Principals reporting, "My teachers aren't all right." Teachers reporting, "My students are hurting." I even experienced how one school has restructured its entire day in support of the young people they are teaching, needing to process the past few years.
Then today, because I was in my office after teaching an 8 a.m. turbo and my door was open, Three different students stopped by my office asking for help, and simply reported they were not okay. Two of the students I've had in class before and one I didn't know, but they said they needed someone to talk to and "all the doors are closed."
Reality check.
Between 700 and a 1,000 people continue to die each day as a result of Covid. Russian is invading Ukraine. Our campus is what our campus is. Kids who do not fit the upper, middle class, suburban personas, feel threatened in every step they take. Everything is triggering them. They don't want to leave their dorm rooms.
All I can do is coach, mentor, ask questions, and guide these young people to the professional counseling services on campus, although that is the site of what has been triggering them because they don't feel they matter. What a ruckus. I had to tap my inner-high school teacher and trained peer counselor days to be an active listener and to take in all that was being processed. Most often I restated what I was hearing and put questions back to them.
I realize this is what Principals are getting from their teachers, teachers from their students. Home lives aren't what they should be, and the world is upside after several years of vitriol, wrath, and unprofessional banter from the top making it seem that cruelty and no accountability is okay.
Thick skin comes from enduring...getting up...building layers to protect the self, but also knowing that one's self-esteem comes from resiliency...trusting that the self is much more than what is being narrated upon you...us...them. It doesn't matter. The heaviness is extra heavy right now and everyone is looking for ways to make it lighter. Some blame. Some lash out. Some curl up with ignorance and spit venom at anyone that comes near them.
It's hard to say, "Just be the better man. Just be the better woman. Just be better" when you're still finding out who you are and where you belong in the universe.
I always think of a colleague of my mom's who disappeared for a while when the world became too much for her. I was still young, but whispers of concerned people searching for her came across our phone and I could hear. Eventually they found her in a hotel eating Oreo cookies (good choice), but she needed to get away from it all. To nestle in a safe space until she could process the world would be okay.
I think the world will be okay. There's never been a time without turbulence, and even when you think there has, that might not be true for other populations around the world...other cultures....the person next door.
So, I listened from 11 a.m. until 2 p.m. - missed lunch and didn't accomplish what I was on campus to do (I arrived at 6 a.m. to get on top of the game, taught, then thought I could work in my office). I missed meetings. I missed phone calls. I missed texts. But I listened.
And I hope this was enough light to guide these young people for another day. I know many might say, "Well, your problem is you'r ein your office and you leave your door open."
Actually, I consider it my blessing. I feel fortunate to be in the right spot at the right time, although not what I planned for my day.