First Day of School

As a child, I always loved the first day of school. I would go to school with my new freshly sharpened pencils, clean and organized notebooks, books covered and ready to start again. There are no grades yet in the grade book and most of the time I had never had the teacher before. Basically it was a fresh start in my education and a fresh start to the year. What I didn't know or at least wasn't consciously aware of was that although it looked like a complete and total fresh start, there was a permanent record that followed me from year to year. This record consisted of my final grades from all previous years, test scores, and any serious disciplinary action that had taken place (I'm pleased to say I never had anything serious although I'm certain every report card said talks too much!). Over the years I have not only been a teacher myself, but I have spoken to quite a few about what they do with that permanent record. Some choose not to look at it until several weeks into school; they prefer to form their own opinions about students. Some read them cover to cover before the first day of school so that they can "know" and/or "understand" the students better. The other thing I now know as an adult that I didn't as a child was that even for the teachers who don't read the records early, if students stay in one school year after year, most teachers know who they are. Teachers are human and they talk in the teacher's lounge, during breaks and over lunch. Unfortunately, the talk is usually about the more difficult students and the more difficult parents. So I know realize that a fresh start is not a totally blank slate.

I'm thinking this morning as my children are going to be starting school, that life and relationships are a bit like that. Things happen and we say we are going to start over and try as we might to have a total complete blank slate, more times than not there are still a few stray marks. There are still things that follow us even if we choose not to look at them or at least not often. When we say or do something that hurts someone deeply, apologies are wonderful and they can help erase the pain, but there is still a faint mark left on the paper that can be seen. I'm not sure, and I'm struggling with, how do we or should we try to completely erase the marks that are left on us? Honestly, I don't know how to get rid of them completely and there are some I truly wish I could. Some would say they are reminders either for us in our future behavior or reminders about a certain person so that we are cautious in future dealings.

These painful marks sometimes come to the surface and the sting is still there--does that mean we haven't forgiven? I don't know what to do with these thoughts as far as how to erase the marks that have been left on my life, but I do know that I want to try as hard as I can to only leave positive marks on the lives of others.