A Message on a Fence

Several times this week, I've driven by an elementary school near my house. The school is bordered by a metal mesh fence. This week, there is a message on the fence spelled out in bright pink plastic cups pushed through the mesh. "We 'heart' you Mrs. Diller RIP" the large pink letters read. The message is framed by two pink ribbon symbols.
I have no connection with the school and never met Mrs. Diller, but I'm sad. I'm sad that this teacher who surely cared for her students and was loved by them in return is gone.

Students don't expect such a loss. They expect their teachers to finish the school year with them, to wish them luck as they move on in their learning and in their lives. Students expect to be able to return to their former classrooms, to stand shyly in the doorway, taller, deeper-voiced, waiting for their teacher's grin of recognition and surprise. They don't expect to say a final good-bye - not mid year, not ever.

Though decades have passed, I still remember with great sorrow, those teachers who didn't finish the school year with me, who were gone before I could come as a "grown-up" to visit.

In Pirkei Avot, Yehoshua Ben Perachyah says: "Appoint a teacher for yourself; acquire a friend for yourself."

May Mrs. Diller's memory be for a blessing.