Lo extrañaré. Or so it’s said in Spanish. Translation: I will miss him, and I’m not alone. Maestro David has been so much more than a teacher to so many of us. This year started off rough for me. My OCD was off the walls; I was stressed beginning the very first day, and instead of treading water, I was totally drowning. Maestro David threw me a life preserver.
I wish I could say he knew about The Project. I wish I could say I’m only being this cheesy because he’ll be reading it. But I’m not. This is how it feels to lose the person that kept you afloat.
It’s no secret that for whatever reason, institutional or personal, Maestro David will not be returning next year to teach Spanish at Charter. Although the motive is unknown, either way deserves our sympathy.
Maestro David has 2 kids. He acknowledges this fact often. But in the end, he took all of us Spanish-speaking misfits in, too, and I know we all share a connection to him that is much stronger than a scholastic relation.
Yes, he makes jokes. Yes, sometimes they go too far. But guess what? He will always go up and apologize to the victim of his teasing and ask them to tell him if he’s going too far. See? He’s not making fun for his own cruel enjoyment.
Yes, he’s fun. Dear gosh he’s fun. Other Spanish teachers might just spend the whole class lecturing and scrawling verb conjugations on the board. Bo-ring. Maestro David breathes life into Spanish so we really learn. That’s the purpose behind his teasing! We actually learned, and now we’re about to understand jokes in another language! Isn’t that cool?
His assignments are far from tedious as well. We wrote fables in Spanish (mine of course involved Sam getting eaten by a wolf), we discuss current events in Spanish. We aren’t just learning the language. We’re living it. Because of Maestro David.
On a bad day for me, he would call, either to talk to me or my parents and check to see if I was okay. He comes in before any other teacher because he cares. He gives us contact information so we can bombard him with questions at all hours that we know he’ll respond to, because he cares. He will not leave you out, struggling for air. He’ll lend you a hand, even if it takes you a while to grasp it. Because he cares.
If you didn’t like Maestro David (for whatever insane reason)… it’s clearly because you didn’t know him. He’s a teacher. He’s a friend. He’s a failed comedian. He’s a guru. He’s a life preserver. Call him what you will, but lo extrañaré.
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