Tag Archives: Relationships

On My Mind

Bad Day

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I caught up to a new colleague while cycling home through the park last week. We’d had our first real conversation just weeks earlier at a wine tasting, which led us to meet in a café days later to continue our conversation. Like many of us who move around, she was looking to find her people. We’re a small school without much transience, and I appreciate that this can be hard to do. I was new once, too.

As one does, I asked about her day and was surprised by the response. “Actually it wasn’t that great,” she said, and I asked if she wanted to tell me more. We rode together until the path forked and I continued towards home.

She’d had a bad day and thanked me for talking about it with her. I was happy to listen, had related some of my own experiences, and had tried to ask questions that might prompt a change of perspective. It wasn’t until I was cycling home the next day, alone, that I realized how seldomly we actually answer the question, “How was your day?”.

I had an administrator once whose classic reply was, “Do you care?”, meant to prompt the asker into thinking about the question. That there’s only one real answer to that question presents its own difficulties. Based on personal observation, Germans tend to avoid the question entirely and just ask how you are. Whether talking about one’s day factors into the answer is purely optional.

Thinking about it from this perspective, I was flattered that my colleague had given me a real answer. It had meant some vulnerability on her part, and that’s not easy with people we’re trying to get to know. But that is the way to get to know people, according to the social penetration theory that my psychology students and I study. Relationships tend to move from superficial and shallow to deeper and more intimate, and people tend to like individuals who share more deeply, leading them to do so in return.

Through the conversation about the bad day, my colleague and I learned a little bit more about each other. We found some commonalities, recognized that others are there for us when we’re open to them, and strengthened a connection. And that’s not a bad way to begin building a friendship.

Education

See Me

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My thirteenth year as a teacher comes to an end this week. As all the years before it, it has gone quickly. There has been, as always, joy and sadness, disappointment and surprise, stress and smooth sailing. I keep track of seasons based on what we’re doing in school and refer to years according to the school calendar. In August I’ll buy a new pocket agenda.

There is a lot on this blog about teachers and teaching, about schools, students, and learning. I admit to loving, really loving, the work that I am privileged to do. If you ask me what I teach, I’ll give you the easy answer: I teach history, psychology, social studies, Theory of Knowledge. It’s true, but far more important to me is the human element. I teach young people and I watch them grow up for a little while. And then they go off into the world and I smile.

Last week I received an email from a student who I’ve taught since grade 10 who just completed grade 12. He is one of many students who has come to me over the years to talk about something that was on his mind, and one of a few who have written to me about it afterwards. What he said struck me and reminded me of things that matter. I wanted someone to see me and you saw me. I needed to talk and you listened.

Maya Angelou had it right: “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

It’s not uncommon for me to raise an eyebrow at a student and ask, “You okay?” Or, when it works better, those words go on a sticky note that I pass to the student when moving around the room. I usually get a nod and sometimes a change in behaviour, and then we go on our way. Occasionally a student comes back to me later and I find out what was going on. Sometimes I receive messages, on a few occasions even years after the fact, telling me about a student’s feelings in that moment.

Young people are crying out to be seen and to be heard, and I think it’s not only young people. When we choose to engage, we don’t always know what our level of involvement will be. We don’t know what we’ll hear and therefore what we will be required to do. And we don’t do it for the possibility of thanks at the end.

To see a young person how they want to be seen, to sit across a table and pass a packet of tissues, to really listen to someone who just needs to talk – this is what I do. And I am so, so lucky to be able to give those moments and the accompanying feelings. This is all part of being a teacher.

Germany

Lazy Morning

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The French press isn’t yet empty so we sit and linger a while longer, doing one thing at a time. Coffee first and then onto other things for the day. Warm rolls and butter and jam and cheese on weekend mornings, just because we can, and I find that my body has adjusted to eating that way; I find myself looking forward to it.

It’s rather different from how I was through many years of being on my own, different from the habits formed back when I used to go running, preferably in the mornings when I could. Back then, and since then, mornings were a time to do as much as possible so that the rest of the day was free for everything else. The best light comes through the windows in the morning, the air is fresh, and there’s a pregnant expectation of what the day might bring. I used to set an alarm on weekend mornings to greet all of that, but lately I’ve found that I don’t sleep in anymore. Lingering over breakfast on a weekend morning is a natural part of the day.

Years ago, we used to visit our favourite diner on a Saturday or Sunday, placing our orders of coffee, omelettes, and potatoes wherever we decided the coffee was best or the potatoes crispiest or the service fastest. We were in and out, often after waiting in the obligatory line (always a good sign), having eaten enough to tide us over until dinner. We sought out diners in different parts of town and compared them to each other, once driving all the way across town to wait in a line and be told that we could request modifications to the menu (I wanted two eggs, like in my go-to diner, instead of the standard three), but the kitchen staff probably wouldn’t listen. We loved every moment of that experience.

It’s a different time, a different pace, and a different partnership now.

Almost a year ago I took you to a diner, an old favourite, almost unchanged except for the prices. Cash payments only in a country that runs on credit, coffee as ever nostalgic and a little burnt (a taste I miss until I have it again, and then I stop myself after three refills), plentiful plates of combinations that matched what you’ve seen on television. And then another diner and another where, finally, “What can I get you, sweetheart?” and I grinned at the look on your face. Sometimes real life is just like the movies.

The bakery bag of tomorrow’s rolls is in the oven. And after we’ve finished our coffee, it’ll be time to live in the day.