The Village

Over my teaching career, I’ve been lucky enough to have had teaching colleagues that were so much more than fellow teachers. More like sisters and mothers and daughters and, maybe a grouchy aunt or two.

It makes sense that these intimate relationships develop; after all I spend more time with these women than my own family. It’s easy to pull myself together for a family reunion once a year, or a church service on Sunday, but pulling myself together from 7:00 – 4:00 every single work day can’t be done, and I’ve discovered that the people that see me when I am completely undone and don’t walk away, are the friends that will bail me out of jail and ask questions later.

Our profession and gender probably play a factor in these villages we create. As teachers, it’s a given that we care deeply about people and relationships, that our job is more than the paycheck. And, at the risk of being stereotypical , our gender (or perhaps the lessons that our mothers have taught us) dictates that we require a pack or a village to support and care for us. A pack that makes us appear less vulnerable and more bad-ass than perhaps we really are.

Over the years, I’ve discovered that school villages know no boundaries. They will tell you that you need to look into some anxiety medicine. That you have some hairs on your chin. That you need to keep your mouth shut during a faculty meeting. 

The village friends know what you like to drink from McDonald’s. They know your favorite donut, and they will take things from your desk drawers or closet, even when you’re not there. They are the same friends that will say you had an emergency if you get a phone call right after school, when you really needed to leave for a hair appointment. And they will swear on the Bible that you were there for a professional development, even if they have no memory of August at all.

Those same noisy, opinionated friends will mourn with you when the loss seems unbearable. They will load up your stuff in a pickup when a divorce is the only answer. They will plan a wedding for your daughter and celebrate as new life comes to your family. They can even be quiet with you when there are no easy answers. They will hold you in their arms and tell you that it’s going to be okay because you are not alone.

This week my mother’s friend, Irene Hadley, passed away. She was 89 and was a beloved member of my mother’s own teaching village and the first to die.

It hadn’t occurred to me that my mother’s village is very similar to my own, and one that I’ve bore witness to for more than 40 years. Mrs. Hadley was a senior member. The quiet, level-headed one that offered to say prayers and light candles. No doubt the dynamics of my mother’s village will shift with the empty place in at least a subtle way, but I’m sure when some tragedy hits their circle and they are loudly complaining, someone will step up and offer to light the candle for Mrs. Hadley. That’s what villages do.

In hindsight, I’m probably as thankful for Mom’s village as my own. They can keep her in check with chin hairs, and they can listen to her concerns for me and tell her I’m really doing just fine. They can listen to her complain and vent, then put her back together and send her home to my dad.

Her village can love her in ways that none of the rest of us can, and she’s better because of it.

Her village has carried her for more than 40 years. Here’s hoping mine will do the same.