Imagine Bridges

“Give what you can.  To someone, it may be better than you dare to think.”  --Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Keep in mind, today is Saturday, a day of rest, a day I get to start off with espresso from the best little coffee shop on the north side, infused with—isn’t that a silly word: infused?  Doesn’t it just mean mixed?—heated almond milk, and time to make a delicious eggless scramble.  Life just doesn’t get any better than that!  Monday is coming all too soon, and it’s likely to be infused with a less serene flow.

So the sweetness that I’m blown away by this morning, more than my special treats, has welled up from a little interaction two days ago and I realize just this morning that I have the greatest job. 

I was sitting in a second rate coffee shop with a first rate friend after school when a former student passing by knocked on the window and waved at me.  I matched his excited expression and he turned around and came in to see me.  “Miguel, you look like a grown up!” I called out when he approached.  He said, “Yeah, I am.”  I asked him how the card trick business was going, expecting to hear that he’d dropped that fleeting hobby.  He surprised me by saying he had a show coming up in a week or so.  Two years ago he was just a kid in my homeroom showing card tricks to anyone who would watch, usually me.  Four years before that he was a student with a mild learning disability in my special ed algebra class.  He dropped out his junior year, went to another country, then came back a year later and was assigned to my homeroom his junior and senior years.  He was a nut: funny, fast and smart.

And now Miguel stood next to me in the coffee shop, a young man with a plan.  He said he was going to see our high school play that evening and was hoping to see some teachers so he could ask them to write letters of recommendation for school.  “What school?” I asked.  He said he was trying to get into the School of the Art Institute in their audio production program, and that his grades weren’t high enough but if he could get some good recommendations he would be considered.  He didn’t ask me, but I offered to write him one.

This morning I thought about that letter looming over my head, and I realized I was looking forward to writing it.  I remember our interaction, the excitement we felt seeing each other, and felt so blessed for that.  We had built a bridge to one another in the little time we spent together, not an algebraic bridge, but a bridge fortified by trust, mutual respect and playful whimsy.  The magnificence of that bridge carries on to more and more constructions because once we learn how to build one bridge with a partner, we can stretch over deeper canyons and rougher rivers.  And believe me, with fifteen goofy special ed kids in not one, but two classes, I’ve got some pretty deep canyons this year, more like black holes.

I’m not so arrogant as to think that teachers have a corner on the bridge building market.  The beautiful thing is, no matter what our profession, everyone has opportunities to be bridge builders.  In fact, who needs to be employed to build bridges?  Every interaction has potential.  We rarely get to see the impact of the small things we do for others, so why not imagine the best of possibilities? The tender smile and thank to a stranger could be just the thing to snap them out of a slump and into the throws of creativity, or new research or kindness to someone else who was missing it and now can finish that last step in curing osteoporosis please.  Romantic, you say?  Yes!  Isn’t it delightful?

And if you’re lucky like me, once in a while you get to look back and see the beauty of your teamwork. 

Now I have an opportunity to be a part of the supply team for Miguel’s new bridges.  It doesn’t get any better than that.  Who knows?  Miguel, or any of my former students with whom I’ve built bridges, or the gal you smiled at passing on the street, they may be the very ones to build bridges between warring countries.  We may end war yet!

But for now, let’s just eat!

Potato Scramble Infused with Tofu (Oh now, that’s too silly)      

2 T. oil (sunflower is great and can take the heat)

½ a medium sized chopped onion with its tears

3 good sized red potatoes, chopped small for faster cooking

1 medium sized sweet potato, chopped like the potato

¾ of a cake of tofu, cubed about the same size as his friends

Salt and pepper to taste

In a skillet (cast iron is great) heat oil and add onions, tossing for a couple of minutes.  Add the potatoes and sweet potatoes, tossing until they’re coated with oil and oniony goodness.  Add salt and pepper and a quarter cup of water.  Cover, stirring occasionally for about ten minutes.  Add water when needed to prevent sticking.  Those darned potatoes!  Add tofu and more water if needed.  Cover, stir, cover, stir, cover until all is tender. 

While you’re fortifying your buttresses, or just part of your buttresses, feel free to sit under a bridge and imagine world peace.