, a little boy named Shawn, with his crayons and paper – as precisely as if he were a surgeon – took my heart and squeezed with such force that I cried.
I was working at the library table with a group of four boys from the early grades who have problems with their alphabet/reading skills. I was beside Shawn, helping Tyler with his block letters. Shawn was being wiggly – perhaps “agitated” would be the more adult word.
“Miss, what can I do, Miss?” he whined repeatedly, in an amazing sequence of tones.
In my most deliberate teacher way of modeling behaviour for my students, I said: “Excuse me, Tyler, but I must help Shawn with his work for a moment.” I shifted in my seat, looked directly at Shawn and asked him what he needed.
“What can I do Miss?” he repeated, in case I hadn’t heard him the first thirty times. I patted his unfinished worksheets with their large traceable letters, I pointed to the wooden block letters and the felt shapes on the table in front of him.
“I’ve done all those Miss, what can I do now?” he said, scratching his patchy hair and playing with a small tear on the thigh of his jeans. I slid the container of crayons closer to him and said: “How would you like to draw a picture for me, Shawn.” (The teacher’s fall back: “Draw me a picture.”)
“What do you want me to draw, Miss?” he asked, lifting a dirty sneaker to rest on the chair.
“Let’s see,” I said. “You could draw a picture of an animal. Do you have a pet?”
“Yes Miss, she’s called Misty.”
“Good,” I said, thankful to have found a focus for him so quickly. “You draw a picture of Misty for me. I’m going to help Tyler a bit, then you can tell me all about your picture.”
He chose a crayon slowly - more slowly than Shawn does most things. I worked with Tyler, checked on the other two boys and came back around the knee-high table to where Shawn was sitting, quietly adding detail to his picture. As I knelt down to observe his work, he stopped drawing. He didn’t look at me with his usual eager eyes.
“Tell me about your picture, Shawn. Is this a picture of Misty?”
Shawn’s fine motor skills aren’t very good, but I truly couldn’t make out what his picture was supposed to be. There were lines, black, brown, and tan in an oval shape in the bottom left corner, and an outlined square with a stick at the bottom that reminded me of a protester’s placard in the opposite corner of the page.
“That’s Misty,” Shawn said, touching the oval shape on the paper. “She’s my cat.” I pointed to the square and the stick on the page and asked Shawn what it was.
“That’s the shovel my daddy used to hit Misty,” he said without looking up from the paper. “He stepped on her paw and she scratched him so he said that that was the last time that bitch cat was going to scratch him - so he got the shovel and hit her with it in the backyard ‘til she stopped moving.”
My breath was gone as if the shovel blow had been delivered to my mid-section, pushing out all the air and not letting any back in. I felt my eyes burning only a second before I felt the wetness on my cheeks. I couldn’t believe that I was crying in front of the kids.
Not one to miss a teachable moment, I quickly wiped the tears and said: “Shawn, that’s a very sad story. You must miss Misty.”
He looked at the drawing as if he were looking at Misty herself then said: “Not yet, Daddy hit her last night…I didn’t notice that she wasn’t on my bed this morning.” His voice became smaller, softer as he admitted his guilt: he had not been aware enough of her presence to notice her absence right away.
Two things about this incident surprised me. The first was how close the tears were to the surface, overflowing before I even knew that they were there. It’s been happening to me so often lately. I’ll cry for no reason at all: watching a stupid movie, or hearing an old piece of music that doesn’t even bring up particularly sad memories. It just seems like everything is making me cry.
The second thing that I realized was how long it takes children to process the reality of a loss. Shawn still had a pet cat. She belonged to him and she was called Misty. At some level, this reality was still true for him despite the fact that the shovel that killed her – in front of his five-year old eyes – and had scooped her up and dumped her in a green plastic garbage bag before she began to smell, was probably still standing beside the back door of his house.
Why am I crying so much lately?
Copyright 2003
