Rumors.

In what's turned out to be an inadvertent follow-up to last week's topic, I had an interesting encounter with one of my administrators in the hallway after a class shortly after posting my last entry. As I've said, I make it an issue not to give away too much personal information about myself to my students, preferring not to share the details of my personal life with them. Of course, the rumor mill hardly needs fuel to run it.

In any event, I'd like to relate this conversation between myself an my administrator, which went something like this:

I met up with her in the hallway outside my classroom, which right away raised a flag in my mind – while the admins do regularly patrol the building to make sure everything is in order, they usually stay close to the common areas: offices, cafeteria, etc. My classroom is far enough out in the wings of the building that I wouldn't see an admin without a reason.

“Excuse me, can I talk to you about something? Something personal?”

Confusion. I've only been working part time at this particular place, and not long enough to make too many friends. So, I'm curious.

“Something's come up – and let me first say that this is perfectly all right, but...”

Confusion being replaced with concern. I've disregarded the second part of what she's said and focused only on the “something's come up” part – nothing about this is boding well.

“It involves something one of the students said you told them...”

At this point, my brain instantly goes into full-blown red alert. My immediate concern is that something I've said has been misconstrued by a student, and while I keep a cool demeanor, I'm already, in the middle of her talking, frantically searching my memory to try to figure out what it could've possibly have been.

“...that you used to have a learning disablity?”

There is no time for relief – I'm instantly back to confusion. I cannot, for the life of me, figure out what I could've said to anyone that could've been interpreted like that. Knowing full well that she cannot and will not reveal any specifics of her conversation, I let her continue.

“Because this student also has been diagnosed, and he was telling me what an inspiration it is to see a teacher who's been in the same situation.”

At this point, let me say, for the record, that I have never had any kind of learning disability. While I'm at it, let me also say that I've never been a priest, never been an alcoholic, never been gay, never been affiliated with any sort of gang, never carried on any sort of torrid love affairs with any of my fellow teachers, and have never been a hitman for the Mafia. I have, however, been the subject of these rumors and more, and have learned to laugh them off and quietly dispel them as they come along – although I will admit, I do have a soft spot for the hitman one.

Having a learning disability is a new one, and While I'll never know what I could've possibly said that gave someone that impression, I responded simply enough: “Well, I actually don't, but if it's inspiring a student, I see no reason to dispel it.” I then asked her which disability I should have, and she (half-jokingly) suggested ADD. I'm not sure if that was some sort of hint, but if it was, it was completely lost on me – in an era of the internet, technology, and instant gratification, it's getting harder and harder to find a student who's not beginning to show symptoms of Attention Deficit Disorder.

So apparently I have ADD now. As rumors go, I'm actually not too bothered by this one (as long as my administrators know the truth), and it's doing a world of good for at least one of my students. Is it true? Of course not. Does it matter? It reminds me of the ending of The Dark Knight: “sometimes... the truth isn't good enough. Sometimes people deserve more. Sometimes people deserve to have their faith rewarded.”

Our students have faith in us. They have faith in our ability to educate them, to show them how much more they can be. That's what matters.