‘I will never forget Jeannie or her dad’
By George Valadie
September 3, 2010
Another school year is open and I’ve been caught up trying to learn all the new faces, the names will have to come later. First, I have to remember those kids who’ve just been gone this summer.
I won’t admit I’m old, but I sure am getting older.
But I will never forget Jeannie or her dad. And they passed through my life over 25 years ago. I first met them when a local employer had called to say he had a recently laid-off worker with a daughter who really wanted to attend our school. Times were tough then too and he, the boss, had just been forced to cut back his staff, including this particular dad.
Feeling badly about the whole thing, he phoned to see if I would meet with her and her father to decide if there was any chance this might somehow fit together.
I think Catholic schools owe every kid that sort of look – it’s what I think we’re all about. He didn’t really know much about the family, but he forewarned me of the obvious — this family would likely be in need of some tuition help if we had any.
That didn’t scare me, depending on how much it was of course. We were already helping quite a few families plug that last little gap they needed to fill. So we set up the appointment to see where this might go.
I began by chatting with Jeannie to see how she had come to have this desire to attend our school, especially since the majority of her friends would likely enroll elsewhere.
She told me all about how her family had moved into our town just a few years ago. Though she had known nothing about us, I was impressed by the fact she had managed to dig and learn. How many sixth graders do that?
And ever since, she had wanted to attend no other high school. It was no surprise this sort of kid had also been good at bugging her dad about it. Sixth graders are great at asking for stuff but few can grasp the financial differences between an education that’s public (free) and private (a lot).
Now, three years later, here she was finally ready for high school, equipped with a wisdom of the world she didn’t deserve and an awareness of a family plight she’d rather not live.
Still, her enthusiasm wasn’t at all dampened. She won me over like few kids ever have. Then I asked her to step outside my office so I might get a chance to talk with her dad about adult sorts of things.
After a few pleasantries, he and I moved to the necessary but awkward financial part of the conversation. I handed him what was in those days a very brief application form. Less prying and complex than what we demand in 2010.
I quickly found out that “degree of complexity” isn’t the same for everyone. He seemed reticent to pick it up or even look at it, much less fill it in. I felt sure he was just embarrassed by either his job loss or the small income he would have to tell me about.
Finally, he awkwardly told me the secret he’d been hoping to protect – he could not read it.
Trying to act as if that happened all the time at our mostly middle class school, I let him know I’d be able to help him. But I’d need to be asking some pretty personal questions. He nodded and so we began.
Do you have a spouse? No.
How many children do you have? Three, er, I mean five.
Five? Well, my brother, who used to help me with these sorts of things, has two kids but he died. I’m trying to help them.
What’s your address? I don’t remember. We just had to move because we couldn’t keep paying the rent.
There were others about investment income, savings and retirement but they were as irrelevant as the final one I didn’t even bother to ask. How much money do you think you can muster for a monthly payment to our school?
I assured him he’d hear from me, but promised nothing. Our school had no resources to make this happen. I knew it, he knew it too. But Jeannie didn’t. And he would have to tell her.
That’s the way of the world. People don’t get to have everything they want. Sometimes the answer is simply “No, we can’t do that.” But I didn’t envy him having to break it to her.
Then three days later, one of our parents – let’s call them the Smiths — walked in with the darndest miracle I’d ever seen. “My wife and I had a good year and we’ve got some extra. I’ve got a year’s tuition to donate but I’d like you to help some family who has absolutely no shot.”
What was last week’s parable? “When you host a banquet, do not invite your relatives or the wealthy … invite the poor, the crippled, the lame — because of their inability to repay you.” And that’s exactly who he invited.
I can’t imagine all Jeannie overcame to make it through four years but we never saw all that much of her dad after that. I think he felt way too out of place. I don’t know that I wouldn’t have felt the same.
Still, I’ll never forget that dad’s story, his daughter Jeannie, or the Smith family who never even asked to know their names.
Dear God – Sometimes the world struggles to believe in you, much less angels unless you’ve gotten to see one. Amen.
(George Valadie is president of St. Benedict at Auburndale School in Cordova, Tenn.)
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