Monday, October 13, 2008

The Girls Give Me Hope.

I am the luckiest one.

My students just threw me a surprise engagement party. I was eating lunch when my boss came by and told me that he wanted to talk to me. He walked me to my classroom asking me weird questions about the Faculty and Staff Gay/Straight Alliance that I had started last year and when I opened the door to my classroom, my students (all 12 year old girls) jumped out of the corners, up from under desks and out of closets, throwing confetti and yelling "Congratulations!!" They had thrown me a surprise engagement party, complete with pizza, cookies, soda, a giant congratulations sign and a bunch of hugs. They are the cutest little munchkins. I can't believe how lucky I am.

I don't teach at a liberal school. I'd say more than half of the families that send their kids here are republicans. I've been fighting discrimination from the administration for the last year (they won't let me live on campus with my partner because we can't be married in our state). But kids are kids, they are more sensitive to justice and fairness than anyone. And... this being an all-girls school... any excuse to talk about dresses, flowers, and all-things-frilly is a good excuse.

These girls give me so much hope for the future. I owe a lot to them. In the face of things like this, we could all use a little hope right now.

3 comments:

Two Chicks Nest said...

That is so fantastic!!!

Anonymous said...

I work at a school, too. The other day some of our kids gave a concert. They played "Ode to Joy" very badly and I thought how great it would be if we could like, invite them to play the processional, but this is not an option really and i got a little misty. Invite your concert band to play at your wedding so i can live vicariously through you!

M.G. said...

That is simply wonderful! I teach at a high school and I'm slowly discovering the open-ness of our school. We just started a GSA (literally-- last week). If you have any pointers that would be great! And I'm so glad I found your blog! It is wonderful.