You Just Never Know

February, 2010

I do a fair share of whining about having to say "so long" to kids that I get attached to in The Shakespeare Club. Let's face it, they have busy lives with new schools to attend, new friends to make and new teachers to admire. I can hardly begrudge them for disappearing simply because I stay put. It's the way of the world.

I found myself regurgitating these thoughts one weekend. We arrived home after seeing a Sunday afternoon movie and the answering machine was blinking. I strolled past, pressed the button and kept walking because the only messages we seem to receive are robocalls. And then I stopped when I heard familiar voices on the speakerphone:

Hello Ms. Ryane, good afternoon. This is Kate and Geoffrey.

We had a fantastic performance on Friday — Saturday — and we we're just here to thank you for all your help for leading us to the path of acting.

Hello Ms. Ryane, this is Kate and I just want to say thank you because our performances were outstanding and everybody was congratulating us because of your wonderful training that you have given us in fifth grade and those three years.

Hope everything is going fine with you, Ms. Ryane, and your husband or boyfriend, and we hope to call you and write to you later on in the future.

Thank you, good bye.

Oh. Sniff. Oh, oh.

This brother/sister team is now in middle school. I returned the call and they told me about a play they did at their church. They said school was good. I told them we missed them in the club. It wasn't a long conversation, just enough balm on my aching heart to make everything, in that moment, right with the world.

They're going to be fine, those two. They'll be swell out there in the universe. The Shakespeare Club is intended to expose children to empowerment. That these kids even made this call proved its worth.

My husband or boyfriend gave me a hug and then transcribed the phone call for me. I took a breath and decided to do even better in the upcoming week because you just never know when or how it'll pay off.

CHILDREN'S WRITES: A Journal Entry

I want to be in Shakespeare club becuase I wanted to act and pretend to be someone, I wanted to know if Shakespeare would be fun, I want to learn about acting

I learned that there is a sickniss called Black Death that you get really fast. I learnd that William Shakespeare had a child and two twins. I learned girls can't go to shool and be a actor.

—Page, 3rd grade