Not with a flourish, but with a wave.

     Yesterday the last of my students walked out of my classroom.  Seniors, who will not be back again next year but will be moving on to something else.  The next thing.  Hopefully a good thing.  Most of them I will never see or hear from again.  And they will not hear from me either.  They passed out of my life in the same way they came into it, according to schedule.  The bell rang.  They left.  

     I've grown accustomed to this departure, and I've lived enough years beyond my own that I know how early this is in the stories of these lives.  For now, this is as much of the story as they know.  But so much more will happen.  Looking back years from now this will not be the time that inspires their recollection or requires their reflection.  It's not that complicated.  They had to go to high school.  They had to take an English class during their senior year.  I happened to be their teacher.  A paragraph, maybe a page, in a life.  So many more chapters will be written.  

     It happened with little more than a wave.  We kept it light:  "See ya'."  "Have a nice summer."  "I'll see you at graduation."  We avoided saying 'goodbye.'  There were no tearful embraces, no manly handshakes.  There were no final words of wisdom from the old sage before the hero's journey.  Just a wave, some casual words, and they were gone.  As if this were only a holiday break and not the journey of their lives.  Perhaps the weight of the latter thought kept us to our daily routine.  We hadn't missed the significance of the occasion.  We just didn't want to talk about it.  We're tired.  We're hungry.  We're bored.  That's enough for now.

     That's enough for now.  But I will remember some of them.  And some of them will remember me.  And whether I am only a footnote, or even just a name in reverse order (Son, Dr. J. Thomas) in the index, or actually get a mention in the text itself, I have become a part of the story of these lives.  Years later, when they are flipping back through warn pages, they may find me there.  A minor complication to a minor plot.  A benevolent presence in the bottom margin .  One teacher among many who wished them well with a wave.  Whatever my character, whatever my part in the tale, I hope it turns out to be a good story.