A hummingbird visits me each morning as I sit and drink my coffee and read my digital version of the newspaper. I hear him, his flutter louder than the bees and other morning sounds, and so I look up. Just there, not three feet from my face, he hovers. His wings a blur and his green, glossy feathers shimmering in the morning sun. I smile and say, "Good morning," and then, he is off. He comes everyday and I have come to watch for him. He reminds me to enjoy the nature that surrounds me and her beauty that is eternal. He only stays but a moment, yet they are as bright as the shooting star I watched as I wrote this. His visits will end soon as summer fades and he travels to warmer climates, but I will look for him next spring, just as I watch the night for one more streaking wish.
A few days ago, I learned of the loss of an icon. She never had her name in lights or a twitter following, but to many primary students, she introduced the joys of creating music. Mrs. Harper had the energy to keep up with hundreds of them and the vivaciousness to keep them entertained. She entertained me in the first grade, as she did my dad, and all the students in between. I had Mrs. Booker in the first grade, a stern, giant of a woman. Her room was on an outside walkway and it was very orderly to say the least. Everything was this pale blue at Kaufman Primary School from the walls to the doors. We would walk along that outside walkway, rain or shine, Mrs. Booker in the lead, whistle in hand, our little legs scrambling to keep up. Through the giant double doors with their multiple panes of glass we trooped, past the restrooms on the right, down the inside steps and then to the left and through another set of double doors, these covered with bright images of instruments and musical notes. There, just beyond, waited a very small woman with fluttering hands and a soothing voice. There were no desks or rows in Mrs. Harper's class. We sat on the blue carpet and her classroom helpers passed out sticks and bells, kazoos and tambourines and we were free. Laughter and joy surrounded each of us as we made our music on that blue carpet. Raucous and off key it was, but it was ours.
To me, she is like that hummingbird. Each fall she brought us joy and she was there to greet each new generation with a quiet flutter and the shimmer of a tambourine. The continuity of it, the routine brings me peace. The thought of not seeing those green feathers is as disturbing to me as generations never meeting Mrs. Harper.
As the marketing gurus of print and screen remind me everyday, the return to school is just around the corner. My plans for the first day activities and of course that first day of school outfit go into overdrive. I'm making plans to get supply lists for my children and making a supply list of my own. Today at Wal-Mart, further reminders greeted me around every corner as "Mrs. Nolan," was heralded through the aisles. One former student caught me off guard and before I knew it, I was wrapped in a hug and talking about this year's tough Cross Country running schedule. My boys, my biological children as I must distinguish since they are all my kids, will enter second grade, my Lily will officially be in middle school having reached the 7th, and my first baby will be a junior in high school. I think back to my teachers, to my first day of school in each of their places. Some of my teachers are still there, Miss Kerr, Mr. Feller, but most have moved on like the hummingbird. In second grade, Mrs. Covington will not greet them at the door as she too has been called home.
Yet, new students will be greeted. They will be introduced to music and dance and history and science and of course, mathematics. I and my fellow teacher warriors will have welcome back posters and silly first day videos. We will compliment new shoes and ooh and awe over shiny back packs and mechanical pencils. We will hug returning friends from class's past and wish them well on their next year. Again, the continuity of it brings me peace.
I do feel a loss as I know I must say goodbye to the hummingbird, but it is fleeting. As every teacher knows, we do not judge time by four seasons, but three, fall semester, spring semester and summer. They rotate around each year and we welcome the fall crop of smiling faces and then say goodbye in the spring. Once ours, they really never leave us. They simply move on to warmer climates until we greet them again somewhere. This year, as I look forward, lesson plans and testing schedules and my hair standing on end, I will hear the hovering hummingbird and the shake of a tambourine and know this too is fleeting. I will remember what they have taught me. That I must enjoy the beauty around me everyday and to never stop making my own music.
So for now, goodbye Mrs. Harper and Godspeed!
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