Mary MacCracken - The Lost Children - Part 3 of 3

Contents Cover Contents Cover Title Page Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Teacher Coming soon … Exclusive sample chapter Copyright About the Publisher

Title Page

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Teacher

Coming soon …

Exclusive sample chapter

Copyright

About the Publisher

“I don’t know anything at all about team teaching,” I say to Dan.

“You’re an expert.”

“How’s that? How did I get to be an expert?”

“Because it’s just what we’ve been doing the last couple of months, combining our classes, except that next year we’ll be in the same classroom all the time. One big room for eight kids instead of two small ones. See, the thing is this. Doris wants to bring in six more kids – two more for you plus one more teacher and four kids. And if you and I combine in the big room, that will free one of the rooms for the new class.”

“And our room? What will that be like?” I ask, trying to get a picture.

“It’ll be good. Open. The kids can work in small groups; we’ll have two aides each morning, so that will be four of us. We can get a science project going – art, reading, math – and the kids can move back and forth between the groups. Freedom in a structured setting.”

“Where’s the structure?”

“Us. We’re structured. We believe in the same things, the same kind of discipline, responsibility. We let the kids grow at their own pace, provide the materials and help if they need it; let them test themselves with us … For God’s sake, I can’t put it in words … you know what I mean.”

I did. I knew.

“What does Doris think?” I asked.

“She’s all for it. She wants more kids, hopes eventually to have room for forty in the new building. Besides – more kids, more money.”

“Dan. That’s not fair.” This was one of the few things we disagreed about: the Director. Dan was antagonistic toward her, whereas I felt an increasing respect for this woman who had managed to found the school and keep it operating for thirteen years. And her dream was coming closer. There was an architect’s rendering now of the new building. Formal fund-raising was starting. Dan found her stubborn, unwilling to change; he disliked the way she said one thing one day, another the next, agreeing with the psychologist during staff meetings, disagreeing with him after he left.

To me – she survived. And kept us all surviving with her. There was tremendous strength inside her slender body and she used every ounce of it, playing the odds, swaying back and forth, it’s true, like a tree in a storm, this way toward the board of trustees, back to the teachers, leaning toward the professionals, bending to the parents; but this was her secret of survival. The pressures upon her were incredible. She could not remain rigid or she would be felled. She was strange about money, fishing old broken crayons out of the wastebasket, cutting up partly used paper for scraps. But she used the scraps. She sacrificed for her dream – the new school.

Dan was not concerned with some future dream: he was young, he was interested in now. He wanted good conditions, good supplies of materials for his kids right now. Why should they, his boys, suffer for some old woman’s distant dream?

Dan’s other complaint was that Doris did not visit the classrooms enough, was not in close enough touch with the children, the teachers. She was not, he said, aware of what we were doing and trying to do. Consequently, Dan, like a child himself, felt that if she didn’t care enough to find out, he had no obligation to inform her.

But again the fact remained: we did survive, and more than that, we grew. Through all our crises, big and small – in spite of ourselves. Matthew on the mountain, for instance, could have been a tragedy, but wasn’t. Now in some strange way our classes were closer than ever. We had known fear and not been torn apart by it; we had made mistakes and not turned on each other. Matthew was no longer so wild; when we crossed even the small street to the graveyard he came and put his hand into mine, never looking at me – but our hands clasped as we crossed the street.

In any event, for once Dan and Doris both wanted the same thing, though for different reasons. Doris wanted more children; Dan wanted to try the concept of team teaching. Whatever my reservations were, they seemed small in the face of their united decision.

“All right,” I said, “let’s try it.”

The last days of school were hot. We worked hard, conscious of trying to prepare the children for summer, give them as many skills, as much self-reliance, as we could, then staying late in the afternoon, planning for the next year. It was hard to say good-bye. Tired as we all were, we had grown used to each other and were conscious of how much we would miss one another.

We had a final party in place of the usual staff meeting. We held it in Jerry Cramer’s backyard, out on the flagstone terrace, overlooking a long meadow filled with apple trees and bordered by low stone walls. The terrace faced west and the late afternoon sun hung over the low range of mountains that rose at the end of the meadow.

Jerry was our psychiatric social worker; he was also a psychologist. He spent more time at the school than the other professionals, often without pay. He had a long, soft, gray mustache, steel-rimmed glasses, and a gentle manner. Though he had his human failings (always trying to stop smoking, which never lasted more than a day), he loved the children and they knew it. They would often go of their own volition to stand beside him or sit near him at Circle.

Dr. Marino, our psychiatrist, was there too. Reserved, always at a slight distance from all of us, but able, informed; I wished there was some way that he could spend more time at the school.

There was no shop talk that day, only gentle jokes and reminiscences. Zoe drank martinis and sat on the flagstone terrace like a small guru. Only our speech pathologist was absent.

I knew I must go – Rick’s high-school graduation was that night – but the tenderness I had felt all year had risen to the surface, floating on Jerry’s bourbon, and it was difficult for me to leave these people. I kissed Zoe and hugged Doris, surprised at myself; I was not usually a woman hugger.

Then Dan walked me to my car parked in front of the house, opened the door for me and waited while I found the key and put it in the ignition.

“How about working with me this summer, Mair? I’ve already got eight kids signed up for the summer program and there are a lot more prospects. I’ll need help. How about it?”

I wanted to. Rick was driving cross-country with friends before college; Elizabeth had been asked back to camp as a junior counselor. I wanted the work, the children, the closeness – but I had problems to resolve in my marriage; I could not retreat from them into the joy of teaching.

I turn on the ignition, and regret makes my voice formal. “Thank you, Dan, but I can’t. I’ve made other commitments.” And the word stands formal and strange between us.

Dan leans his arms on the edge of the car window and bends his big frame until his eyes are only an inch from mine, and I turn my head away before I say, “Good-bye, Dan. Good luck. Ill see you in the fall.”

He leans there looking at me, not moving, holding the car door, and then finally he straightens, “Take care, Junior. Take care of yourself this summer.”