There are all these "shoulds" I keep encountering in my life:
I SHOULD have been married by now.
I SHOULD have had children by now.
I SHOULD have become a famous actress by now.
I SHOULD, I SHOULD, I SHOULD, I SHOULD... ENOUGH!!!!
I SHOULD, BY NOW, know better than "should-ing" all over myself because it produces nothing more than a whole pile of shame and shoulds!
I received yesterday, via certified mail, my lay-off notice from the school district I gave only one school year to... I am happy to have finally received it. It was the most challenging teaching assignment I have ever had. I can say I hated my time there. I have never disliked a job as much as I disliked this one and I feel I "SHOULDN'T" have... perhaps because I learned so much about the students and the community in which I was teaching. Now, they SHOULD be unhappy and hate their lives, but they don't. They don't make excuses for where they live or HOW they live and they certainly don't complain as much as I did... but maybe I SHOULD give myself a break since I had no idea what I was getting myself into and these students' of mine and their friends and families grew up in it and are thriving... maybe just surviving... or really maybe thriving because they don't allow the poverty, and the crime, that surrounds them to dictate how they SHOULD feel about themselves, their lives, or their futures.
I, on the other hand, take things to heart a lot. I don't know WHO I think I SHOULD be, but often I feel like I need to be Wonder Woman to those I see as less fortunate than me. Is that arrogant? Perhaps. Maybe I am the less fortunate one because I haven't acquired the thick skin that most of my students have at such a young age, and I think I SHOULD have by my age. But I really feel a deep sense of need to give of myself to those that haven't had the same opportunities that I have been blessed with, but how, if when they look at me they see something so different from them just by the color of my skin? You see, I SHOULD have been born in another era. I SHOULD have been born another race. My skin SHOULD be a different color. Or should it?
As the school year wound down, my students and some of their family members, stopped seeing my skin color as a disadvantage at reaching and teaching them... so much so, that at the end of the year, my students said, "AH, Ms. Cunningham you SHOULD come back here to teach next year!" "They SHOULDN'TA laid you off, you're the best teacher this school ever had!" I didn't know how to explain that when your position is eliminated and you've been told you're laid off you can't do anything about it. The funny thing is my students' knew how I felt about working there. They knew I didn't approve of a lot of their behavior, especially one class period. However, they also knew I loved them and they didn't get it... I don't get me sometimes either. Maybe it's because I SHOULD have had children by now... and I guess I DO... my students', many of them, are like the children I have yet to birth... IF that is even ever to happen. I do love them. I SHOULD love them, they came to love me even though I really SHOULDN'T have made it through the school year. I was determined to prove to some of my "brats" that it doesn't matter what color your skin is, you SHOULD try to embrace everyone because you CAN learn from anyone.
One disrespectful student disrupted my class one day to verbally punch me with, "Ms. Cunningham, you're not going to last here!" He meant the school year. At times I thought he might be right and perhaps to spite him, I stuck it out to the bitter end. This same student became one of my cheerleaders... he didn't like his classmates' being rude to me or even getting close to me because he felt protective of me in some ways... it was kind of sweet the seeming jealousy he acquired toward me. He shouldn't have had this transformation, but love does that sometimes. Love SHOULD NOT see color, or any other life circumstance get in the way of its transforming ways... I guess it didn't. I shouldn't have loved that student. I shouldn't miss any of them, but I do - that's what love SHOULD do... to me too.
I SHOULD get to work on my thesis now.
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