CLEVELAND - The day was in early September. The late summer sky was mostly sunny, peppered only with bits of cloud. That late summer in Cleveland brought with it a touch of approaching autumn. The high humidity of summer had slipped away, and the later days of season brought a mildness in the air.
It was a school day and the children who were bound for my elementary school were giddy as they ran, walked and skipped to school. For two years prior to my kindergarten year, I had looked out the front window of our middle-class home across the street from the school. The building was a gathering point in our neighborhood.
But now it was my turn to make that walk between the crosswalk lines of my street to the vast playground, which was next door to the school building itself.
My memory of the day is like a mist hovering over a meadow. There are patches of it here and there, but most of the day is etched in my memory banks.
My mother and I, hand-in-hand, walked across the street. At that time, I was the only child of my parents. My father was at work on school's first day, so it was my mother who walked me to a major turning point in my life.
Five years of age is a tender time to begin anything new. So it was that day when my mother guided me the beginning of my formal education. Mother was as nervous as was I. You see, this was a first for her too -- sending a child to a first day of school.
Through the crosswalk, she and I traveled.Along the wrought iron fence of the school yard, we followed the sidewalk. We passed the sliding board, now empty of laughing children although it would certainly be used during recess as it had been during the no-school weeks of June, July, and August.
Mother and I walked through the big doors with the brass push handles on their insides. We were greeted by educators who had gone through this process many times before with other children, but this was my time. Mother and I were led to the room my mother and I knew would be ours.
It was the large kindergarten room with big windows. Miss Lee was the teacher. I remember her as a kind young woman with a nice smile. My mother tried to explain to Miss Lee that I was a "good boy," as she described me, quickly adding that I was also a "sensitive boy."
Miss Lee acknowledged that, trying to calm my mother's nervousness. And my own, too.
Over the years since that day, my mother has told the story of how she advised Miss Lee that my parents were always nearby, living across the street, and that if I needed family "for any reason" that Miss Lee should feel free to call our home.
"Thank you," said Miss Lee, trying to get my mother to release my hand so I could begin my time in school with the other kindergarteners. Still, my mother offered last-minute advise and instructions.
"That's alright," said Miss Lee, breaking into my mother's litany of advice. "Your son will be fine here with the other children and with me," she said, in her soft voice, her smile still evident. Mother left the room. She had tears in her eyes as she walked home alone, leaving her only child in the capable hands of a teacher. Years later, when I would become a parent, I would better understand my mother's emotions that day.
Other children were coming into the classroom too. As I did, they looked at the pictures and paintings on the wall, the alphabet blocks, and other things common in a kindergarten room. There was even a large rocking boat. It was boat-shaped structure with rockers underneath. It could hold as many as six children at a time. I remember it distinctly.
All of us kids were new that day. It marked the beginning of schooling for us. Miss Lee would help us understand the things of kindergarten and prepare us for the first grade, which was a year away.
The first grade teacher would eventually prepare us for the second grade. And then came the third, fourth and so on.
Each Cleveland school teacher helped me find the threshold of my own learning. Through junior high (now called middle school) and high school, I would sit at desks and learn the things teachers would bring to their classrooms. I drank in the subjects and digested the wisdom which each teacher brought.
There were teachers in abundance who helped me. The men and women of the Cleveland Public Schools system helped me open my mind to the subjects which still serve me on a day-to-day basis.
I am a proponent of education and its importance. Today, I am troubled with thoughts of students dropping out of school before high school graduation. Education is their key.
Teachers took me in at the age of 5 as my mother released my hand to place it into the hand of Miss Lee. I have learned from many educators who guided me from kindergarten through graduate school.
Among the building blocks of my life are teachers -- those special people who taught me how to learn and helped me find my place in society and in life.
At the beginning of every school year, I reflect on the times of my youth with a few
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