letters to my class

Dear Bloomers,

The lilies in our backyard have turned to woody stems. Just a couple weeks ago they were blazing orange blooms. And it makes me feel a little bad, like I should have enjoyed them more while they were in bloom.

But I take comfort in knowing that they’ll return next summer. And if they don’t, I know we will replace them with something else.

Sometimes we’re blooming. Sometimes we’re dormant. Sometimes we get replaced by something else. Life is about enjoying what surrounds us, but it’s also about looking hopefully forward to what’s to come and ruefully back on what was.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Other People,

Sometimes my family will go to a museum, amusement park, or pumpkin patch on the weekend and there will be a lot of traffic, no parking, and it will be super crowded, and I’ll complain about all the other people.

And then when we finally park, it is often next to another Subaru–same model and trim. And the family that jumps out of it is also the same model and trim as us. And sometimes that other dad  (who I can also tell isn’t too happy about things) is wearing the exact same shirt as me.

Other people are a lot like us. They want the same things we do. And they have as much right to them as we do.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Friends,

I talk to a lot of people who put pen to paper and they all seem to have their own favorite type of pen. Because it all depends on what you’re looking for. Some prefer durability or reliability or how it feels in their hand or how it looks on the paper.

Friends are kind of like pens. There are a few essential qualities that make a good friend–honesty, loyalty, respect–but beyond that a lot of it is personal preference.

Which is a good thing, because some of us are ballpoint, some of us are gel, and some of us are rollerball. But no matter what, there’s someone out there who is looking for a friend just like us.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Walkers,

I hiked on Saturday and was completely surrounded by awe-invoking nature–clouds thunderheading to the heavens, crickets chirping and dancing, and the bluest skies you’ll ever see filtered through green quaking aspen leaves. But I spent most of the hike with my eyes fixed on the trail, watching one foot clomp in front of the other.

Life’s kind of that way too. We’re all the time surrounded by beauty and wonder, but we have our own path that we’re walking. And it’s important to keep our eyes on where we’re going so we make sure we get there.

But we have to remember all that surrounds us. And, every once in a while, stop and take in a big breath of the beauty and wonder.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

We all come from families that came from somewhere and got here somehow. And they might have come as part of a wave, which means there are a lot of people who are a lot like us. 

And that is part of our story. But it’s not our whole story. Because the best parts of our stories are the parts that make us different, not the same. And those parts of the story are largely up to us. We get to decide.

Just as our ancestors responded to the pressures of their time and place, we’ll respond to them as well. But we’ll do it in our own way, informed by what came before, but also knowing that our future is mostly in our hands.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Answerers,

Yesterday we were making nouns plural and came across “circus.” We were reviewing the add -es rules, and that works fine for “circuses.” But there’s also a rule that nouns ending in -us get changed into an -i, like cacti. And “circi” also works. And some people even love to add an extra -s before the -es and make it “circusses.” 

It just goes to show you: the word that we should always make sure we’re writing in plural form is “answers.” Because there is always more than one.

And though you’ll probably never have to pluralize circus again in your lives (who goes to more than one circus in a day?) you will find questions with more than one answer every single day.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Time Travelers,

When I walk into the classroom in the morning and the day’s date is already written on the board and the pencils are all sharpened and the room is prepared for the day, I give a little shoutout. “Thank you, Yesterday Me.”

But sometimes that guy is a real jerk. Leaving dirty dishes in the sink, ignoring the ungraded math assignments in the backpack, and you ought to see some of the stuff that guy puts in my stomach.

Everything we do is a pebble dropped in the water. We can’t ever know who the spreading ripples will touch. But we can know that we will get the largest ones. So be kind to Tomorrow You (and forgiving of Yesterday You).

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

When we’re born, we’re entirely dependent on our caretakers. To feed us, to protect us, and to keep our rear ends clean. And then we get pretty good at cleaning our own rear ends and think we’re independent. But then we find we still need people to give us advice, make us laugh, and make us feel like us.

And even when we’re able to take care of our own physical needs, we find ourselves called to the needs of others. Maybe our own children, our friends, strangers, or maybe even the people who used to take care of us. 

In this life, we’re never independent. We’re always connected to others. No matter how clean we keep our rear ends.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Humans,

Sometimes when I’m driving home and the song I’m listening to isn’t quite over, I drive around the block real slow so I can catch that final verse and chorus.

It’s never with a new or unfamiliar song. It’s usually an old John Prine song that I’ve heard a million times and could recite from memory backwards.

Because there’s something about the known. And though the recording doesn’t change, our ears do. And the cars we drive do. And the homes we park them at do. And the people riding in the car with us (or no longer riding with us) most definitely do. 

And with all that change surrounding us, it’s good to hear that same old chorus one more time.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt

Dear Learners,

Learning is about creating mental buckets to store information. When we learn about nouns, we create a noun bucket in our head. Then, when we need a noun, we quickly retrieve it from the bucket.

It’s a pretty good system! But it’s important to remember that it’s not really about the buckets. It’s about what we store in the buckets. And that stuff moves from bucket to bucket depending on our situation. Because a word that’s sometimes a noun isn’t always a noun.

Some people really love their buckets and think things must always belong in the same bucket all the time. But that’s not how this crazy world works. So get yourself some buckets, but get really good at swapping stuff out of them.

Sincerely,

Mr. Curt