“Now grab a girl’s name, we can’t forget the girls,” I say as Boogie Down rises to the tips of his high-tops, stretching to reach higher into the plastic prickles of the Giving Tree. The Big Deal, tightly clutching his Ten Year Old Boy card, says, “Let’s get him an Xbox One.” He’s serious. “Great idea, you can pay for that yourself!" Silence.
Each holiday season we hit the Wal-Mart Giving Tree. I try to make this annual trip to Wal-Mart my only trip to Wal-Mart. We get there later every year. I guess it’s a good thing because most of the younger ages have been taken, we’re happily stuck with the double-digit kids. My heart aches for the names we leave behind; it’s as if they’re watching me walk away... Hey Mister, what about me? What about me? Our tardiness to the tree makes our goodwill trip seem an afterthought, but it’s not. I think about helping a lot more than I actually do. I am always slightly ashamed when I hear about families who go and serve at a soup kitchen or make turkey sandwiches by the hundreds. We should do better. We should do more. For now, it’s the family trip to the Giving Tree.
As teachers, my wife and I get a steady dose of reminders that there are quite a few in our community living under extreme pressures. Many of these stories make their way to dinner table conversation, to the ears of my sons. The boy who, at 5, was dropped off on a DC corner by his mother, yet somehow made his way back home to the Virginia suburbs. He hoped that his sudden exit from the vehicle had been a mistake, that his mom accidentally left him behind. It was no mistake. Then there's the usually quiet girl who excitedly told me, “By spring, we get to move out of the shelter and into our own house! Finally!” She exuded such relief. Spring came and went with no big announcement from her. I was afraid to ask. Year after year, story after story, one as depressing as the next; my boys are no strangers to these real-life dramas. Whoever said you shouldn’t bring work home with you has never known a school teacher.
Boogie Down and Big Deal have always shown genuine compassion for others, they wouldn’t mind seeing Dad get a $100 ticket making an illegal U-turn in order to give the man holding the “hungry” sign on the median one dollar. We’re still waiting for Baby Dynamite to demonstrate this selflessness trait, for now it’s all about him and violently so. At the moment, my two older sons look forward to doing their part, helping those in need (with my money, it should be noted).
Don’t get the wrong impression of my school. It is a tremendously economically diverse place. The socioeconomic extremes are striking. And here I am, a teacher, smack dab in the middle in every sense.
Not long ago I asked my students to take out their assignments, another due date had arrived. After two weeks of hard work, it was time to collect the fruits of their labor. “Make sure your names, date and period are at the top. I will no longer grade anything without a name!” I lied. I made my way down the desk rows collecting from most, hearing excuses from a few. I never ask in public why one is without, but guilty consciences often force a handful to offer an explanation anyway, deferring their right to remain silent. Guilt is a strange thing. The bell sounded ending class as I searched for a paper clip. The hourly hallway stampede was on again, but I noticed a couple of stragglers milling about the classroom. Don’t they know to never stray from the herd? I engaged one, “So what happened? I see you didn’t have your assignment.” Sheepishly the young lady looked up at me and said, “I’m really sorry, Mr. Ransom. My family went to Iceland last week and I didn’t get a chance to do it. I’m so sorry; I can do it this weekend!” Inside I’m thinking how much better a trip to Iceland is than any dumb Create Your Own Continent map activity. I mean, fjords, black sand beaches, volcanoes, geysers, waterfalls, the meeting place of two tectonic plates…the northern lights! Now that’s a field trip! We talked for a moment about her experiences, agreed Monday would be fine (with a slight deduction) and she moved along to her next destination. Problem solved. “Need a hall pass?” I asked. “No thanks,” she smiled, “nobody says anything. Thanks, Mr. Ransom!”
Up came the next straggler in wait. This one was more sheepish than the first, a slender boy. “What happened buddy? How come you didn’t turn yours in? I even saw you were off to a good start in class.” His feet flattened and shoulders slumped, “I don’t know. I tried, I guess.” I have to admit, this wasn’t quite out of character for this guy. “You tried? You guess?” I just had a feeling I needed to pry a bit, not sure if it was teacher intuition or parent intuition, or some combination thereof. Something wasn’t right. The sheepishness had taken on a look of pure stress. After a short talk, it was clear. He’d not finished the assignment because he was too hungry at home to work. His mom, he told me, works two jobs, sometimes three, in order to scrape together money for food. It obviously wasn’t enough; his feet were bigger than mine. He relies on the school’s free breakfast and lunch for the bulk of his meals. Weekends are especially tough. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I just can’t concentrate when I’m hungry,” he said peering at the dirty floor tiles, as if he had offered up a dumb excuse. I couldn’t stop the flashback from entering my head: There I was standing in front of a stocked fridge calling angrily to my mother, “MOM! There’s nothing to eat in this HOUSE!” Shame on me. The young man and I hammered out a solution to complete his work. Problem solved? I went on to shuffling papers, oh, and to find that paperclip. “Um, Mr. Ransom,” he was still standing there. “I need a hall pass. Somebody’ll say something,” he reminded.
Same town, same school, same classroom, same teacher… two totally different worlds. The two students who stood nearly shoulder to shoulder were totally clueless about the world in which the other lives. To truly understand each other, and ourselves for that matter, we’ve got to tune in to our neighbors. I guess that’s why it is so important for me to keep my sons connected with the realities of others. The sad stories that sometimes permeate our dinnertime discussions are our attempts as parents to keep the boys from getting so buried under a pile of plastic toys that they can’t see when others are in need; to keep them from floating into the far reaches of cyberspace, so far that they can’t hear when others cry for help. The Giving Tree has much to give them; the feeling that they’re not powerless to make a difference for a neighbor, even if that neighbor is a stranger. We should do more, I know. And it’s not all selflessness and gallantry. Making our way through the busy Wal-Mart aisles, hunting a gift for the person that lives behind the label 13-Year-Old Girl is filled with barking reminders, “Gentlemen, we’re not shopping for you!” and “Boys stop looking at that stuff! Remember why we’re here!” All while I pretend not to notice that the paper-thin 70” 4K Samsung TV on the back wall is whispering my name.
Some of us teachers used to do “home visits” to get a better understanding of our more challenging students, trying to gain insight on why they’re so bad (that’s right, I sad it). I’d leave many of these “home visits” wondering how these children were so good. A whole understanding was born; a whole new relationship grew. What happened? I got to know my “neighbors”.
No Child Left Behind legislation never worked. What would happen if we actively paid attention to our neighbors and began behaving like a community? The result just might be No child left behind!