The Perfect Kid

I have the PERFECT kid in my class this year. I had him last year, too, and that's when I realized that he was an amazing kid. I naturally hand picked him to be in my homeroom for this year when I moved up to a grade 8 homeroom. I didn't have the pleasure of having in my homeroom when I taught grade 7 last year, so I figured it was only appropriate that I have him this year.

I normally refer to the kid as DF because those are his initials. I don't call him that to his face. When speaking with him directly, I call him by his lovely given name. It is in referring to him out of his company that I call him DF. Normally the context is something like this, "My god, once our DF graduates on to the high school, who the hell will take his place?"

He's perfect. He's super duper smart and hard working, he's nice to the other kids, he's as handsome as they come, he's sooo nice to the other kids, he's athletic and he is completely unassuming and modest about all that he has going for him.

Today he asked me if he could stay after school to work with his partner on their Power Point presentation. Naturally I said he could. He then asked me if he could ask one of the girls in the 8th grade class to come and help him with the finer aspects of power point. He isn't the most gifted computer person. (I guess everybody, even DF, has their weaknesses.) The great thing was that he asked the girl who is probably the most academically limited kid in the class (but she's pretty good with Power Point) if she could help him. Naturally the girl was totally flattered to be asked by the by far smartest kid in the class, for her help. She was glowing.

They were with me until almost 5:00 this evening and I had a great time with them.

But here's the thing....

DF's parents are extremely young, maybe even younger than me. They are divorced and they are bitterly angry at each other. They spend a majority of their time with the kids trash talking each other. DF has spoken with me at length about how this stresses him out and really hurts him.

Yesterday was one such day. DF came to school very late and parked himself in the therapy chair next to my desk to talk with me about what was going on. It was pretty heavy.

He is usually so pleasant, but yesterday he was pretty out of sorts. When he went to lunch, he seemed particularly disjointed.

Anyway, our lunch period is just under 30 minutes. With about 5 minutes remaining in the lunch shift, I went across the hall to use the faculty restroom in the main office. The sight that greeted me upon entrance to the office shocked me. There was my perfect DF sitting in the "I'm in trouble and waiting to be busted by the principal chair." I literally rubbed my eyes and tried to refocus. I simply could not believe that DF, of all kids, would be sitting there.

When he saw me in a state of shock, he looked so totally embarrassed. He spilled the beans and told me that he had been loud in the cafeteria and when the janitor told him to knock it off, he totally lost touch with his normal perfect DF self and told the guy, "Get the fuck out of my face."

I was SHOCKED!! He immediately apologized for repeating the thing to me, but quickly added that he knows he can talk to me about stuff like that. Before I could say anything to him, he totally started beating himself up. "I cant' believe I lost control of myself like that. I was so rude to the janitor. This is totally unacceptable. Even if I'm upset I just can't speak to people that way...." All the perfect DF stuff.

I sat there quiet for a moment, looking for the right thing to say to the fallen-from-grace DF. Finally he broke the silence with, "Well, Ms. B., so much for the DF pedestal, right?"

I wasn't even aware of his awareness of the fact that I have him on a total pedestal. But I didn't miss the opportunity. I said, "Nope, no way." I explained that although he had totally screwed up, he could at least take credit for totally owning what he did, realizing that it was dead wrong, and resigning himself to the trouble that was about to come his way.

When the principal showed up, she was equally shocked by what she heard. She let DF off the hook because she knows he is the perfect kid who even handles his imperfections the perfect way. She spoke at length with him about what happened, but she understood that he had just been stressed out and that he was mature enough to take responsibility for what he did.

Today, he came to school with a lengthy apology note to the janitor, (and this kid is an amazing writer) complete with his father's and mother's phone numbers just in case the janitor wanted to call his parents and speak to them about what had happened.

Even the janitor said, "Christ, I almost feel like apologizing to the kid!"

Anyway, I'm just saying that there are a lot of complaints forthcoming from me about the increasingly difficult job teaching has become. But then you get a kid like DF. And it is all worth it. Of course, I know this is THE one DF I will really have in my career. Sure, there will be good kids in the future. Lots of them. But there'll only ever be on DF, and he's in my class for anther 5 months. I'm going to enjoy it while I can!