A Good Change

So, some of you know that I started blogging long before I started blogging.

Part of it was when Mate was working and going to school and I was alone with Big T and Chicken when they were in diapers. I would save up kid stories to tell him on his one day off, so he wouldn’t feel like he was missing too much.

The other part was teaching. We were encouraged to tell kids about ourselves, to humanize ourselves. “Yes, I have a family and a husband and you’ll hear me tell kid stories–I try to make them fun.”

So when I started blogging, even though it was supposed to be about knitting or writing or whatever, I also told kid stories–and every now and then one of you tells me that the family stories mean more to them than I ever imagined. (Which is why I keep telling them, honestly, even though the blog is pretty passe as a marketing tool atm.)

My students told me the same thing. Having a teacher who talked to them as someone with experience in a family made them feel more comfortable about their OWN families–even if sometimes they were dysfunctional.

We were supposed to be role models and authority figures and accessible all in one.

Unless of course we were gay.

Because if a teacher told students he or she was gay, then the administration could use that as a tool to keep them from getting tenure and everybody knew it. (I didn’t. Seriously. It’s one of the things I had to open my eyes to, because I didn’t realize the world was THAT STUPID. But I did learn. *sigh*)

My daughter came home today all excited about a new teacher. The old one got fired for being a racist douche and not that I’m glad she was a racist douche but I was glad to hear she wasn’t allowed to be one.

The new one is nice and fun and has a lot of good energy and does standup in her spare time.

And has a wife.

And that was okay.

The kids were fine with it. The teachers wear little rainbows on their nametags to tell the students that they’re LGBTQ friendly and the kids can confide in them and they’re safe. This teacher was just doing what the other teachers do–share details about their lives so the students know they’re interacting with human beings.

Eight and a half years ago I was pulled out of my classroom for giving kids a book that said romance was just fine for gay kids.

Is everything perfect? No. Can there be positive change? ALWAYS.

But I’m pretty sure that the same thing that happened to me eight years ago wouldn’t happen to another teacher like me now.

And this makes me really happy.

It seems I’ve spent the past twelve years blogging looking for a reason to have faith in the world. Sometimes it was betrayed and sometimes it was rewarded and sometimes it was renewed.

This teacher may never know it, because my kids don’t talk much about me and what I do for a living, but I’d like to thank her for teaching and fighting the good fight and being a human and an authority figure all rolled into one.

And for giving my faith a win.