I've spent the last week collecting thoughts to make a video for them, so I can be there in spirit and I realized something digitally interesting while doing this. I have photographs galore from 1995 - 2004, but such practice ended in 2005, when I started shooting video and not hoarding photographs from CVS print shop. I went from physical to digital, and I have very few memories of this time, having done all the work in mini-DV form (which I've yet to convert for this generation's way of consuming).
I was 38 for my 20th, which would be the age these kids are now. When I had them in school, I was 32 and 33 years old, younger than they are now. And yet, like all the classes, they trusted me as having something to offer them.
This was also the largest crew I ever took to Denmark. It was a blast, with only a few incidences, and I miss the Nordic ways of my summers when we went there each year and in the Fall, when we hosted the Lille Skole's 10th grade class.
We can always say it was a different time then, and sadly almost all of the teachers I worked with overseas are no longer with us. The connection to that home away from home is still in my heart, but no longer a part of my routine.
This is true of the Brown School, as well. Two years after they departed the corner of 1st and Muhammad Ali, I parted, too...for a doctorate. And in these twenty years since they were seniors in my care, much has changed not only for them, but for me. Everything Brown, however, stays to the core of who I am as an educator, philosopher, thinker, teacher, and human being. That school molded me into a better creature upon this planet...the kids, Martha Ellison's vision, my mentors Sue and Gay, and the incredible leadership of Ron Freeman.
And I'm thinking a lot of things. I knew Laurie Wade because Jess (who graduated in 2005) was a student at the Brown School and she came to my nature camps when she was little. Laurie is the one who sent Sue to look for me at the Louisville Nature Center and, long story short, Sue took me under her English teaching wings and parented me as an educator, a 2nd mom, and a man in his 20s and 30s. 2005 is special, because Jess was in the class (and was on my volleyball team as well as in my classes before she graduated).
Coincidences. That's the theme for my video I'm creating for their reunion. It was close to the time of I HEART HUCKABEES coming out and many of the film-loving students quickly noted there was a Sudanese actor in it. Well, that's Ger...and Ger became a brother during Covid. Go figure.
There's meaning in everything and meaning in nothing. It is what it is and for that, I am thankful.
Blink of an eye. Twenty Years Ago. Dang. 18 years since I left that scholastic utopia. Still know it was the best decision for me at the time, but PHEW...how luck am I that I had so many brilliant years with such a beautiful school. Dang.
