13.

I have moved my students out to the hallway so we can hear each other reading a play.  It is our second-to-last day in the temporary classrooms, and the speech teacher has decided to go out with a rousing, loud game of charades or something similar.

It is sixth hour, and I cannot describe how angelic my sixth hour is. If you saw them, you'd think I was paying them in cold hard cash to behave.  To not have to manage any behavior between fifth and seventh hour is completely awesome.  They are fun.  They joke.  And they know when to work.

As our school is under construction, we've been holding class in the gym for the last ten weeks.  The kids know that nothing makes me angrier than outsiders disrupting their instructional time.  There is one construction worker who is constantly walking about the building, blasting his hip radio and dragging heavy boxes.  Whenever we hear a noise from inside our not so soundproof classrooms, we all look at each other and say, "that guy."

Anyway, we're in the hallway, trying to hear each other read aloud.  The students are holding themselves up against the lockers and I'm sitting at one end, in the middle of the hallway.  Class is clearly in session.  We hear "Stairway to Heaven," faintly at first and then coming closer. It is that guy.  Our laughter ripples like the wave--as soon as he passes one pair of students, they double over in silent glee.  By the time he passes me, the only person left reading is the poor girl who started the monologue.  She has not looked up from her lines.  Someone says, "That guy."

Tears are seriously rolling down my cheeks.  Shared human joy is so easy when you let them be people.