I'm feeling nostalgic tonight.
I work with a lot of kids from a lot of different backgrounds. Sometimes the home situations are happy and more 'normal.' Sometimes the home situations are strained. Sometimes the situations are bleak and painful and most times they are no fault of the child. Tough situations are not reserved for special education students, but we have more than our fair share of hardship and broken homes.
And to think, I owe a large part of my choice of career to a Matt in my life.
This Matt is no longer among us. He passed away a couple of years ago. My dad spoke at the funeral. It's one of the few times my wife has seen me cry.
So who is he?
Matt is the twin of my friend renting out our basement, Dan. At birth, Matt was the healthy one and Dan was sickly. A procedure was botched and Matt ended up with a traumatic injury that destroyed a large part of his brain. Matt and Dan's parents reached out for help through the Twins club in our area, and my parents felt called to reach back. That was when I met Matt, Dan, and Bill.
Matt and Dan were under a year old, and Bill was the same age as me, three. We've all known each other since.
Matt had a lot of health difficulties over the years. He also had a surprisingly accurate aim when spitting or lobbing a board book across a room, and he could move really fast out a door and up the street if someone wasn't paying attention! He was a character. He had clear likes, could play N64 with one hand better than you'd ever expect, and clearly had a well-developed sense of humor. I remember my dad mentioned the "twinkle in [Matt's] eye" was how you knew he was up to something when he gave his eulogy.
I remember my dad also saying that now that Matt's in heaven he can run, jump, and swing and do all the things he couldn't do here. I can still feel a welling of emotion thinking about it (even if I don't show it), so I can assure you it was a powerful eulogy. Matt left a mark on me over the years. It's hard not to know a person and feel connected to them after being around them over a couple of decades.
I was already a teacher by the time of the funeral.
When I got my Bachelor's in Computer Science years earlier I didn't know much about what I wanted to do with myself other than steer clear of computer science.
As a high schooler, I spent several years at Georgetown and American Universities teaching programming to kids at a summer camp. I loved doing it, and that's what initially made we want to be a programmer (Oh, how joyous Nana was that I could "do" something!) Then I went through college, learned to program in 10 different languages (to varying degrees), and burned out. Computer science was something I could do and I feel I was good at, but it didn't really bring me any joy. I hated my chosen field out before I landed a professional doing it. I ended up failing multiple classes on what should have been my final semester, because I stopped showing up to those classes.
My parents weren't pleased. I didn't like what I was doing, but I was too close to being done to switch programs. I went back to school part time and started working part time too (my dad wanted me to pony up the cash for college up front and he'd reimburse me if my grades were up to snuff).
I don't exactly recall how and who I got the idea from, but I ended up applying to be a substitute teacher. The money was better than the library I worked at paid, and way better than the night security job I did for a while. Plus, it was the sort of job where you could work as little or as much as you wanted. I like teaching programming once upon a time, so it seemed like the perfect fit for an early twenty-some-odd-year-old trying to do finish a degree at night.
My very first teaching assignment landed me in a WAT classroom at a huge high school. I remember walking in to the front office and reporting for duty. I was told to report elsewhere and given directions. Oops. I followed the directions through several labyrinthine hallways and ended up in a back office. There was some confusion about why I was there, I got pulled in to a back room, and then someone realized what was going on and led me to a classroom to peddle balloons.
Yes, I started my teaching career taking orders from high school students while a teacher filled balloons with helium.
The morning bell rang and my short retail career went on hold. Donna, the WAT teacher, gave me a run down of what to expect through the day. WAT stands for Work Awareness and Transition. The goal of the class was (and still is) to train students with more severe disabilities to perform tasks and to maintain a job. The balloon side business helped purchase funds for the program and it gave the kids practice making deliveries throughout the school, as well.
By the end of the day, I'd shocked my co-teacher. "You did great! You weren't afraid of the kids!"
Really? I wasn't 'afraid?' It's a sad state of affairs when that's one of the statements I clearly remember from Donna. It also makes you worry about how else shows up as a substitute to help with needy populations.
I'd been around Matt all my life and none of the kids I met that day tried to usurp control of the TV or bang on a door to wake me up on a Saturday morning after a sleep-over. Yes, the kids were more huggy, hands on, and one would've loved to keep a finger up his nose if everyone didn't keep making him pull it out, but they were still kids, just of a different sort.
Donna told her coworkers, my number got passed around, and I spent the majority of my sub time working with special needs children at the monster high school. I really liked the kids and how they all enjoyed school and looked forward to seeing their teachers.
There was a Bible verse that I felt really spoke to me back then "What you do for the least of them, you do for me." It appalled me that people would be 'afraid' of the students I worked with. I could understand that some people would not enjoy working with students with severe disabilities, but to not recognize them as valuable felt like a crime. I ended up getting a job in alternative education as an instructional assistant while I pursued my special education teaching license.
Special Education felt like a natural fit to me then. Most days, it still does when I'm not too tired or jaded! Matt helped mold me to be who I am. He taught me patience, empathy, and awareness at an early age. It's a lesson I'm glad I was given the opportunity to learn.
I have a lot of respect for Jerry, Matt's dad. After the funeral he would bike up to Matt's grave to read to him. I hope that I can communicate that level of love to my own son as he grows up.
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