Originally uploaded by PackRatty McRatterson
I had a really rough time during high school. Somewhere in between the poop in my locker and a teacher inciting violence against me, I had had enough. The day my principal screamed in my face that I was "too stupid for advanced classes", I walked out. Nobody really reached out until I had been gone for more than a month. Then one day, I got a letter from my English teacher.
I won't disclose exactly what it said, but it motivated me to go through the process of finding the right psychologist who worked as an advocate for me. I went back to school. I still struggled to make myself go or care, but I felt much better knowing that *someone* in a position of authority cared about me, and saw what was going on.
His class ruined Shakespeare for me forever, but he saved my life.
He hated grackles. His hall pass was a baseball. I had autographed it at some point because I was a smartass. On the last day of school, he tracked me down and gave it to me.
He died days later, before I had a chance to tell him (or before I had grown up enough to realize) what his letter had done.
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