Uprooted

This post is written in order to explain some of the back story for a blog post on ETFO’s Heart and Art of Teaching and Learning blog.

In 1978, my family packed up and moved from a very small western town in Wyoming to Toronto. At the time, it was a devastating life event. Everything and everyone I knew was in flux. Where would we live? Would the people there be nice to us? Even though I was Canadian by birth, I feared being treated like a stranger in my own country.  Needless to say, I was not thrilled to be uprooted and then replanted. Worse than that, I felt alone.

Who knew, in hindsight, that a new learning adventure would unfold in the Summer of 1978?

A home in a new neighbourhood – Jane and Finch.
A new school(my 3rd in as many years) – first experience with multiculturalism.
A new grade(7 – awkward).

On the first day of school, I am taken outside to my new class which was located in an L-shaped porta-pack. By this point, some doubts were forming. Why the heck, can’t this school afford real classrooms like back in Wyoming?  The door opens and I am nudged in. Suddenly it felt like a new prisoner being thrown into general population. The eyes of my new classmates glared as if they’d been rudely awakened from a deep sleep. Why wasn’t anyone wearing bell bottoms like me?

I missed my home, my friends, my town. I missed being able to walk to the YMCA after school. I missed my dishwasher job at the deli, and I missed the mountains. Where were the mountains? When we left Canada in 1970 there were mountains.

That first week I realized that some people were nice, others indifferent, and that others were just mean. It took time to find a friend, and that came with many awkward lessons. What did any of us have in common at first? I had a western drawl, a bowl haircut and wore hand me downs. With time, I found out where I fit in thanks to two friends named Jerry B and Terry L, where the Becker’s store was along the way home, and how to hold a hockey stick.

There were tears, fist fights(sorry mom), angry words, and frustration that eventually gave way to acceptance, understanding, and friendships. And then there was my first school dance. DON’T ask! That was more about pre-adolescent survival than anything else. Although, the Led Zeppelin was a welcome relief to overcome the Disco.

And new subjects, like French and Italian. Did I mention that the history was completely different from what I was taught? Where were the rockets red glare and waving flags? Or, that I had to use something called the Metric System for measurement?

And then we moved again and it started all over again at new school in a different neighbourhood of Toronto. I remember my dad saying how adversity was character building and that there is always something to learn through all of these opportunities.

Fast forward to 2017, I’m loving every minute of my 8th year as an educator, and not much has changed since 1978. A charismatic Prime Minister named Trudeau leads the country. Gas prices hover around a dollar – except that’s per litre instead per gallon. The world continues to become a smaller place as technology connects us all. Immigrants continue to make Canada their home and we become a stronger nation from our depth of diversity.

Disco still sucks. Standardized tests continue to be a reviling option in education. Dictators are still dictating in some familiar and not so expected places. Rush is still rocking, Quebec is still threatening to separate every now and again, and the Toronto Maple Leafs are still trying to hoist the Stanley Cup again.

I’m glad we moved back because Canada is the best country on the planet by the metric equivalent to a country mile (1.62 km). Thank you.

OK. Back to the Heart and Art blog.