Not a bad public, that.

My dad died two years ago today…more or less. I won’t go through the same blarg I talked through on Saturday. Two years and two days, or two years by the calendar, or something–the more I think about this, the less I think we should commemorate/celebrate/remember specific dates and lean more toward marking the 52-week anniversaries of things. Which would throw the calendars off altogether.

I mentioned earlier that I didn’t have a copy of the feature that the local newspaper did for my dad. Grabbed a copy today online–they interviewed his teaching colleagues from school, also a former student and some others. My dad once commented that I had his dream job; I know he mentioned that to others as well. But the stuff I do at work really can’t compare to the influence of a good teacher like he was. The tributes we received from his former students in the weeks following his death bear that out. One teacher is all it takes to make all the difference in one life. Or in many.

There’s a scene from a movie that gets appropriated at times like this: Sir Thomas More’s advice to Richard Rich in “A Man for All Seasons.” Sir Thomas is goading Rich into becoming a teacher, saying that he’d be a fine one, “perhaps a great one.” Rich asks: “If I was, who would know it?”

“You, your pupils, your friends, God. Not a bad public, that.”

Not a bad public indeed.