I’ve entered my third year as a retired middle school English teacher, and I now fill my days working on my PhD, teaching literacy classes at Western Michigan University as a TA, and sneaking in fun with my fellow retirees. Once a month I attend a luncheon for retired teachers hosted by the Kalamazoo Area Retired School Personnel. It’s a great way to reconnect with fellow educators and hear about timely topics presented by the monthly speakers. A few months back, a newly retired teacher sat at our table, introduced herself, and before long we discovered we had gone to WMU at the same time and attended many of the same classes. She laughingly joked, “Oh, I remember you. You were a smartie!” I laughed along–I’d kinda forgotten about that. Oh yeah…
Along the same lines, my husband and I went to a theater production of Driving Miss Daisy with a long-time teacher friend and her husband this summer. She and I share a boatload of memories as we both went to Western, ended up teaching in the same small rural school district, and even played in the same BUNCO group for years. So we were chatting in the car on our way to the theater, reminiscing about our college days when my friend said, “I was so jealous of you when you got that award for “Most Promising Student Teacher” in our last semester.” I was stunned. For a moment I thought she must have me confused with someone else, and then slowly it started coming back. That award was the reason I’d gotten a call from Schoolcraft Schools for an interview. Hmmm, I’d forgotten all about “most promising.”
Last spring my advisor and I sat down to document a plan for the completion of my PhD, charting which classes I’d take when and projecting a date for my graduation. As part of that process, we needed to record all my previous grades from my Masters degree onto the online document. I read from the transcript as my advisor plugged the data into the form. Every class was a 4.0. I knew I had done well, but I’d forgotten about this unblemished record of academic success. I know this post is not humble, but I assure you my boasting serves a purpose in illustrating a point. All of this remembering of who I was brings clarity for my decision to further my degree at my alma mater. I needed a reminder. I’d lost track of who I was.
So many years have passed between that December in 1991 and the present day. So much time and life has left me forgetting the best part of me–I am a person of great potential. I forgot for a minute. Sometimes we all need a reminder of just how amazingly powerful we are.
It’s so easy to forget.
