THIS LETTER CHANGED MY LIFE
ON JUNE 5,1990
I was in kindergarten at Holy Cross Elementary School in 1990 and a lot of things happened that year. I had no clue back then what they where or what they meant or even how they would effect me later on in life. Mrs. Russo was the first person who spoke up for me as an educator. Now some might say what could possibly go wrong when you are 6 years old? Little did I know that this was going to impact my life forever. My mom tells me the story all the time, that there was a time when all the kids where asked to hold hands and to make a circle and there was one student that did but another that did not, because they thought my hand was different.
That then gave Mrs. Russo the idea to bring in someone from the local Shriners Children’s Hospital and speak about all the different types of weaknesses. They also showed the students all the cool things about being different. At the same time, there is nothing to be afraid of and no one is the same if you look around the room. There was not anyone in the room who is the same. We all come from different backgrounds; look and you will see there are people with blond hair, brown hair, black hair, red hair, along with different color eyes some blue, green, brown, hazel.
Mrs. Russo was an awesome person, she always made sure that the children in her classroom felt at home. There was a number of times that she helped others. She would never let anyone feel like they were different and that was one of the things that made her stand out the most for me. There was a bunch of instances where I have had to speak up and times that I have felt self-confident about how I am.
Later when I was in high school, I heard that Mrs. Russo was diagnosed with tongue cancer and she had a percentage of her tongue removed. She had to stop teaching full time but she went back to work part-time. Because of the surgery that she had she was not able to talk clearly but she loved teaching and making a difference in peoples lives. So when my mom told me about the kids laughing at her when she went to read a book to the students, it broke my heart. I know when kids are young they don’t know better, however, it still hurts because she made a huge difference to everyone, especially me. Thank you Mrs. Russo for showing people that being different can be a good thing.
