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Today I sent email to a teacher with whom I studied more than 30 years ago, thanking her for her kindness to me, which included giving me books of poetry that I couldn't afford to buy myself. I have lost or given away a number of books over the years, but I still have those, and I still read them. She replied almost immediately, saying that she was moved and grateful to hear from me.
I wrote to Margaret today because one of her books was next to one of Joanna Russ's books on my women's studies shelf, so that I saw it and remembered her when I took down Joanna's book as part of remembering and mourning Joanna. One of the things Joanna always did when she saw me in the last few years before she moved to Tucson was to thank me, again, for taking care of her once when she had just been in the hospital (many people in the Seattle science fiction community in those years had the experience of taking care of Joanna after she'd been in the hospital; she had back surgery and foot surgery and a number of other hospitalizations). Joanna wasn't good at gratitude in the moment when you did something for her; she was frequently cranky or in pain or medicated for the pain. She was excellent at gratitude after the fact, a skill which few people who are bad at gratitude in the moment take the trouble to learn.
Thinking of Joanna and Margaret together, I realized that I could thank Margaret now as I couldn't properly thank her when I was a young woman, so I did. I've managed to thank a few others of my important teachers over the years, though many of them died before I got around to saying just how meaningful they had been in my life.
Every once in a while, I think about those other teachers, the damaging bad teachers, the ones who weren't kind or smart or patient or quick enough, and I consider what it would take to explain to them what they had meant to me. When I feel compassionate myself, I am able to remember how difficult their task was, to be a good teacher for so many very different kids all at the same time, and that I wasn't the easiest kid to be around. When I don't feel so compassionate, I wonder why they thought teaching was an appropriate profession, since so many of them so obviously didn't like children at all (the logic for bad college professors is different, since they don't deal with children).
It's more fun to think about the good teachers.
I wrote to Margaret today because one of her books was next to one of Joanna Russ's books on my women's studies shelf, so that I saw it and remembered her when I took down Joanna's book as part of remembering and mourning Joanna. One of the things Joanna always did when she saw me in the last few years before she moved to Tucson was to thank me, again, for taking care of her once when she had just been in the hospital (many people in the Seattle science fiction community in those years had the experience of taking care of Joanna after she'd been in the hospital; she had back surgery and foot surgery and a number of other hospitalizations). Joanna wasn't good at gratitude in the moment when you did something for her; she was frequently cranky or in pain or medicated for the pain. She was excellent at gratitude after the fact, a skill which few people who are bad at gratitude in the moment take the trouble to learn.
Thinking of Joanna and Margaret together, I realized that I could thank Margaret now as I couldn't properly thank her when I was a young woman, so I did. I've managed to thank a few others of my important teachers over the years, though many of them died before I got around to saying just how meaningful they had been in my life.
Every once in a while, I think about those other teachers, the damaging bad teachers, the ones who weren't kind or smart or patient or quick enough, and I consider what it would take to explain to them what they had meant to me. When I feel compassionate myself, I am able to remember how difficult their task was, to be a good teacher for so many very different kids all at the same time, and that I wasn't the easiest kid to be around. When I don't feel so compassionate, I wonder why they thought teaching was an appropriate profession, since so many of them so obviously didn't like children at all (the logic for bad college professors is different, since they don't deal with children).
It's more fun to think about the good teachers.
