They were the most lovable bunch of kids ever. I taught all three grade levels my year at Boerne Middle School (’83-’84). My one sixth grade class and homeroom was a crazy mix, including ESL students, all boys, that didn’t know a lick of English. They were the children of undocumented migrant workers whom ranchers paid $2 for a 12 hour day. Made my blood boil. They were tiny, the darkest brown, sat in the back, hunched over, and only looked sideways to giggle at each other. The rules in their world were to never look white people in the face and never speak to them. Just do what they’re told. When I spoke to them they just looked down until I went away. Not much science learning. Sometimes they giggled too much. My room buddy, Sam Champion, had a real human skull on our desk that was wired back together and hinged at the jaw and cranium. His name was Charlie or Carlos. When the giggling got to be too much I put my hand in the back of Carlos like a puppet and flapped his jaw while saying in an old witch’s voice, “¡Callete!” That was all it took to restore order in the back row for about a week. You couldn’t help but love those little boys.
The rest of the crew was a real mix of personalities. There was a boy suffering from a liver or kidney problem that made his skin yellow. He had the most positive attitude about everything. Very infectious. The attitude I mean. I don’t remember his name but he needs one for the sake of this story. We’ll call him Louie. My favorite student was a tall girl named Rachel Reibe. She was so confident, talkative and lived to debate anything with me. Even when she ran her ship aground, she just backed it up and stoked the furnaces. She was friendly and sincere. I loved seeing her come through the door. She gave me a sort-of-selfie of us at field day. Rare.
Field day at the end of the year was all about sporting events and much to my chagrin, the teams were the homerooms. Ugh. I would say we spent the day getting clobbered but it was worse than that as I tried to explain how the games were played and who was supposed to do what. Not only was English a barrier for many, they had never played or even heard of most of the games. The rest of the team didn’t have much more experience and even less physical coordination. We had fun but the final game was the biggest challenge.
It was supposed to be softball but I am fairly certain we had to use a hard baseball. We were up to bat first. No one got any lumber on the ball so we just put kids on base and let them run with the pitch. There would be two or three kids on a single base holding hands or they would take off running, for no reason, in the wrong direction. So we switched them to the field. Not a single kid had brought a glove. Most of them didn't own one. I didn’t want any of them missing out so I spread their skinny little butts all over the field like oleo on toast. If the other team hit a grounder, our players just watched the ball roll between them. If it came toward them they scootched away. I finally convinced them to pick the ball up but instead of throwing it they ran to their best friend and handed it to them. By now the score was a zillion to nothing in the bottom of the first. I was ready to pack it in when Louie begged me to let him play. I had not put him on the field because he was four feet tall and seriously fragile. I would not be the teacher that got Louie hit in the face with a line drive. I said OK, but just one out. The batter was right handed so I put Louie on the opposite side between first and second. Jiminy, why didn’t I put him in the outfield? The batter hit a screaming one hop grounder right at Louie’s face. Then something happened we never could have imagined. He whipped off his oversized baseball hat, fielded the ball with it, and threw it to first base. The batter never took a step. I shouted, “We won! We won!” and the team took up the chant. They tried to pick up Louie to carry him off which scared me way more than the ground ball. As we ran away to tell the rest of the school I could hear our opponent exclaiming, “Hey! We were winning 28 to nothing!”. But no….we won. Oh yes we did.
What I am looking for is a blessing not in disguise. - Jerome K. Jerome
Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else. - Margaret Mead
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