Life Lessons

I am totally caught up in this Facebook business. I have reconnected with friends that I haven't talked to in years! Today, someone posted a picture from my 2nd grade class! Looking at it brought back so many memories and some of us started writing to each other.  We were all laughing about games we used to play, our teachers and the joys of being an office aide. 

A little later in the day, one of my classmates sent me a note and I want to share what he wrote: 

"Tracee, I have to tell you as an aside that I don't have many regrets in this life. One of them, however, involves you.

Back in the Sycamore days, I called you a name on the playground that was especially mean. It was probably because I had a crush on you at the time (I was never the rock-throwing type). In any case, you handled it with such diginity and maturity that the rudeness of my remark and your very thoughtful response have stuck with me all of these years. You told me (I think a day or two later) that what I said had hurt you, that it was wrong of me to say, and that it was beneath me.

I apologized, as I recall. But it was one of those lesson-moments that stick with you forever. In any case, thanks for forgiving me back then and thanks for the lesson."

We are 36 years old now! And he still remembers this day! (I have absolutely no recollection of this moment.) But reading this made me think of something ... this had almost nothing to do with me and almost everything to do with my mother. 

I was always short. My ears stuck out and eventually, my near-sighted eyes forced me to wear glasses. But my mom was always pushing me to stick up for myself. Whether it was when I came back to the car without an ice cream cone because someone had cut in front of me in line at 31 Flavors or when I came to the car crying because Andrea Pollard had told me that she was going to kick my ass every day after school for a week ... My mom somehow got me to believe that I should just march right up to these people and say, "EXCUSE ME! I AM NEXT!" or "IF YOU'RE GOING TO KICK MY ASS, THEN WHY DON'T YOU JUST DO IT?" (This one was particularly scary ... Andrea Pollard was rumored to have a boyfriend named Spike and they supposedly met at the graveyard at night to make out!)

My mom instilled a self-confidence in me that has allowed me to be the person I am today. I'm not always totally sure of myself, but sometimes I can hear her cheering me on and it gives me enough courage to just pretend! Looking back now, I see what a gift that was ... Thank you, Mom, for encouraging me to stand up for myself. This is just one of the great things that you have done for me as a mom.  And it wasn't just a life lesson for me - it also touched another person enough to make them remember that day on the playground almost 30 years later.

That's me in the front row on the left.