Thank you.
The other day Ali talked a bit about her Week in the Life project. It’s an important project. I knew that.
I just didn’t know how important.
The page above is one from the week I chronicled in her class last summer. I chronicled the week beginning July 3rd, 2006. It was a week of working hard and playing hard…trying to get lots of done before end of term (school here goes nearly to the end of July), doing some extra little jobs I love despite their need for time (photographing awards assemblies and end of year projects, that sort of thing). A week wherein the 4th was an ordinary day but perhaps the 7th was not. A week with Orange Wednesdays, Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom and Krispy Kreme.
It was a really good week.
On Tuesday’s entry, there is an entire panel dedicated to one student receiving his award in assembly and how much I had learned from him. A boy I taught when he was eleven years old and much like anybody else. A boy who went through something at twelve that no one should ever have to go through. How watching him go from the brink to winning awards, all with a smile on his face reminded me that my fights are small. That I am incredibly blessed. That there is so much to live for.
It’s something I might have thought about a little, but without this project, I wouldn’t have thought to record it. But I did. And it was hard to do without tears, if I’m honest, but if there had been tears, they would have been good ones. Tears from moments when we realise we can be very, very lucky to brush with certain people in our lives. People like that boy who stood in front of my camera with a certificate and a smile.
Thank you, Ali, for something you really could not have known you were doing. Not quite.
And thank you to another A, for everything you taught me in that short time. I promise to remember.
May you rest in peace.
xlovesx
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