Twenty years ago, one of my community college students wrote an essay about a day so busy that she forgot to pick up her seven-year-old daughter at school. She was terrified that the girl would be scarred for life from waiting an hour in an empty classroom. Her essay bore tiny puckers where her teardrops landed. Yesterday, I read another student essay about a day two decades ago when the student’s mother forgot to pick her up from second grade. She remembered waiting alone, reading every book on the classroom shelf, hugging her mother tight, and only crying a little.
John Sheirer is in his 30th year of teaching at Asnuntuck Community College in Enfield, Connecticut. His latest book is Stumbling Through Adulthood: Linked Stories. Find him at JohnSheirer.com.