Human Soup

I have become rather good friends with one of my student's sister. Her name is Daša and it's been really great to get to know her. True, she's still not my age, but she's older than 13 and younger than 55, which makes her a lot closer than a good number of my friends here. Plus, there's something quite nice about being friends with someone younger than you. Something special, I do believe.

Before I came, I didn't think so much about coming to a small town, but had I, I would have expected to know everyone's whole family. And I have met several of them now from local events, from kids bringing their parents to frisbee, from students yelling to me from across the street, or from running into them at the grocery store*. In Daša's family, I know them even better because of the things that they have invited me to do with them (i.e. go skiing in Italy). It's pretty amazing. The other day she introduced me to her grandmother and grandfather, and we saw one of her uncles later the same day. Whole family? Yeah, I'm pretty much in.

But I guess that's not the limit, due to the small town atmosphere, the fact that I teach everyone's kid, nephew, cousin, whatever, the rarity of having a stranger living permanently in your town, and my very, very red winter coat, I am sort of known here. The community knows me as 'our Američanka' which I kind of really love.

In a way it reminds me of another time in my life... a time where I was just a regular student teacher in another small community, just trying to make it at Perry Lecompton High School. But the other members of the community were known to the school just like they are here.

My favorite part about that experience was lunch. Quickly I realized that the place to be during lunch was NOT with the teachers in the staff room, but in the cafeteria. On the court, if you will. In the paint.
Why was this the place to be?
Let me introduce you to the team:

1. Point guard- Mr. Scrimgouer (I never did know how to spell it). Shop teacher. Very tall man. Relaxed? Yes. Calm? Yes. In charge? Definitely. Ate two school lunches every day at the beginning of the year, until his wife started packing him ''healthy choice'' lasagnas. Afraid of blood.

2. Shooting guard- Mr. Haggard. Steady, dependable. Beloved biology teacher. My mentor. Incredible about giving me space and opportunities. Spent the whole time I was teaching building super awesome things like a giant Newton's cradle and hover craft. Knew everything about everything, really. Shared his muffins almost every day.

3. Power forward- Mr. Larsen. Fellow student-teacher. Hilarious. Well received. Fashionable. Ate from the cave every day out of comradery with the students and possible laziness. Spilled coffee on his pants every morning. The students noticed.

4. Small forward- Ms. Schmidt. You know me, so I probably don't need to repeat the usual compliments that I give to myself. Though I should add, amazing ability to dunk.

5. Center- Clint (Clive? Clay?). The local cop. Came almost every day during lunch because he didn't have anything else to do. Ate 2, sometimes 3 lunches. Big man. Full of stories. Loved anime.

Sub- Martin. Not one of my students. Came to enjoy our company. Not the healthiest eater... once saw him eat a tub of cool whip and a snickers for lunch. Heard he washed it down with a bottle of Hershey's chocolate 'shell' syrup.


As you can imagine, this was an extremely entertaining group of people. I had my plan period during lunch also, so I was able to stay during the entire lunch period if I wanted to, and usually that is exactly what I wanted to do. Amazing.

It's hard to pick a favorite memory from this team... it could be the time I brought fresh spring rolls:
Mr. S: WHAT are those?
Me: Spring Rolls! (almost take a bite)
Mr. S: Ahhhh! Wait! It's still got the paper. You're so excited to eat them you've still got the paper!

Or it could be the time I was denied giving blood (stupid anemia) and Mr. Scrimguer confessed being horribly afraid of needles and hating to talk about this stuff, which reminded Cliff of all of this days as a detective, and all of the things that he found. Which he told us about, much to Mr. Scrimguer's displeasure, throughout the rest of the lunch period.

Here school lunch is different. We have snack, but kids eat with their classes, teachers eat in the staff room. There is lunch, but it's not mandatory and kids eat right before they go home. The food is about 1000x better, but I'd give anything to have my old lunch back.



*Which, I should mention, is NOT my favorite place to run into kids with their parents.