Witness

I taught kindergärtners the past two days. I have witnessed a few things. here are three in no particular order that had me grinning at one point or another (don't judge, somethings are funny, especially in hind sight).

• A little girl had just gotten a drink of water, and stated to no one in particular "There is a lot of water in the sea."
• A boy accidentally spilled his milk on the floor. After I had replaced it and arranged for it to be cleaned up, the youth said, "I didn't see that coming."

The third needs a little introduction, given that I may find a deluge of mail telling me how uncaring I am. Or, perhaps, how mean I am. Honestly, it wasn't my fault. I really am sympathetic to the various digestive, respiratory, and cardio-pulmonary systems of the students I teach. That said, here is the third thing I witnessed.

• At the end of the day, I had bus duty. That meant that I and several other teachers watched the kids while they waited for the buses. That was going well apart from being cold and more than a little windy. Then, just as the final bus was rounding the corner in to view, a couple little boys in the line for the last bus called to me. One of them had been in my class today. After a little bit of talking at the same time, I gathered that the little boy from my class had to go to the bathroom. I looked at the bus coming up, then back to him. "Can't you hold it?" The answer was part grown, part moan, "Nooooo!" I looked to the principal and tried to get her attention, to tell her we needed to hold the bus for a minute or two. She didn't hear me. I turned back to check on the boy and his expression of consternation and, perhaps, pain changed to surprise and anguish. His entire body gave a slight convulsion and a dark stain began to grow on his pants, and then the flood really let go. The whole time he was trying to stem the flow with his fingers, which apparently on served to accelerate the flow, as you might with a garden hose...this merely made the spectacle a little less interesting than those waterworks outside those Las Vegas Hotels...instead of simply flowing down his trowsers, it came out away from his body and was caught by the wind. It spattered onto the pants leg of his friend. It left an interesting pattern on the ground, since it was not a completely free flow. With the flow of urine came the flow of tears. It was about this time, as my eyes took in and my brain cataloged the spectacle, that the principal turned her attention to the yowling mass that was three boys distressed over a natural body process in a most socially un-natural place! I stated the obvious. She said get him to the office to see if we could get a hold of someone to pick him up. Until then she would hold the bus. I pointed to the office, but made no attempt to grab his hand...or touch him. He followed. When we got in the office. I asked him if he still needed to use the bathroom. He said, "No." I guess that should also have been obvious. Still, I thought I should ask. And, he DID look like he was feeling better. We got the secretary on the case. I asked him if he wanted to wash his hands. He said, "Yes." His mom DID come and get him. Everything seems to have ended well. I, however, am left with an interesting visual, which I will probably never forget: that fountain of urine flowing from the pants of a young boy in the wind.

And I thought teaching would not be very exciting...what was I thinking? This is THE place to be!!