Do You Remember Your Old Teachers?

What would you say to them twenty years later?

Image taken by Author

I bumped into an old teacher of mine recently.

She taught me and my two brothers back in primary school at various stages.

I must have been just 6 years old.

And there she was, waiting in line at the same restaurant just meters away from me. She was with friends or colleagues, I couldn’t tell.

I noticed her immediately, thinking that it would be nice to re-introduce myself. But a wave of anxiety held me back.

I was trying to pump myself up to do it, conscious that at any moment either of us may be seated, taking that chance away from me. Perhaps I would never get the opportunity again.

The waiter asked them to follow him, and as they started walking in a line directly past me, I jumped up from the ‘waiting’ sofa and tapped her on her shoulder, forcing me to say something as her friends walked on obliviously.

I told her that she used to be my teacher. Her face lit up as I added that she’d taught not just me, but all my siblings too.

Incredibly, after taking a moment, she recalled exactly who my brothers and I were and when she taught us, even going on to ask about my parents and how they were getting on.