This past summer marked 25 years since I graduated from high school. 25 years since my graduating class of just over 400 were sent out into the world, just a few months shy of the events of September 11.
It seems like a lifetime ago, and also like it was yesterday.
Truthfully, I have no idea if there was a reunion or not. At one point, those things were being organized and planned on Facebook, and I would rather stick my hand into a beehive filled with murder hornets than willingly log into Facebook.
So, if there was a reunion, I hope it was fun.
I was an average student throughout high school. I never really excelled at anything, but I also never really struggled with anything either. Unless you count pre-calculus. Thank goodness I sat next to a smart kid who let me copy his homework.
My favorite class, however, the thing that I honest-to-god looked forward to every day of my senior year, was Honors English.
Honors classes were kind of like AP classes for kids who weren’t quite smart enough to go through the process of placing in AP classes, but needed a little bit more from a class than what a standard class could offer. Or maybe in 2000-2001, we just didn’t have AP classes yet? I don’t know, I’m not an educator.
Either way, Donna Kernutt taught 12th grade Honors English and at the risk of using every teacher cliche possible,she was as much like the high school version of Robin Williams’ character from Dead Poet’s Society as one could have in a public high school setting.
I don’t recall everything about her class, but she had a way of making literature come alive. Of making you believe that the characters in the stories you were reading mattered. Like the words on the page could save the world.
And we believed her.
One of the things she did in her class was called “Soapbox time.” This consisted of her placing a wooden crate at the front of the class, and giving every student in the room a set amount of time (I seem to remember no more than a couple of minutes) to talk about whatever they wanted.
Apparently the process originated in London, where if you were a certain distance off of the ground, you could say whatever you wanted about the royal family freely. I have no idea if this was actually true (for all I know, she made it up), but nevertheless, once every few weeks, we had “Soapbox time.”
Soapbox time scared the living shit out of me.
I hated public speaking more than almost anything. I got sweaty. I got nervous. I, more than once, would get physically sick on the days I knew I had to give speeches. So to have to stand up in front of my classmates and just talk? With no script? With no outline?
Madness.
But, one of the things that I wasn’t scared of was writing. I knew how to do that. Every time we were given a paper to write, while others might have groaned in protest, I got excited.
And Ms. Kernutt knew that.
I still remember, before Thanksgiving during my senior year, as the class was filing out of her room at the end of the day, she made eye contact with me and asked me to stay back for just a few minutes to chat with her. Naturally I thought I was in trouble.
Quite the opposite.
She sat down at the desk next to mine and proceeded to tell me, in not so many words, that I was a good writer. That I had a gift. She could tell that words came easy to me, and that I really loved getting to create something beautiful on the page. She really loved reading everything that I wrote and she looked forward to the rest of the school year. She also suggested, as nervous as she knew I was about soapbox time, that I write out some ideas to have on hand in order to not be as nervous.
She was the first person to ever tell me that I was a good writer. There in that concrete classroom in Eugene, Oregon in the fall of the year 2000. She saw something in me that, if I’m being honest, I didn’t have the courage to see in myself, and altered the trajectory of the rest of my life with that 10-minute after school meeting.
I graduated in the spring of 2001, found Ms. Kernutt on graduation night, thanked her for everything, went to college, and then mostly didn’t think about her for years (except for when I was deciding to get a degree in English and Creative Writing.)
But 25 years later, I just published my first book (shameless plug, you can buy a copy at burnthehousebook.com)
And during that process, I reconnected with her and let her know what I was up to.
And a few days ago, I got to address an envelope to Donna Kernutt and place a copy of the book that I wrote inside of it for her. I included a card with some kind words, but honestly, how do you thank the person who changed your life?
How do you say thank you to someone that took the time to see the best in you?
I said thank you the only way I knew how. With words. I wrote a book. I told my story. I chose to believe what she said about me.
So, thank you Ms. Kernutt.
I hope you love the book.
Because it wouldn’t exist without you.
Forever your student,
Stephen