This week I came in to see one of my third grade friends working away on a computer. He already had stacks of books beside him. His library selecting complete, he'd decided to take advantage of our Internet. When she saw me the librarian raised her eyebrows.
"Ask him what he's doing" she mouthed.
"D., what's up? What are you doing?"
"Oh, I'm just googling Think-Tank Teachers to see their pictures. I miss them, and I want to look at them. Especially my old teacher, she's so beautiful."
"You're googling teachers? Have you found anything?" I asked, scared to find out what may be out there.
"Just this," he said, pulling up a staff picture. After he told me the name of every single teacher in the building (which is impressive since we have a huge staff and he's only in 3rd grade) he settled on his third grade teacher.
"You know, she had a baby" he told us. "want to see a picture? She emailed me a picture." he proceeded to go into his email (which, by the way, is in Korean- his entire email account is Korean. I wish I spoke Korean and English when I was in 3rd grade) and pulled up the picture of his teacher and her baby.
He gave a long sigh, staring at it.
The librarian and I suggested he print out the picture and add it to the staff bulletin board in the office of teachers and their babies. He excitedly complied and a few minutes later D and I were walking down the hallway toward the office.
"You know," I said, "You'll also see pictures of Mr. F's baby. Did you know Mr. F had a baby?"
D's eyes widened. "Mr. F was pregnant? He had a baby in his belly?" He looked truly horrified.
"No," I corrected, "his wife was pregnant. You can see a picture of his wife's baby."
"Thank goodness" D said, obviously extremely relieved. "His stomach did not look very big. You know though, sometimes boys have babies. I've read all about it. I hope I'm not one of those boys. It hurts. A lot."
There was a pause as I contemplated how exactly to respond to that.
"Are you going to have babies?" he asked.
"One day,"
"Well, just a word of advice- it hurts. A lot. Don't say I didn't warn you."
With that, we opened the office door and were greeted by the principal, the assistant AP and a few teachers. We showed off the picture and immediately went to hang it on the bulletin board along side other pictures of his teacher and her new baby.
When he saw the pictures of his teacher (and Mr. F) he stopped and sucked in his breath. Then he began to slowly traced his finger along the pictures of his teacher, shaking his head.
"Poor, poor Ms. B. It was rough for her, you know, so much pain. She had a hard time."
And with that, he turned around and skipped (yes, skipped) out of the office, leaving the office staff to contemplate whether or not D and Mrs. B were such good friends that she had shared her particular labor stories with him, or if he had actually been present at the birth.
Just wait until D gets to fifth grade and participates in Family Life Education. Who knows what tidbits he'll bestow on his teaches and friends...
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