One Pink Sprinkle

During Breast Cancer Month (October), women and men all over the country undertook various activities to raise money for a good cause. One of those women is my former student Laurie, a patent attorney in Minneapolis. Like others of her friends, I donated money for her walk of 60+ miles over three days with a team of women who called themselves The Pink Sprinkles. To thank me, she sent this photograph and a lovely note.

Laurie's smile is beautiful. In it, I see her mother and father and her growth from the time when I first taught her in 1995, as she was beginning eighth grade. That year, she wrote about her family's Christmas celebration, complete with tree and other greenery and gifts. The celebration bothered her because her family is Jewish. In tenth grade, she returned to the topic, creating a strong essay in the form of an argument which convinced her family to drop the tradition. In twelfth grade, she returned to the topic one more time and crafted a beautiful college admissions essay. (She went to George Washington University in DC, where she earned an engineering degree.) Laurie proved over those years that composition is important for the very reason my mentoring teacher gave me in 1972: teenagers need to write to compose themselves.

Seeing Laurie also reminds me of her father and his great gift to me at the end of my McGehee career. Each morning, after dropping off his girls, he started out on a vigorous walk through the neighborhood. That last morning, as always, he dropped them off and left the school grounds. He came back, however, for one reason: to find me. When he did, his words and actions stunned me. He thanked me for loving his daughters and for contributing to the people they were coming. Some years earlier, he wasn't altogether convinced I was on the right track. Why? Because Laurie earned C's in eighth grade. By tenth, her work earned B's, and by twelfth it earned A's.

But this is what I most remember: that last morning, he cried and I cried as we hugged each other. I respect and love him and his family, still.