Real loss.

Just last week, I wrote about how upset I was about losing a football game. I also stated that in the grand scheme that is life, losing a football game is almost meaningless. That could not have been made clear in the last two days. 

Yesterday I took a sick day from work because I was feeling overwhelmed, overtired, and just straight up exhausted. The past three weeks have been insane and busy and I am not ashamed to say I needed a day to myself. For the first time in my nine year teaching career, I took a mental health day. (My second day off the entire school year. Only second to the personal day I took after the marathon. I deserved this.) I needed to take a day and really take care of myself, get my thoughts together, and get a final pick-me-up for the rest of the home stretch of the school year. After a run, completing some errands and treating myself to lunch, I made my way to Central Park to simply just relax and take in some sun.  As I finished opening my blanket, my phone rang and it was my assistant principal calling. She had already texted me in the morning to see if I was okay because, like I said, I don't really ever miss school so I was curious why she was calling me on my "sick day."  When I picked up the phone, she had told me she had some very bad news for me that she had to tell me before I saw the news or heard from anywhere else. One of my ninth grade students, a 14-year-old boy, had been hit by a car and killed that morning. I was shocked. Sad. And devastated. This quiet, shy boy whom I not only taught in class (who I had inside jokes with (nicknames and science raps) and loved to see smile, laugh and break out of his shell a little) was also in my homeroom, was now dead. Gone. Fourteen years old. My heart hurt. Cue my utter shock and disbelief and the tears. The many, many tears. 

My AP filled me in on how this was being handled at school and how they hadn't told the kids yet but were about to go into the class of mine that he should have been in at that time. We talked (cried) a bit more and then I really broke down. I called my parents hysterically and told them what happened.

This was real loss. Fuck the fucking football game. This boy is dead and his family is heartbroken and will probably never be the same.

Then I did what I now consider a mistake. I looked online to see if there was anything about the accident and of course there was. I read the article, which only made things worse. It explained how this young man was running to catch the bus to school early and got hit by a car. I began to sob again. From that point on, all I could do was picture him running with his big braces-filled smile in his school uniform and black hoody to catch that bus and that car just hitting him. Devastation. Is this real? How could this have really happened? He'll just show up at school tomorrow because this was a bad dream. He's way too young to be gone.

Of course then, I began thinking a number of things...
     -How are his parents handling this?
     -How can they go on after a tragedy like this?
     -Did he have siblings? (How did I not know this?)
     -How are my students handling this right now?
     -How am I going to teach the rest of the year looking at his empty seat without breaking down?
     -How can I look at his work? His binder? Lab folder?
            (When I was grading papers trying to keep my mind busy today, I came upon his homework assignment and lost it again. Oy.)
     -How could this happen? This was a teenager with a whole life ahead of him. He was so young. So excited to learn. So happy. How could this happen?

I also began to wish I was there for the students in my class. I felt so guilty I wasn't there for them although I probably would have been a bad example of how to handle this with my blubbering self. As I've previously stated, I am lucky enough to not have had to deal with a lot of death in my life and am already a huge crybaby as it is about so many things and this was no different. I was most certainly not okay. The rest of the day I just kept sobbing on and off. I barely slept last night because I just thinking about him running across the street. About him getting hit by that car. Hoping at least that he didn't suffer. That poor little boy. This is heartbreaking.

****

Today at work was very difficult to say the least.  Almost the moment I walked in the building, I began to sob. It lasted most of the day on and off. We had crisis counselors in the building for staff and students. I didn't feel the need to talk out my sadness to a stranger. No amount of talking will make me feel any less sad. I've talked (read: sobbed) to my parents and my best friend. (Unfortunately she has been through the same thing, more than once, so she can sympathize with this. And unfortunately, I hate to say it, this is not the first student of mine that has passed away. I had a former student die in the East Harlem gas explosion this year and her brother, another former student, get severely injured in the same accident. I was so upset over that, but this tragedy has just been a whole other level of sadness.)  This is something that 1) you will NEVER get use to (or have to) and 2)  just have to cry through and eventually it will get easier. I can only hope its the same for his classmates and his family. 

So many of my students came up to me right away and offered hugs to me before I got the chance to even offer them to them. They seemed to be handling it pretty well. Perhaps they process it differently and want to be strong in front of their friends. They were more concerned that I was okay. Some of my favorite girls came to me because in my absence, when they heard there was bad news, they were very scared it was me that was hurt (or worse). And then when they found out I wasn't, they just wanted to make sure I found out what happened.  It was so sweet of them, but I want to make sure they are okay and will be okay. This tragedy is something that might not hit them until tomorrow or next week. They have so many other battles they constantly fight and I worry that the stress of state testing and this will eat at them. I know I am overemotional and this has been eating at me too the last two days. I also know things will get easier. They have to. They will. Until then, all we can do is go about our lives and remember this boy for his big bright smile and the joy he brought to his friends and his family and hope that this is something that none of us should get use to.