Timothy Allan Johnston
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The ATA Magazine - Editor’s Notebook

Volume 70, Nov/Dec 1989

                                                        Last of the First Days

 It’s been a long time since I last cried in school. Probably Grade 5. And I can’t remember what might have brought on the tears back then. But on Wednesday morning, September 6, I cried in school again. Well, actually, just outside school.


The occasion that brought on the blubbering and sniffling was my younger daughter’s first visit to her Kindergarten class. Kalie now attends French immersion Kindergarten at Father Jan School in St Albert. Because of space problems, her class is actually held at Vital Grandin School.

My wife and I drove Kalie to Kindergarten and left her in the capable hands of Madame Klimchuk. We could tell that Kalie was quite pleased by the whole event, and when we said goodbye from the doorway she never gave us a second glance. She was in her first classroom, thank you very much, and she clearly didn’t expect her parents to hang around cluttering up the day. On the way back out to the car I felt the rather unfamiliar little stings around my eyes that told me I was slowly sliding onto emotional thin ice.

Kalie’s Kindergarten was our first stop that morning. Next, we drove over to Father Jan School. My older daughter Galien wanted to say goodbye to her Grade 1 teacher. Galien had spent five years at Father Jan and had enjoyed every one of them, but now she was on her way to the National Ballet School in Toronto. Before she left, she wanted just one more hug from Madame Romanuk.

So there the three of us were, in the parking lot of Father Jan, when the dam burst. “What on earth is wrong with you?” asked my wife, Rebecca. “My baby has gone to school!”

Trying times for this old dad—one of my children beginning in a fine school and another leaving it, both on the same day. In a rather motherly way, it seemed to me, Rebecca pointed out that I hadn’t cried when my other children had started school. “But we always had a baby,” I replied, with what I thought was the height of logic.

You would think that once you have left school it wouldn’t be able to affect you like that any more. Those of you who are parents and have seen your own children take the giant step into school probably know how foolish that notion is. In my case, it took five of my children beginning school before it struck me that there wouldn’t be any more first days of school for me to attend. It seems that even at my age, school can really grab you.

Let me be absolutely clear here. I wasn’t upset because Kalie, like her brothers and sister before her, was passing somewhat into the hands of strangers. I would entrust my children to any one of you, and a number of teachers in this province have already given exemplary service to my sons and daughter. I know you do your best for my children and all the others that pass through your classes.

I guess I’m telling this story for a simple reason. Teachers have the care of my children and the children of everyone else for a significant chunk of each school day. I just want you to remember that the work that each of you does affects others as well as those children. It goes straight to the hearts of those children’s parents.


By the second week of Kindergarten, Kalie seemed to be in full bloom. Going to school every morning was no problem for her. Fortunately, her father had also adapted, quite well I might add, to her new experience. I found that the few minutes I spent in the school each morning as I walked my daughter to her classroom often gave me a fresh and honest perspective for the rest of the day. Like the morning I said hello to two little boys in her class. “Hi,” they said, and one went on to inquire if I might be Kalie’s grandfather. Kalie promptly informed him that I was her dad. “How old are you?” he asked me, a trace of either disbelief or wonder crossing his face. “Forty-five,” I replied. “Wow, that’s big. My dad’s about, um, sixteen.” What a marvelous perception of his world he had.

There have been no more tears from the father. I realize now that those shed in the school parking lot were tears of recognition of change and growth within my daughter, not a little heartbreak at seeing my baby growing up.

Well, maybe just a bit.