Hello Beautiful People,
I went to go teach my class today, and walked into a somber classroom.
A good friend of one of my students had died from a heroin overdose.
She was what, nineteen?
And yet…I’m not surprised anymore. And that makes my heart a little bit. Aw hell, it breaks my heart a lot a bit. I’m desensitized to a teenager dying from an overdose. Yes, it was an overdose…but it doesn’t change the pain. It doesn’t change the hurt. It doesn’t change the loss…
And this student, who I love, who I think of as my own kid, she looks at me and says, “I could have stopped it.”
Gah. [insert] Break screeching halt, heart wrenching punch, I don’t know what teachers are supposed to do in moments like this. Do you? Do you know what teachers are supposed to do in situations like that?
And once again she looks at me for answers.
And once again she looks at me to make it better.
She looks at me, wondering if she’s right. Wondering if she could have stopped it.
And so I tell her, no. She could not have stopped it. That it was not her fault. That her friend chose to do the drugs. That it’s a terrible and awful thing. And I ask her, like I do whenever my students are hurting and confused, if she’d like to do a free write.
And she says yes.
And so she starts writing in her journal, and I put on “The Goodbye Song”, by Joe Iconis.
And she starts to write…
And I can visibly see her processing the song…
And about thirty seconds in she starts to cry.
And cry.
And cry.
And cry.
And she says in more of a question than a statement, I’m not going to see her again?
And I tell her, no.
And I ask her if she wants me to turn off the music, and she says no.
And then she says, she always watched me. Even when we were little, she always watched me. And you know Ms. Min, you make think I’m crazy, but I think she’ll still watch me.
And I say, “No, I don’t think you’re crazy.”
The song ends…and she asks me if I can play it again, cause it make her think of her friend.
That, dear friends, is what music and theater and art is all about.
Live, Love, Learn,