While writing a letter about himself to me, one of my 6th graders asked an interesting question. He wanted to know the word for “when birds come out of their eggs”. Although I had no idea how or why the word “hatch” had any relevance to the assignment at hand, I wrote it on the board for him.
The following day, while marking the letters, I learned that B likes technology, inventing machines, and “hatch chicken eggs” because it “helps” him. Curious. He didn’t, however, tell me how it helped him in that or the following letter draft.
Intrigued, I caught B in the corridor. I told him that he’s a very interesting person, and wanted to know exactly how hatching chicken eggs is helpful to him. B is a little thing with an impish grin. He first looked at me as if I have eight heads, and then he shot me a broad smile.
“It helps me with technology.”
“How many do you have?”
“Two.”
“What do you do with them?”
“We’re going to put them in a cage.”
He looked at me as if I had sprouted a ninth head when I told him I wanted to see pictures.
Later that day, B caught me before the lesson, still grinning.
“Miss Rebecca, what day do you want to see?”
“Day? How many are there?”
“7.”
“OK, I want to see 7 pictures.”
When his printer was fixed, he proudly brought me a picture of an egg incubator, a domed contraption with two eggs in it. He explained that he doesn’t have to turn the eggs because the machine does it by itself. Clearly it was the 6th day as indicated by the number in the corner. No need to see the others because I’m sure they’re almost identical.
Every day, B gives me a new report. His sister is going to film the chickens when they hatch. Well, she can only film them if they hatch in the morning. They’re going to hatch on either Saturday or Sunday. She’s going to bring them to school.
Clearly, B and I have bonded over the chicken report. I’m not sure what we’ll talk about after the chicks have hatched and turned into ugly adolescent birds. We’ve got a while to think of something.
Even as a kid, I was aware of my over-sensitivity. I held people to unrealistic standards which, unfortunately, they often couldn't meet, (could I? I don't know.) resulting in my great disappointment. For example, when I was in early primary school, I can't remember exactly how old I was, Francisco visited Bloomer with family members from Venezuela. I loved him. Of course, anyone from another country who could speak another language was an exotic human being in my book. I loved him because he was an adult who actually paid attention to me, to us kids. We were special to him, and I especially appreciated it as the middle child lost amongst many. We weren't shooed out from under his feet in the kitchen. He actually listened to what we had to say and played a mean game of King of the Hill.
One day I stopped talking to Francisco altogether. We were going on one of our family day trips to somewhere in the car. While I enjoyed these trips, I always hated the pre-trip tension, the I-can't-find-my-shoes, do-you-have-the-fill in the blank... On this day, I couldn't find the pair of shorts I was supposed to wear. In a panic, I grabbed someone else's elastic waist-banded ones from the clean laundry basket, not realising they were my brother's, and somehow managed to pull them on backwards. When Mom informed me of both, Francisco laughed. He could have been responding to something else, but I was certain he was laughing at me. My buddy Francisco laughed at me. I was so hurt and disappointed that I never spoke to him again until he eventually asked me, down at my level, directly in my eyes, why I was ignoring him. I squirmed, and couldn't answer. I don't think I had the words, and I certainly didn't know how to deal with my hurt pride and embarrassment. At the same time, I think I was kind of ashamed because good little Catholic girls are supposed to be forgiving and forgetting.
Apparently, I am now an adult, though I sometimes have my doubts about that. I’m still too sensitive. Friends tell me not to be bothered by things I can’t change, yet I remain bothered when I think people are being mistreated. Unlike my younger self, however, I can at least distinguish if the mistreatment is intentional, or at least done by someone who should know better. And sometimes I still burn bridges, though now I have language to express my anger and disappointment.
There is a bridge I want to burn. The bridge I want to burn is attached to an institution, not one person, but then again, institutions are made of people. I don’t appreciate liars. I don’t appreciate the misogynist boss who makes inappropriate jokes, who revels in the humiliation and discomfort of others, knowing that his underlings cannot speak out for fear of losing their jobs. I have no respect for the immediate superior who feigns innocence when confronted with a, to her, difficult question, who ties my hands and forces me to be a page-turner rather than a teacher. I have less respect for an institution that plays loose with labor laws, who treats its employees with disrespect, unprofessionalism and an utter lack of compassion, a group that allegedly promotes education while fixing the grades of its “best” students for the sake of appearance, thus undermining its teachers and those students who are not the "best." An institution that sees fit to wait until the last day of classes to clear out its foreign language department by firing teachers who were still hard at work when they got the call to the principal’s office. Although it is still possible for native speakers to find decent jobs for the fall, it is nearly impossible for the Turkish ones to do so.
I want to burn this bridge and scatter its ashes. I want to scald the ground on which the bridge was built, make it unliveable, destroy all its plants to their roots and curse it a thousand times.
I call this group the cavalry.
This is my version of a Boetian bell idol. Her legs are clappers. She makes a pleasant, musical little sound when shook. She sounds nothing like she looks.
These are my little boat people. This is my least favorite of my versions of the subject, but the only one of which I have a picture. My favorite one is on loan (probably permanent) to an archaeologist friend. It would be nearly impossible to get it acrosss the ocean without mishap unless I called on the V&A packing crew.
I am most attached to this one. He's an abbreviated version of an ancient one with four horses. His little hat is separate and has holes in it for string intended to attach to his head. His hands and the horses muzzles have holes for reins, though I never got around to putting the string through the holes. I never got around to fixing the axles with string either.
I call him Ben Hur. I didn't quite understand how to structure the chariot to hook up to the cart correctly. Next time.
Like thickly clustered, fragrant grapes, wisteria creep up and cascade down the wall below the blue house. A sign says "Beware of the dog." I've never seen the dog.
Along the Bosphorus, the hills are covered with Judas trees. I don't know whom they betrayed. New leaf greens and reds stand out against evergreens and trees not yet awakened.
