Speechless

Today was our last day of school before the holiday break. Things have been stressful and I'm definitely ready for some time off from the job and time on the water. I deal with some challenging students but I really do like working with them. They stunned me today when I came in to my room well into first period and they had a gift for me. I've gotten plenty of gifts from students before but I wasn't expecting this. The card said, "Thanks for putting up with our shit". They gave me a new coffee maker since mine broke a few weeks ago. They also made sure that I got my special acid free coffee (I get horrible stomach pains when I drink most any other kind of coffee). It was the perfect gift as I can't make it through a day AND keep my composure while dealing with all of their issues without a lot of coffee. I suspect that my assistant Evelyn paid for everything as I know my students don't have any money and would feel terrible if they spent any that they did have. Evelyn said they all talked about what to get me when I was out sick on Monday and quickly decided on the coffee maker. I almost got choked up. Most of my students don't have a ton at home and many of them get really cranky when they know they're going to be away from a big piece of structure in their life. I was really impressed.