And it was still hot

So in the C.A.R.E. package sent to me by Petra I pull out not just three vacuum packs of genuine COLOMBIAN coffee, there is a copy of Sendak's Wild Things. We are undoing the package during class, with my 9th graders, and I spot the book. Wow, I think. And none of them has ever seen or read it. So then I read it to the class, very dramatically, showing the pictures, ROARING the terrible roars, and GNASHING the terrible teeth, and so on, making them stand up and do a wild rumpus, and then I get toward the end of the book, where Max is lonely, and wants to be where someone loves him best of all... and suddenly I am starting to choke up, it is getting to me very deep, and I don't understand it, I can't tell why...

A few hours later now, I think was is a combination of things...

remembering how I would read the book with Thomas and Meredith

perhaps grieving that that golden time now lies so far in the past

missing friends and family

having sailed, like Max, in and out of days and through weeks and almost over a year to a land where Wild Things are... well, if not Wild Things exactly, then people with whom it is hard to connect, not through any failure on anyone's part but just because of langauge and culture, mostly though because of language

and then reaching the end of the book, where from far across the world Max senses that there are still good things waiting for him back home, so he gives up his job as King and sails back home, where for him there is comfort and familiarity and warmth

he finds his supper waiting for him

AND IT WAS STILL HOT.

It is a tale of forgiveness, Max is a prodigal son, who sins against the parent (making mischief, saying I'll Eat You Up) and then runs off on his own, only to realize at the end that it isn't really what he wanted, so he heads home and is forgiven and welcomed and has a feast prepared for him even before he gets there.

Nearly every job I have had has worked like this: six months to figure things out, one year to do it, then it is stale and boring and I need to move on. Right now I feel I am getting things done, I am through with the learning curve, I can function, I have a fair amount of control, and things are happening.

But a year from now, I will be more than ready to give up being King of all the Wild Things and happy to return to the night of my very own room, where, God willing

there will be a supper waiting for me,

and it will be

still hot.