You make me brave.

I have no idea if I've told this story or not but go with me...

On my first day of teaching high school, I'm standing at the front of my last period class and I started sweating. I started fanning myself like a crazy person because I was so hot. These kids/mini adults were just looking at me like, "Who is this lady? Where did our principal find her? What is wrong with her?" They were right, I was just having an "Oh my gosh, what have I gotten myself into, I can't breathe" attack for a minute. Therefore, that increases my body temperature by about 200%. 

We laughed about that moment a lot that year. They laughed about a lot of other things too- me not knowing how to pull the fire alarm. Me saying I was going to call "someone" when I realized the student lived with someone who was not a family member. Me saying a lot of crazy things that didn't make any sense. Me riding on a roller coaster screaming at the top of my lungs. Me doing a lot of things that were ridiculous. Me getting mad for ridiculous reasons. Etc. You get the point.

I was just talking to one of the boys from that year tonight. They were grace to me. They are grace to me. When I think about a lot of my boys particularly, they represent a lot of sorry's and forgiveness and mercy and mess that God was cleaning up in me. The girls were like mirrors of me-- worrying about relationships and self-esteem and fear and lack of confidence. I was the one sitting on their side constantly struggling with what to do with my life. Worrying about what people thought. Maybe I still struggle and need those things.

There was something about that group of students and few students before that just made me want to take a risk. I wanted to be a better teacher.  I wanted to learn and grow and work my butt off. They made it feel easier. They still do. Talking to them about what they're doing and have been doing gives me a great amount of hope. I'm proud of them. I always think that those must be the things that happen when you have kids of your own. Those must be the things you feel or want or see in your kids.

I don't really know what else to say on this at all but I adore them. Each of them for multiple reasons. Some of them make me laugh so hard and I can't stop smiling and some of them bring tears to my eyes and not in a bad way and some just do both.

I know I'm not always so nice and I can go a little crazy but I'm thankful that they make me brave. They make me better and a lot of the times they don't get the pay off for that but hopefully someone in the future can say thank you.

To my kids-- you make me brave and excellent and hopeful. Hoping that you keep passing it along.

Love, Ms. Gillespie

Staying and Grace Gifts and Kleenex.

I've sat with my kids for the last couple of days in Leadership in one-on-ones. Those times are normally moments when they open up about what's going on. Guarantees?

-One that needs a kleenex for them.
-One that needs a kleenex for me.
-One that laughs at himself.
-One that I laugh a lot with.
-One that takes it very seriously.
-One that's super anxious.
-One that hasn't talked to adults in weeks.
-One that has not talked to anyone or trusted anyone ever.

Pause.

These conversations are so good for me. Every single one is a grace gift. A sweet, peace filled grace gift. It cannot be taken. Those moments can't be. Last year and the year before, I realized how much I was beginning to look in my own face and life except they were these other humans sitting before me talking and it was me who was listening.

Play.

Yesterday, I commented to one that she wasn't listening very well ( I was more polite I hope than reading this sentence). Today she told me she wasn't good at listening (and she knows it) and then we talked about overanalyzing and over thinking and staying inside of our own heads. Sometimes when we get in that mode, we forget how much people care and love us and take care of us. How much people want us to stay in their lives. I wanted to look at her and say, "There's hope! I am you! You are me!"

Depression comes and goes here in Melissa world. Sometimes slowly and sometimes quickly. Always changing. During my second year of teaching, where it was unknowingly invading my life, I had this group of terribly wonderful kids who talked to me about Lil Wayne and shared their poems and lives with me. I slept a lot that year and lost a lot of weight that year but I think that their ridiculous ways made me stay there. It made me stay me. It allowed me to come back to the light and see what was actually going on. I could step outside and look in the mirror and see myself again at the end. They were continually helping me to stay. The next year was a repeat and then, they stayed. Many of those kids that made a great impact (from both years) have somehow stayed in touch with me. I LOVE that. I love getting to stay in people's lives.

Two years ago, when I took a new job, I was terrified. But there were these terribly wonderful kids again who won me over ALL the time. They were so ridiculous that somehow I had a decent self-esteem while teaching for one of the first times while they were simultaneously torturing and annoying me daily. I had some of the best conversations of my life that year. I learned the most about other people that year. I learned a lot about other people too- a lot of my kids and their pasts and it encouraged me to sit down at my desk and have them pull up a chair. I learned a lot about what makes a teacher at heart and what makes a teacher by position. I wanted the heart. I wanted the heart to stay. And those kids somehow invaded my heart and took over. And they stayed there.

One of them came to visit. One of them messaged me. One of them messaged last week to check on another one. My heart brings them to mind SO OFTEN. I stayed and they stayed in my heart.

Today is World Suicide Prevention Day. So I'm asking you who want to leave to please stay.

You matter. I'll get the kleenex. Love you. -Melissa/Miss G

If you or someone you know needs help, please don't wait! There's a phone and online portion here... http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org

How do we sleep at night?

I mean, honestly, how do we do it?

How do we sleep at night??

When we see things like this and KNOW what is happening in the world around us. 

We are so comfortable that we crawl into our beds each night and complain about the noise the neighbors make and in the meantime, thousands of refugees are fleeing from the worst crises in our day and age. Families wanting to live. Wanting their children to not have to survive in a literal war zone. We have no idea what that life is like but this picture-- Aylan, the little boy who drowned at sea from Syria shakes me up. It makes me angry. Because he could have lived (and his brother too) but he didn't... They didn't. 

And yet, here we are... Complaining and bypassing the real atrocities of the world. And maybe I'm a little more attentive because I feel a strangely beautiful connection to the culture of family and care and kindness and protection, which is what I've experienced of Syrian culture. And I'm whining because the speed of the Internet on my phone is slow and I'm hungry for dinner although I had lunch a few short hours ago. Although I may fear some things, it is nothing of the life in the picture above. A little boy's body lying on the shore. A little boy who wanted to live. 

I hope for you. That you lose sleep. A lot of sleep. Because there is REAL injustice in the world and we are so selfish and focused on us that we don't know what to do about it so we do nothing. We sit silently, idly by. 

Seventy years ago, many Americans did the same thing. Slept well at night and when we woke up... And we saw the numbers following... 11-15 million dead in Europe. We did the same thing in the 1990's. But we stepped out and they were endangered in Rwanda- 800,000 dead within months. We've watched the atrocities of Sudan within our lifetimes and even allowed their president who is wanted as a crime offender internationally move freely. And now this. What will our kids say in 15 years when they learn about this in their history classes? What will be our answer. 

The least I can say is that I lost sleep. And stayed and prayed for the families of those who have chosen to stay despite the immense danger to their lives. And for those who have taken the risk to leave, may Europe and the Western world open their eyes, arms, hearts, pockets and homes-- then we will truly see change because we give and become part of the solution to the problem. 

Jesus, you're always it- may we hear you speak in sleepless nights on what you want us to do. On how we change the world. On how we let go of our lives to see others saved. 

I'm not sleeping either. Melis