I won't lie to you. I think this was probably the fifth or sixth selfie we took together. That was after the sixth or seventh she wanted to take with my youngest son in the picture. We switched sides of the stroller, she took the selfie, then asked If I would take the selfie. If you had told me in 2001 that the woman who left a note on my desk with the little smiley face explaining that she would be my resource teacher was going to meet myself and my son in a park in 2020 during a fucking pandemic just so I could give her an author's copy of my first book? First I would laugh, then I'd tense up and say...A FUCKING PANDEMIC!?!? but more importantly? I would say, there is no way in hell that I will ever have that moment I have dreamed about since we said goodbye to each other when I graduated in 2005. Handing Mrs. Burnham the first copy a book I published. Officially as of today? She has the only copy anyone will touch (including myself) until it is released on September 1st (I jokingly pleaded with her not to post spoilers on social media i.e. *spoiler alert* THIS BOOK SUCKS!)
Its funny, after I look at this picture? I don't know how my eyes were so dry. Hers certainly weren't. I don't know if she was trying to hide it or not, but I did hear a whimper and see tears. I didn't know how to process that anymore than I have been able to process the texts or e-mails from people I've known at various points in my life to congratulate me and let me know that they always knew I would accomplish this. God damn it, when the hell was everyone going to tell me? As surreal as it all has been (and I don't get a fat head about it because frankly, tomorrow I will wake up and try to survive parenting my two kids while my wife works, while trying to avoid the dumpster fire that is the current state of our country, and also thinking to myself...now what?) I still can't wrap my head around today.
To be fair, I had no idea if I should sign it. Why the hell would I sign it? I'm not famous. Only famous authors sign books right? Oh alright, I'll sign it because I can say something to her that will completely summarize how important she was/is to me. Shit. I can't even articulate or conceptualize anything that could hold a candle to what she did for me. Alright, fine. She once let me "borrow" her Live on Two Legs Pearl Jam album, no idea why. She simply told me it was her favorite and she thought I should hear it. Unbeknownst to myself or her? That was the album that helped me from a disastrous breakup in 2006 (a year after I graduated) that I only didn't think I would survive. I always meant to give the CD back to her, but the last day of senior year when I held it in my hand ready to give back? I realized that if I gave back the CD then I would have to say goodbye to a woman who did what no other educator or adult did in my adolescent and post adolescent phases...she cared. Not only did she care, she once sat on the floor next to me outside of her classroom when I was having what I now know as a manic episode, talking me through it with the kind of empathy that only a dedicated educator or guardian angel possess...and she was definitely both.
I jokingly also bought her a copy of that CD (as I stupidly lost her copy a few years ago during the great purge of 2018 when I was getting rid of stuff that my one year old son could potentially eat, or destroy) so I could finally give it back to her. Since we reconnected after the birth of my first son? I no longer fear losing the only person in my life who made me want to care about myself the way she cared about me. Hell, there is a town in the book named after her. She is getting my first copy. What can I really say to her so she knows how much she meant/means to me and how much I genuinely love her and how my love for her motivated me to graduate high school (the only one of my parents' kids to do it) and to go on and get my Bachelor's degree (only one in my family) and subsequently my Masters degree. That makes me the only one of my parents' three kids to not only accept his diploma at his high school but fight like hell despite a crippling learning disability and no self-esteem and fight for my life to not just get one but two college degrees (they'd feel way cooler if you know, they actually helped me get a job). Regardless of what came of that education, the point is...I did it because Mrs. Burnham was the only adult in my life to make me believe that it was possible. She was the only reason I went to school every day. Prior to high school? I had a fourth and fifth grade elementary school teacher who would antagonize and demoralize me in front of classmates over my penchant for horror, my inability to understand math, my drawings of aliens, hell she went so far as to phone the parents of my closest friends to suggest that their kids shouldn't hang out with me anymore because myself and my white trash family (my sister was 16 and with child at this point) would only drag them down. Middle School, I had teachers actually tell my parents in a core evaluation meeting that I was essentially useless. Then high school...because of the way I dressed and looked? I was told that my future was going to be bleak and I'd be lucky if I lived to see 30. I knew the PERFECT inscription. I scribbled some of the lyrics to one of my favorite Pearl Jam songs and the one that reminds me the most of the woman who tore the wings off her own back, handed them to me and encouraged me to fly.
That was when it hit me. OF COURSE I was going to finally do the unthinkable. I didn't have a choice. I HAD to publish a book. Why?
He floated back down 'cause he wanted to share His key to the locks on the chains he saw everywhere But first he was stripped and then he was stabbed By faceless men, well, fuckers He still stands And he still gives his love, he just gives it away The love he receives is the love that is saved And sometimes is seen a strange spot in the sky A human being that was given to fly Because I had to show her in the bravest and most incredible way how amazing of a human being and educator she was. I had to fulfill a dream in order to show her how invaluable she is to both her profession and to this world. If no one else reads it, buys it, or even acknowledges it....I had to show Mrs Burnham that Eddie Brophy could do it, and he did it because she knew that I was given to fly. Thank you Mrs. Burnham. I knew that a scribbling in a book wouldn't suffice. You are worth so much more.
TEACHERS MATTER. Let's make sure we protect our most precious resources of hope. God knows that without Mrs Burnham? There wouldn't be a book worth writing and subsequently worth reading.
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