the job, part 1

(This is terribly hard for me to write about. If it’s rambling, just know I tried to make some sense of it, but cried a good bit while doing so.)

As some of you know, a while back, I lost my job. Not my dream job, but the closest I’d ever come to it: teaching performing arts to 300 grade school children at a private school.

And right from the start, it was an almost impossible task.

Two weeks before the school year started, the principal called to tell me that space was at a premium; I would not have a classroom.

I was silent for a long moment.

“Where will I teach?”

“Well, come up to school tomorrow. I think I have a space you can use.”

She had a space, a ridiculous space: a tiny trailer packed with desks and chairs that could not be pushed out of the way, becase there WAS no out of the way. There was no room for 20 plus kids to even stand, much less do all the big, expansive, crazy things creative drama requires. She showed it to me sheepishly. I was irritated that I was finding out this minor detail at virtually the last minute.

I looked her straight in the eye. No time to be diplomatic.

“I can’t use this.”

I knew she knew that. I drove home, room-less, space-less, and began to frantically revamp my whole program.

The first three weeks of school, I taught my classes outside, practically yelling, trying to manage my own personal “Lord of the Flies.”

It wasn’t working. I went to the principal.

“I need to be inside, somewhere. Please.”

After that, I become the roving performing arts teacher, peddling my wares from classroom to classroom, teaching each class of each grade level one session per week. To cope with the space problem, the teachers and students would shove the desks out of the way to make some space before I arrived. Then the teacher would leave for a welcome break while I taught class.

Some teachers were more generous than others with the space they created. But even with the best efforts, the spaces were still very small. Laughably small, really. I could tell who liked me and who didn’t by how big the spaces were. Huge resentment made for tiny spaces.

Still, it pushed my creativity to the limits. I had to create a program from scratch that was portable and fun and small, but with big impact. I still don’t know how I did it, but I DID IT. I am unashamed to say it. The kids loved my classes and I loved them.

At the end of every day, as I walked down the hill to my car, kids would appear at my side, gather ’round me, calling my name, grabbing me, until I felt like the mushy middle of a frantic hug donut. Many days, I’d drive away with tears in my eyes. Do they really like me? How is that possible? I felt sure someone was putting them up to these mass huggings, that they’d tire of having to do that day after day, that they’d discover I wasn’t hiding candy in my pockets. My heart wouldn’t let me believe it. But day after day, the hug donut happened, unabated, even got bigger.

“I love you, Mrs. Tracey.”

My heart was exploding.

I’d had so many bad jobs, been laid off too many times from too many failing ventures. It was uncanny, actually. And yet here I was. Actually succeeding. Fitting in. Not out of step. Not ill at ease. No one more surprised than I.

And I just knew — this was my job for the rest of my life.

There was one teacher, though. She taught 5th grade. I loved her students; they were always willing to push the barriers in performing arts class. They were game for anything, unafraid to play, sold out to the silly. Sometimes, we’d all just howl with laughter at the things they came up with. That class was one of my favorites, just the chemistry those kids had together. Magic.

But their teacher. Let’s call her Donna. She made me uncomfortable right off the bat. Donna was probably in her late 50’s, with a phony regal bearing. It seemed stiff, practiced, in strange contrast to her dumpy form and always brown clothes. Her admitted favorite color. Her kids — those crazy shining lights — noticeably dimmed whenever she was around. Frequently, she wouldn’t leave the room when I conducted class. She knew she was supposed to leave; the principal had actually requested that of all the teachers on my behalf. Nevertheless, there she’d be, plopped in the corner at her desk, looking so casually busy, that I was almost certain there was nothing casual or busy about it. Her presence felt disrespectful, defiant even, and it made it harder for me to assert my authority with the kids.

Finally, I talked to her about it. Made it sound like my problem. That she wasn’t doing anything wrong. Her voice was all honey:

“Oh, okaay, Tracey. If that’s what you feel you NEED.”

I ignored the phony tone. “Great. Thank you.”

When the Christmas show rolled around, she was assigned to assist me. Turns out, she’d done the previous year’s show — all 90 butt-numbing minutes’ worth. But on this one, she was no help at all. AT. ALL.

She sat in meetings with me and the principal and said absolutely NOTHING. The principal, fortunately, gushed over my rather untraditional ideas. But Donna just sat there, smiling benignly. When the secretary showed me a mock-up of the program I’d written, Donna’s name was magically included as Co-Director. That was certainly NOT what I’d given her. In my version, Donna’s name had been under the “Special Thanks” (for nothing) category.

“Uh, what’s this?” I said.

“Well, Donna’s helping you, right?”

“Um, well, you know, she’s not really the director.”

“Well, she should be in there as SOMETHING.”

“Okay. Um ….. how about ‘Technical Director’?”

Well, I guess she HAD given me the name of the guy who did lights the year before. Grudgingly.

Anyway, the show itself was a triumph — a multimedia triumph, owing so much more to My Beloved and his talents as a video producer than smiling, useless Donna. It was daring and unconventional for a Christmas show; there was not a towel-headed shepherd or 6-year-old virgin Mary in sight.

Because I don’t really like that.

Instead, we filmed kids being kid crazy — cartwheeling, running, trampolining, waving streamers; then, on show night, all 300 kids sang “Joy to the World” as this video romped across the giant screen. We filmed kids answering, sometimes HILARIOUSLY, my off-camera questions about the true meaning of Christmas. We filmed kids reciting, sometimes poignantly, sometimes hesistantly, their assigned verses of the Christmas story. We scanned colorful, spindly Christmas drawings by the shyest kids, editing them together for the big screen, while the kids sang, live again, songs to accompany the drawings.

And, oh! We had the MOST wonderful angel drawings! Just my favorites. I still have them. Some angels looked like bees; some like butterflies, some were triangles with wings, some were squares with wings. But up on that huge screen, in their 20-foot glory, those crooked colored pen drawings CAME TO BLAZING LIFE!

And as the pictures sprang to the screen one by one, all 300 kids were yowling “Angels We Have Heard on High” at the top of their lungs, like this:

GLO-O-o-o-o-O-

O-o-o-o-O

O-o-o-o-O

RIAAA!!

IN EXCELSIS DAY-OHHHHH!!

I could hardly keep conducting them, my eyes were tearing so badly.

But my absolute favorite video was for a song called “What Can I Give Him?”
I selected about 20 kids and asked them one question:

What is something special of yours that you would give to baby Jesus, if you could?

I made sure to tell them they would keep their “gift,” of course; just bring it to the shoot to be filmed.

The kids brought just the sweetest, funniest things:

a toy car
a shell
a snow globe
a porcelain angel
a Doug Flutie jersey
a pacifier
a pumpkin
some rocks — from a little 1st grade girl who’d just lost her dad. Her big brown eyes on that big huge screen said everything she didn’t have the words to say. Those little rocks. Those huge lost eyes.
a sign that said “My Life” — one 1st grade boy stood there so proudly holding his handmade sign. He would give Jesus his life. He looked like he would. He was nearly choking up, but he seemed brave, too. He would give Jesus his life.

My Beloved is, frankly, brilliant with a camera and filmed each kid separately, carefully. He’s easygoing, so the kids relaxed. He’s funny, too, so he made them laugh. And he likes the phrase “less is more,” so he made it easy for them. He had them simply stand, holding their “gift,” as he very slowly panned in — to the gift — to their excited, open faces — and slowly out again, to capture the whole moment.

You’ve never seen such beautiful kids. Even the unkempt little boy with the glasses and the cowlick and the crooked collar looked RADIANT and PERFECT through My Beloved’s lens. It was breathtaking.

Later, during that shoot, I gathered the kids together, gave them each a blown-up white helium balloon and an indelible red pen. I just said, “Write a note to Jesus — whatever you want to say. We’re going to send it to Him.”

My Beloved filmed this — beautiful, heartbreaking closeups of little faces bent so earnestly over their balloons. Drawing hearts. Stick figures. Flowers. Their name. “I love you, Jesus.”

When they were done with their notes, they stood together and on the count of three, released them into the perfect blue heavens of that day. That moment on film — those little, honest notes to God — was sheer innocence and joy.

So as the parents watched this video that night, all 300 kids sang this, live:

What can I give Him
Poor as I am
If I were a shepherd
I would give a lamb
If I were a wise man
I would do my part
But what I can,
I give Him
I give Him my heart

It’s a perfect, simple song. But the kids BLURTED it out with all their hearts, as if it were the only thing they cared about in the whole wide world. And as they sang, “I give Him my heart,” the balloons floated heavenward on that giant screen.

The whole show was a series of miraculous, perfect moments. I was literally stunned. People came up to us afterwards, crying — CRYING:

“Thank you. Thank you for using Michaela. She’s been so sad.”
“Thank you for using Dale’s artwork. He’s so shy, but he got to have a part in this.”
“Thank you for just letting the kids be kids.”

I couldn’t believe it. I’d never felt more proud. I was bursting. So proud of those kids. So proud of My Beloved, who brought all my ideas to LIFE. And so proud of myself, too. Because I was sure I couldn’t pull it off. Because just weeks before, I’d been panicking, not sleeping, because I had NO idea what I was going to do for this show.

Donna came up afterwards, mumured tepid praise. We just stood there looking at each other, clutching the giant bouquets of roses the headmaster had presented to BOTH of us at the end of the show, acknowledging us as equals in front of the thousand people in attendance.

I accepted her tepid praise tepidly.

The next day, I said out of the blue to My Beloved, “If there’s any threat to my job, it’s Donna.”

“Why on EARTH would you say that NOW?” he asked.

“Just a feeling is all,” I replied.

Guess who has my job now?

(part 2 to come)