The Ghosts Who Linger From Here to There

I used to work in an elementary school.  I was a special educator and and a psychologist.  I managed kids who ran up and down the halls barefoot.  I set up behavior plans to motivate students with neurological problems to get off the school bus.  And I loved my work.  I didn't have much affection for a lot of the adults who were harder to manage than the kids. But, six years into retirement, I miss the little souls I connected with on a level few will ever understand.  One of the luckiest parts of my time in the elementary school was having my granddaughter attend the school I worked at.  She has always been sweet and deeply caring, despite her own heavy maternal burdens to bear.  When she visited me in the mornings and sometimes stopped by for lunch I was thrilled.  In this photo I visited her in her third-grade classroom for their Halloween Party seven years ago. All Hallows Eve when ghosts linger between here and there.  The shadowy presences we all have sometimes hidden away and sometimes not.  My granddaughter is now nearly six feet tall and has to bend down when we hug while I stand on my tippy-toes.  I don't see her much any more as she is busy with friends, life, designing clothes as she aspires to be a fashion designer but we keep in touch and the love is still there.  Watching her grow and become a young woman reminds me of the passage of time more than anything else in my life.  Well, maybe my gray hair and wrinkles give it away.  Someday she will likely be a grandmother and reflect on her granddaughter or son who grins under her embrace, reminding her how important the right kind of family connections are despite the sisters who disappoint, the daughters who disconnect, the mothers who can't provide the the love that nurtures peace and confidence and the fathers who try their best.  I am lucky she is in my life.  It helps me make peace with my own ghostly apparitions of life that might have been and may yet be.  Those who linger from here to there, and sometimes everywhere, my life has a history yet to tell.