Remembering some specific students

Today, at my eye exam, I was speaking with a lady who graduated from Seneca the year I started and she mentioned a number of students she knew who went there.  It was amazing how many names I remembered and for most, I could remember what they looked like, and in some instances, I even remembered something about them or, on some occurrences,  that the two of us were involved with.  It is really interesting how much effect my students had on my life.

It is also interesting how reinvolved some of them have become in my life.  Three of my former  Seneca students are owners of two Restaurants, both in Jeffersontown, and one former student is part owner in another.  I see them often.  Another was, for a while, my next door neighbor.  Another was a policeman that responded to an accident that I had witnessed.  Another Manual student lived for a while in France but we tried to  share lunch each time she came back for a visit.  She. now lives nearby.  An emergency room doctor at Baptist East was a student of mine and I see him during various visits there.

A surprisingly large number became fellow teachers with me.  I did the same with some of my teachers.  My former daughter-in-law and my son, met through a Seneca extra-curricular activity and she now teaches at my second school, Manual.  I have lost maybe 20 or 30 of them because of their deaths.  I am amazed how much that sorrowed me.  It was almost like they were my own kids and each year, when they graduated, I had some strong feelings of loss and stronger feelings of pride for them.  One senior girl, on the goodbye walk through the halls of Seneca, came over and planted a kiss right on my mouth.  I was a bit embarrassed but I certainly remember it well.  She is, as are many, a facebook friend.

for the most part, the vast majority of my student that I still know have become wonderful citizens and scholars, even if they did not attend college, They're good parent and, in many cases, grandparents, many with grandchildren much older than my own.

I just can't adequately expressed how my students, as a group, and some individual ones have blessed my life.