Wednesday, October 15, 2003

When they had made it about 100 feet into the school, Jean-Carlo’s mother let go off his arm and rapidly made her way out. She hadn’t yet made it to the gate when Jean-Carlos screamed, “Estúpida!” She had brought him inside by force. I thought, “Great, time to lock-up the gate, call the assistant principal, the psychologist, and a third staff member who helps them deal with him.” When he doesn’t feel like being in school, it takes those three people about 20 minutes to get him to calm down. Surprisingly, though, other than having heard him call his mother stupid, Johnny was acting normal. He was walking toward his classroom, so I turned my attention away form him.

Next time I saw him, he had his left leg over the school’s seven-feet fence! I stepped outside of the school, locked the gate, and walked toward Johnny. Because seeing him try to jump over the fence is a rare sight (:roll:), I didn’t even panic. I stood there, ready to hold on to him if he decided to jump to “freedom,” but he didn’t. Minutes later we were standing inside the school. I was doing the talking, and he was doing the ignoring. I’d ask him questions and he’d not even move his eyeballs.

Then he started responding to my questions! I almost asked him, “Hey, Johnny, what’s wrong with you? You’re supposed to be ignoring me, as you always do when I try talking sense into you!” But no, he was listening and responding. I sat down on the bench, and I asked him to join me. I told him about how much I loved my job, specially because I often get to play with the children. And I get paid for it! He digged hearing that.

I asked him if he’d love to do my job one day, he said he would. I told him that in order to be where I am, I needed to go to college, and that to go to college one needs to go to school every day and do homework, too. I told him how much money he could make per hour, per day, per week, per month. Ooh, the PlayStation II games he could buy with all that money! He must have loved the sound of that, because he then got off the bench and was ready to go to class. 🙂

Although, I’m still wondering whether it was my preaching skills or my boring him that got the job done. Ah, but the job got done, and that’s all that matters! I think… 😕

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