Looking Up

It didn’t bother me the first time. The third time? No big deal. But now (what was it, like trip number 28?) my fermented attitude was about as chipper as orange soda missing its fizz. Why do I have to take out my roommate’s garbage again ? Why doesn’t she ever clean the sink? Why…why… I flung the white trash bag over the rim of the green dumpster. I nodded approvingly as it neatly slumped into place among its other grumpy compatriots. There. Maybe I won’t have to worry about it overflowing in our bathroom for a few days. I crunched on through the muddied snow, mentally cataloging my list of grievances, when my typewriter jammed. Wait a sec.   I get to do this. I swigged some steamy coffee from my travel mug and nearly choked. The photos plastered on the mug were of my family and my friends. There was so much laughter and love in those memories. Did I deserve that? Absolutely not. Did I deserve to be healthy enough to walk to class? Nope. Actually, I dese...

If not for the expectations of my boss and the desire to keep my teaching job, one piano lesson with little five-year-old Maddy would’ve been enough for me to write her off as incompetent. To be sure, she was cute. Her innocent green eyes were captivating, igniting with even the slightest spark of excitement. And it was not difficult to excite Maddy. From the moment her dad brought her into the studio, she was babbling over the pretty blue carpets (her favorite color that day), the “dreidel song”, and unicorns—all in less than 60 seconds. It was my first run-in with a child diagnosed with severe ADHD.     At first, she seemed like every other beginner I’d taught: exultant in the grand occasion of a first piano lesson. I succeeded in getting her to perch “like a princess” on the wooden bench in front of the piano. She showed me how she could relax her wrist to gently hold an invisible bubble. We numbered her fingers. “Twos and threes, twos and threes,” she twittered, e...

“Studyin’ hard?”  I blinked at the young man meandering past the couch where I was huddled, feverishly slurping soup and cramming for a final exam approximately 30 minutes away. Was this kid talking to me? “Uh, yeah…” I shook my head and lowered my eyes back to my notes.  Less than two minutes later, he was back. Pointedly dropping himself onto the seat to my left, he peeked at me from under a sagging red hat, sprawling tendrils of dark hair framing his glasses. Nope, I’d never seen him. He decorated his query and re-fired: “So do you have a big test comin’ up or somethin’?” The nerve! He was acting as if we were grade school buddies. “Yeah,” I answered, trying my best to wipe the bafflement off my face. “What are you doing?” Taking a swallow of his 20-ounce cafeteria cola, he replied “Eh, nothin’ much. I just thought you needed someone to talk to.” I inwardly guffawed—this sounded like the start to an ill-played pick-up line. But his statement had triggere...