Mr. C

 Some of the kids at school refer to me as "Mister C." Others call me "Mister Clean," or just "baldy." None of these epithets bother me much, though I prefer "Mister Caven," since it serves as my secret identity. My alter ego. Altered ego. I say this because the things that I do as "Mister Caven (clean, C, etc.) are strained through a filter that keep me on the right side of public education. The employed side. On those rare occasions that the mask slips, I go through all manner of twists and bends to try and right the morality ship, knowing that Mister Caven is supposed to be the person I want to be. The upright citizen. The valued community member. The shaper of young minds and lives. Which is why I was so embarrassed when I unloaded, however briefly, on a fifth grade class two days after my mother died. Herding the jutting spirits of ten and eleven year olds is a tricky business on any given day, but on that particular afternoon I didn't have access to all the patience I might have summoned otherwise. After asking for them to settle for the ninth time, I shouted: "Give me a break! My mom died this Saturday!"

For a very short moment, part of a moment, there was silence. Mister Caven has a mom? Had a mom? Mister Caven has feelings? That last one was perhaps the biggest leap. The mood in the room shifted. I thought about all the voices that had suggested that I take a few days off instead of leaping back into the fray. I thought about what I might say next.

That's when Cathy, who was never part of the problem in the first place, looked up and said, "I'm sorry for your loss, Mister Caven." In my head, the clouds parted and I savored that connection, even as the rest of the room found their way back to their own drama, their own operating noise. I thanked Cathy and went back to my job. It was the bubble that needed to burst. 

Over the weekend, another Mister C ran out of patience. An elementary school principal from Huntington Beach drove over to Disneyland, parked his car in the Mickey and Minnie structure, climbed to the top and jumped off. Christopher Christensen, the principal of William T. Newland Elementary School committed suicide just outside the happiest place on earth. Reading the account of how this man's life fell apart after he had been placed on administrative leave from his job in the wake of an argument with his wife two weeks ago which landed him in jail. He was due in court Monday after pleading guilty to child endangerment and battery. Life as he knew it was about to change forever, and so he took the only way out that he could see. “I have made so many wonderful connections with families over the years and those who know me closely know how much I cared for my students, staff and families,” his last Facebook post read. “Please remember me for all the good I brought to the world of education.”

I only wish that Cathy had been there.