Reunion

This past weekend was my high school reunion.  I had a really good time seeing old friends, meeting spouses and babies, and networking with members of my class and older classes.  I sang for the retirement party of my old Choir director, who was truly amazing and will be sorely missed. 

There were lots of moments that made me think--especially in light of my posts about dress codes and school.  Many members of my class hold clothing in high esteem.  I realize that clothing is a status symbol and all, and that at reunion you want to look good.  I, personally, had spent quite a while picking outfits and making sure I had a dress for each night and that they were the appropriate level of formal.  I tried to make sure they were tasteful, while still being fun. 

Believe me, I was pretty damn surprised to see one of the women, who has a 4 month old baby, show up wearing a silk dress.  Now, to be fair, she looked fantastic in it.  I hope I, too, will look that good when my hypothetical baby is 4 months old!  However, this woman quickly proved that she was still as spoiled as she always had been, because she was a) surprised and b) ran off crying when her 4 month old baby spit up on her dress. 

There are many things I could say about this.  I do not have children, but many of my friends do and I babysit for them a lot, so that my friends get breaks.  However, I guess what it made me realize, even though I knew this theoretically, is that I think practically, learned to laugh at myself, and don't run away from my problems.  This is clearly something that this particular woman never learned to do.  She had always struggled with it in high school, and I guess I had always assumed she would grow out of it.  I felt badly for her husband, who had not gone to school with us and was a stranger to us and to the culture, left alone with a crying baby, while his wife fled her problems and wept inside. 

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised at such childish, petty behavior from an adult...I mean, I see it every day.  But I try to hope that people will grow up.  But this one little incident left me thinking the whole weekend about learning to function as an adult human being in the Real World.  We don't do a great job teaching students how to do so. 

Instead, we teach them that you can hide from your problems, that it's OK to do something as long as no one sees/finds out, that everything is high stress and high stakes.  Instead, the real life skills are that you have to think practically, and that you have to learn to take life with a sense of humor. 

I guess, the best place I can take this is to two simple words that adorn the front wall of my classroom: DON'T PANIC.  Approach things rationally.  So, how do we teach our students and our children and ourselves to do this?  What are the steps and lessons that we should teach?