Ms. W Retires

It never occurred to me all those years ago when I trooped up to my son's elementary school to ranch the children who would be performing in the annual talent show that there would be any need for a balcony in the auditorium. The very fact that there was a separate room for eating lunch and dancing and singing seemed like a very good move, architecturally. There always seemed to be just enough room for all the parents and aunts and uncles and friends and siblings of those who were on stage to sit in rows of folding chairs, along with a few spots on the side and back of the room to stand. I hadn't considered what might happen if you tried to fit fifteen years worth of students, family, and friends into that same auditorium.
That same room was full and overflowing this past Saturday for Ms. W's memorial. My son's third grade math teacher lost her battle with cancer back in November, but it took some time to get everyone and everything organized to pull off a celebration of her life. Teachers, students, principals, family, friends that helped tell the story of her life could hardly be contained by the four walls of a school auditorium. My son and I took our spots just outside the door and watched and listened. There was laughter. There were tears. There was music. There was more laughter. It made me happy to learn more about this woman who had been a piece of my son's life, and therefore a piece of my own.
It made my son uncomfortable, at first. He had dealt with the passing of pets, and he had listened to stories of others who were only faces in photos or names in his parents' stories. This was his one-degree-of-separation moment. He had a hard time standing still, which is a struggle for any thirteen year old boy, but all those memories swirled around his head making his math teacher into a human being: a mother, a wife, a friend. And now she was gone. After some consideration, he made his addition to the book that sat on a table in the lobby: "Dear Ms. W., Thank you for teaching me fractions." He signed his name. He slipped it into one of the back pages.
On the walk home, we talked about memorial services. We talked about something Ms. W's sister-in-law had said about how the Chinese tradition is to send people home with a piece of candy. It's a way to come away with something sweet. We stopped at the 7-11 and bought a Hershey bar. Later that evening, we split it up into fractions and shared it as a family. And once again I thought about how they needed to put a balcony on that auditorium if they wanted to get the whole of everyone who was touched by Ms. W. inside.