A Christmas Memory, circa 1968… in San Antonio, Texas

Picture me, age 25, a high school English teacher of largely Hispanic students, four classes of sophomore English, and the text book the same one I had in high school in 1958. I was a young teacher, knew I would be at Harlandale High just that semester. So I ignored the rules and bought 30 copies each of four novels:  To Kill a Mockingbird, The Pearl (Steinbeck), Lord of the Flies, and West Side Story (to use with Romeo and Juliet in the textbook). Most students spoke Spanish, many with limited English. I rotated the books and no student lost a copy that semester.  On the last day I was there before the Christmas break, I hauled my record player to school, along with treats, and put on a recording of Dylan Thomas reading, “A Child’s Christmas in Wales.” 

I laugh at myself now. Those kids “bore” with me.

This week in a file I found an old Literary Christmas quiz, which has a passage from Dylan Thomas. I have edited it for space. Imagine my Hispanic students hearing Dylan’s actual voice speaking these words:  “There were the Useful Presents: engulfing mufflers of the old coach days, and mittens made for giant sloths; zebra scarfs of a substance like silky gum that could be tug-o-warred down to the galoshes…and balaclavas for victims of head-shrinking tribes… and from aunts who wore wool next to the skin, there were rasping vests that made you wonder why the aunts had any skin left at all.”

Oh, to hear the Welshman read his words in a voice that had to be heard to be believed. I remember suggesting “not to worry,” just hear and love the sound of the English language read in this lyrical and intoxicating way. 

That same week I read Truman Capote’s “A Christmas Memory,” to my classes, brought in fruit cake so they would know what Capote’s crazy aunt was making to send all over the South to strangers she had met that year, plus one to the President in the White House.

“One must have a little madness/ Or one never dares to cut the rope and be free.” Who said similar words I do not recall. I will only say that Harlandale High is not on my resumé!  My teaching “record” went from Dodson Junior High in Los Angeles to the decade in the Napa Valley, then beyond in other countries, until American University in the late 90s.

My students at Dodson had been Latino and black kids bused to a white school on a Southern California hill. The other day I returned to an essay I wrote years ago about Rafael, a student I taught for three semesters at Dodson before moving to Texas for those six months.  I added the following to this “old” essay about my calling to be a teacher.  Again, edited for space…

“Here I am, age 82, and still teaching for a community college program, usually two short courses of literature and writing each year. Why do I keep doing this? Because teaching is in my blood, a marker of my character, the way I have given to others throughout life; and I hope to continue teaching until my death./ A science writer I have used often in classes was Lewis Thomas who said we ought to reach the end of our lives and like a milkweed go poof and just blow away.  He wrote, “We pass the word around; we ponder how the case is put by different people; we read the poetry; we meditate over literature; we play the music; we change our minds; we reach an understanding.” Yes, Lewis Thomas, as you did in life, I have given my heart and soul to being an educator and would not have lived my life in any other way.”

The finest of holidays to all.  I’ll be back early in 2026, a most welcome New Year!