A Good Education

I love my 2nd graders, Xavier, Antonio, Pedro, Ricardo and the others. They are adorable wearing Bill's old flannel shirts as printmaking smocks. One of my favorites is a Puerto Rican Elvis Presley! I want to bring apples so they can make apple sauce using the hand cranked food mill. Or make whipped cream by putting marbles inside cream and shaking until it thickens! I can only be in the moment with them! Their lives I cannot fix, only the moment.

The boys went wild on Wednesday - it's not even the full moon yet! They mixed all the colors into mud and made hand prints on the floor. They danced in stockinged feet across the aluminum cafeteria tables. They spun even more wildly when I asked them to chill out. We stopped the printmaking and washed everything. One teacher yelled at them after class and three of my boys cried. I said it's all forgiven, let's move on. I told them it's sad for me to see your big beautiful eyes fill up with tears. They are all beautiful brown puppies with big eyes. I call them "My Romeos." I cry now imagining them crying.

I remember all of my teachers from elementary school. My kindergarten teacher was Miss Estep. She taught me left from right. For years I had to picture her standing with her back to us saying left with an outstretched left hand in order to know my left side from the right.

My first grade teacher, Mrs Haggerty, taught me to read. Her little OO poster said MOON ROOM COOL SOON TOOTH. She was a million years old and had a sister teaching in the school too. I was always sneaking her books home and getting busted. My mother would bring in a manila envelope the size of me, filled with all of the books I had squirreled away. I was completely ashamed. A bookohaulic at age five.

I recently got to thank my Mary Poppins of a second grade teacher through her son who got his mom on the phone. Mrs Dennison had a pet skunk as well as a son and a daughter. She let me sleep over when I was 7! She was also my math tutor.

My third grade teacher Miss Wood drove a white Karmann Ghia convertible and told us about her two cats who wore glasses.

My fifth grade teacher Miss Naomi Blume also let me sleep over to hear a Shakespearean reading in her apartment in NYC. I was very lucky.

My fifth grade teacher Mr Papierman got me interested in tropical fish.

My sixth grade teacher was Mr Perucci. I made him a painting of an owl because he loved owls.

Middle school was not as wonderful except for my fabulous pregnant French teacher Mrs Aiello who wore cowboy boots and showed us how the French peel oranges. She was married to my Math teacher Mr. Aiello who taught us "rotation flotation," something about triangles. I was lousy at math no matter how many times I stayed for help, but I loved French. I even dreamed in French! I had a great Art History teacher who was receiving acupuncture for deafness, and a Theater teacher who was once a real show girl. I learned to tap dance from my English teacher.