when you meet young people at their most potent yet also most vulnerable moments, you can't help but be marked by their lives. Good teachers I argue are as marked by the lives of their students as their students are marked by their teaching.
I'd been teaching for about six years when I met Bart (a bald pseudonym; this young man is the least likely person to be named Bart). From day one, he saw right into me -- there was no bullshitting him -- and he reciprocated: he gave me no bullshit. Bart never made excuses when he missed assignments, never falling back on the travails of his personal life as an explanation of his spotty schoolwork. This guy was hands-down the most frank student I had ever encountered. In class, for almost two years, I valued his commentary, his questions, his relentless challenges; he kept me and his classes honest, open.
I was crushed when just a few years after he left high school his sweetheart of several years, also a former student, was murdered, shot as she opened the door to their home. Months after her death, I will never forget holding this man, man-among-men as he had heretofore portrayed himself, wracked by sobs, inconsolable.
I was stunned about eight months later when Bart, along with another man, was arrested for his sweetheart's murder. The local newspaper reported he paid $1000 for her murder with a $100 bonus if the killing was done before Christmas.
I was stunned. Bart?
I was stunned. Bart?
$1000 for a human life? $1100 for expediency, a stocking stuffer? Bart?
Though he was eventually released because of insufficient evidence, I remain conflicted. Was what I shared with him grief -- GRIEF, irreparable loss of a loved one -- or was it cover-up, denial, the guilt of the guilty? Will we/I ever know the truth?
A couple nights ago, Bart and I crossed paths for the third time since his arrest. What I have wanted to say to him: " Bart, either way, this sucks. If you did what the local newspaper has convicted you of, it sucks. How the hell could you have killed her? How the hell can you take a human life so casually? If you didn't do what they claim you did, it sucks. You've already had to live the life of a convict, ostracized, hounded in your home town (you spoke of having your tires slashed days before). You're life will never be the same. You're life will never be the same."
I wonder how honest Bart can be. I wonder why I haven't been as honest as I would like to be. I wonder how honest any human being can be.