It's so nice to get to talk to you again.  That's one thing I love about Facebook; how I've been able to reconnect with you.  Many of you now have jobs. Some of you are married (Hope you made good choices). One of you became a mama day before yesterday (Congratulations)! One of you just joined seminary and one is about to go on a mission trip to Africa. Some of you will be donning a cap and gown this week (Wish I could be there).

Just today the little gray faceless heads on my Facebook screen lit up red notifying me that I had a friend request. It was one of you. As soon as I saw your name my heart immediately flooded with memories of you, who like so many others captured my heart. I accepted the request and sent you a message. "Hey Gabino old friend!"

Your reply wasn't one I was expecting:

"I can't believe you remembered me!"

What?! I was CRAZY about you, I thought.  You had to have known.

How could I forget listening to you read your first book from a stool placed in front of the class. You were so proud and I was too. You laughed the whole way through the book. I listened to many of you read your first book. We read Junie B. and shook our heads at the messes she continually got herself in like the time she hid her fuzzy bunny slippers under the bed because she had took scissors and "snip, snip, snipped their sweet white fur". How could I forget the stories you used to tell about chasing goats or how you always used to get in trouble during music time because the music teacher didn't like the way you were dancing something like the Cotton-eyed Joe to the classical music played on the portable boom box? Remember how "having to change your color" was the worst thing in the world?  I remember how one of you was obsessed with Tyrannysaurus Rex; another of you with Pokemon.

Wouldn't  you know that just yesterday I came across a big plastic tub full of stuff that included a class picture with you in it? You were all in there. Your letters to me were in there. Your pictures of rainbows arching over stick figures of you and me were in there too. I found a journal where I prayed for all of you. I have an envelope from one of you that you sealed with chewed bubble gum because the envelope didn't have it's own "sticky".  I have thick stacks of pictures that I took of you back when we used to develop film.

I still tell stories about you. I tell about the time I laughed at you and said "You're funny!" I can still see your stone-serious second grade face "Am I'M laughing?" Or the time one of you requested that I help you choose a girlfriend by allowing you to pick one of the girl's names out of our can that held names on popsicle sticks.

I would have taken you all home with me if I'd thought your mom and dad wouldn't protest.

I know I fussed at you. I'm sure you shed tears in my class; either for a time I got on to you, or a time when someone was unkind to you or when you skinned your knee on the playground. Know that I hated the tears you shed even when I might have been the person that caused them. I wanted what was best for you. I wanted you to work harder. I wanted you to learn to be ok when other kids were excluding you. I wanted to teach you to be kind when you were the one doing the excluding. Every last day of school I can guarantee you, I was the one shedding tears.

When you left my classroom you didn't leave my mind. You didn't escape my heart. You are all pieces of a wonderful tapestry God has woven into my life.

I can't expect that you'd know how special you all were to me, but I expect you to hear me out when I tell you that God puts an extra special kind of love into a teacher's heart. He allows a special kind of remembering of stories, and of victories big and small, and of laughter.

I crammed as much knowledge as I could into those little heads of yours. But for old time sake let me say one more thing.

I know God has a plan for you; one He privileged me to be a small part of.

It's a plan that I'd give anything to see played out, but even if our paths don't cross again I trust this.

You'll have teachers who love you like the dickens.  And parents who love you and want to see you succeed even more.  You'll have big dreams of your own.

But God says:

11 I know what I'm doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for.

12 "When you call on me, when you come and pray to me, I'll listen.

13-14 "When you come looking for me, you'll find me.

"Yes, when you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else, I'll make sure you won't be disappointed."  Jeremiah 29,11-14

Thankful to have been a part of your lives.

Your teacher who will remember,

Mrs. Burden