My Precious Angels

I call my boys that a lot: precious angels. Most of the time, my voice is dripping with sarcasm. I could think of many adjectives to describe the boys I teach, but "precious" doesn't rank in the top 100. Sometimes they surprise me though.

Take this past week, for instance. I would like to preface this by saying that my boys revel in being assumed tough, stoic, and otherwise unaffected. You've heard Kanye's song "Heartless," and this is a title they wear proudly--going as far to advertise themselves as such. I remember one day I came to work sick and without much of a voice. I started every class off by saying, "If you have a heart at all..." That day was one of my worst to date.

Anyways. This week Mr. S was collecting funds for Haiti relief efforts. He started off the morning announcements every morning by explaining a little bit about the devastation there and asking RMS students to contribute each day--even if it was only a nickel. I watched along with my first block, thinking to myself, "Yeah, right." These boys don't exactly come to school with cash falling out of their backpacks. Shoot; half of them don't even own backpacks. They may have fancy shoes, but they're topped with the same pants they wore the day before, and the day before that. Over 3/4 of them qualify for free or reduced lunch. Add this to the fact that their screen names are some version of "dontgivaf***96" and you're going to have a bunch of empty offering baskets.

False. Every day when Mr. S came in with his green bucket, I was overwhelmed by my kids' generosity. Boys that would rather get an F on their lab report than pay 25 cents for a pencil to complete it were emptying pockets and turning their bags upside down. This Friday, 8th grade was coming in second place (after 6th) with over $400 given. I even heard about some students skipping lunch so they could put their $2 in the bucket instead. They may not have much, but they recognized that they were in fact fortunate compared to so many Haitian families.

And yet again I am teacher-turned-student, learning lessons from those crazy boys. I basically got to see the parable of the poor widow played out in real life. Humbling, much?

Also sweet on a smaller scale:

This Friday we had a lockdown. This means that there is some danger present within the school walls and no one can leave the room. When the "Lockdown" announcement came on over the intercom, I had vague flashbacks to RMS training back in August. Something about how I needed to lock the door and slip some card underneath it...Where was that card? For the first time, I felt nervous for my safety at RMS. I ran out into the hallway to lock the door from the outside, shakily fumbling for the right key. By the time I came back inside, my students had calmly turned off all the lights, closed the blinds, and were sitting quietly in the corner away from the door. "Everyone stay seated and silent," I said, trying to sound calm. The directions were pretty unnecessary, though, because my boys had already taken care of all the safety precautions for me. Whenever someone started to speak, his classmates hushed him disapprovingly.

I looked around the room at their dark silhouettes, thinking about how much I've really grown to care about each of them over the past few months. "Ms. M?" Rosamuel asked.

"Yes, Rosie?"

"Imma be real with ya. If they let us outta here, I'm pushing you to the side and runnin' out the door. I just wanted to let you know 'cause I'm selfish."

"No." Norman countered. "I'd get Ms. M out of here safe first." The rest of the class murmured in agreement.

I smiled to myself. My brave little 14-year-old protectors. My precious angels.