It wasn't that many years ago--no more than five, I swear--that I wondered, honestly, whether I'd ever not get nervous the night before meeting students the very first day of term. The truth is, I'd never slept all that well the night before the first class, and I'd never stepped into a classroom that first day without an XXL case of the jitters.
Last night, honestly, no sweat. Last night, the origin of the sleeplessness I suffered was the near-terminal snuffiness of a 640-acre head cold. Once I went over my notes before ten, I never gave those soon-to-be newly populated classrooms a second thought. This morning is my very last first day.
A ton of first-year images still have a place in my otherwise leaky memory; and the night before my very first day of teaching will never, ever leave. The apartment I rented--an old house trailer--was still occupied and would be until September 1; so I took up residence at an ancient, red brick hotel, the building farthest to the left on the picture, the southwest corner of the town square in Monroe, Wisconsin--second floor, I remember, with a window that looked out over street.
It was August hot, and there was no air--after all, this was Wisconsin. My window--a huge one--was wide open as I remember. No screen. I had my roll sheets in my hand. Must have been dittos because it was 1970, 42 years ago, and nobody at Black Hawk High School or almost anywhere else outside of fancy tech labs had ever heard the word computer. I was four months out of college, completely alone--no girlfriend, no attachments, no nothing. It was just me, just me and those roll sheets--one journalism class (I'd never taken a course in journalism in my life), two junior English classes (American lit--I had a shot at that one), and two senior classes (English lit--the way things went all over in the olden days)--plus a study hall. I was on my own, accountable to no one else, and that, I remember, felt very good. I didn't feel anymore like a kid.
For some reason, I didn't doubt for a moment that I'd be just fine once things got started. I didn't sit there questioning whether or not I'd done the right thing taking the job when it was offered, late July. I wasn't worried about whether or not I'd do a good job--I was just worried about those names, those kids, those human beings in my hands. I read through the names time after time, trying to imagine them and their lives.
They were Swiss-American names, many of them anyway, as foreign to my ear and tongue as if they'd been Korean, raised as I was in a Dutch Calvinist ghetto. There I sat on the bed in my underwear; it was very hot in that old, upstairs hotel room and there was no desk. Time after time after time, I read through all those strange names, wondering what on earth those kids would be like.
Voices arose from beneath me on the street. Some kids were hanging out downtown. Their words were indistinguishable, but their banter carried the loose hilarity kids create anywhere. I couldn't help wonder whether one or two of them might have names right there on the lists, but I also knew the cold, sad truth: they weren't thinking about me right then, not like I was doting on them. Tomorrow, I'd be an asterisk, simply the new guy. If I'd ever be anybody in their lives, I'd have to become what I could totally on my own. To them, I'd be a human being without a history, without a name, and something about that equation was scary and perfectly exhilarating.
Honestly, today, 42 years later, I'd have more trouble remembering my students' names from last semester than I would the names on those class lists. If you'd read 'em to me now, I could tell you exactly where those kids sat in the rows my classroom. Some of those students I'd still recognize by their handwriting--I swear it. All of that exists clearly in my memory, although what I see today is still their 17-year-old selves.
When I think about it now, I imagine I must have been somewhat scary to them, too. After all, I was still their age, really, just four years older. I was just a kid, even though that night maybe, for the first time, I didn't think I was. Today, those students are all approaching 60 themselves.
This morning, it's very early, but it's the head cold that got me up--cottonmouth, not nerves. Last night, I looked over my computer lists, complete with color pics and turned on the Daily Show.
This morning, it's the last first time for me, and I'm ready. Finally, I'm ready.
And thankful. In so many ways, I'm just thankful.
It's been a good life.
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