Today’s Think Write Thursday topic is to write about a favorite teacher. And to also work in a bit of gratitude, too.

I have been very fortunate to have had many wonderful teachers over the years. My kindergarten teacher was a close friend of my mom’s and I adored her. My first grade teacher, Mrs. Sykes, and I had a very special relationship and I can see her face to this day. I had some great teachers in junior high and high school; I am even friends with one on Facebook. (Hi, Mr. Paine!) And then there was college. Oh, college. I had such a fabulous experience at Wheaton and I owe a big part of that to the wonderful professors there. My absolute favorite, and the one I want to write about today, was Sheila Shaw.

Professor Shaw taught 18th and 19th century English literature and I was an English major so we were bound to cross paths eventually but, luckily for me, I met her my 2nd semester of my freshman year. I was in a survey class and she guest lectured on the book Pamela. She was so smart and also funny and extremely engaging and I think I fell in love with her a little bit right then. And I became determined to take every class of hers that I could. And I did. Nineteenth century women’s literature, English classics, and more. We read everything from The Woman in White to all of Jane Austen (Professor Shaw carried a book bag that said, “I’d Rather be Reading Jane Austen”) and Dickens and so much more. She opened my world to classics that were good, not just classics you had to read. I wrote paper after paper for her. Long papers full of themes and interpretations and criticisms. She taught me, more than anyone else ever had, how to write. Not just about books but about life and how books can illuminate life. How to find a theme and put it together and make it cohesive. Thinking about it now, I’d have to say that I’m not sure I could write this blog were it not for the things I learned from Sheila Shaw.

In the fall of my junior year Professor Shaw told me that she would be on sabbatical for my senior year. I was crushed because I had been planning to take my senior seminar course with her. I applied for, and received, special permission to take my senior seminar in my junior year and we spent an entire semester reading, discussing and writing about George Eliot. And it was fabulous and everything I’d ever dreamed of in a senior seminar. We read and read and read. Seriously, Middlemarch alone is over 900 pages. And there was also The Mill on the Floss (my favorite) and Adam Bede and Daniel Deronda and Felix Holt and yes, even Silas Marner. (which, I must point out, is the least tolerable of Eliot’s works and the one most often assigned in schools. turns everyone off from her right there and I find that extremely annoying.) My final paper was on religion as portrayed throughout Eliot’s books. It was a ton of work. A ton. But I loved getting to work closely with Professor Shaw and every insight she shared with me, every thoughtful comment, every office meeting, every cup of tea was valuable and meaningful and special. It was a glorious time in my college career and I owe so much of that to the care and nurturing and wisdom I received from this woman.

I never saw Sheila Shaw after graduation, not for any particular reason, it just never happened. And she died a little over 3 years ago. I was sad to hear the news and spent a lot of time thinking about her and the influence she had on me, not just from 1984-1987 but in all the years since then. She changed the way I read and interpret books – not just the good stuff she had me read but all the books I’ve read since. And, given the amount I read, I guess it’s pretty easy to conclude that she was indeed the teacher that influenced me the most.

I can hear her voice in my head as I’m writing this post and it’s bittersweet. I’m so grateful for the opportunity I had to study under Professor Shaw. I know it’s not something everyone gets to experience – not everyone loves college, not everyone encounters a fabulous teacher who changes their view of the world – but I did and I am full of gratitude when I think of all of it.

The opportunity. The lessons. And Sheila Shaw.

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The topic for Thing Write Thursday this week is to write about an abandoned building. 

“I dare you,” she said. “I dare you to just go look in the window.”

“I’ll do more than that. I’ll go inside.”

And with those words I walked up the cement sidewalk to the abandoned branch library in my neighborhood. It was Halloween night, 1977 and I was 12 years old. I wasn’t particularly brave but I was very competitive and I wasn’t going to back down from a dare like that one.

The double front doors were locked, of course, but I would not be deterred. I knew this library, I had visited it weekly for years before it closed, so I walked around to the side where the basement windows were, the ones that went directly into the children’s room. Luckily (or maybe unluckily) the window was unlatched. I pushed it in and crawled over the edge and dropped to the floor.

It was dark. And cold. Colder than outside. I’m sure I would have been able to see my breath if I could have seen anything at all. And then I remembered the flashlight in the bottom of my trick or treat bag, the one my mom had insisted I bring with me. I turned it on and the light shone weakly around the former children’s room. Memories of happy times rushed back to me. Carefully choosing books to bring home. Attending story times and puppet shows. Spending hours reading on the little couch in the corner while waiting for my mom to pick me up.

All of that was gone now, though. No books filled the sagging shelves, no happy greeting came from Miss Keane, the librarian, no colorful posters lined the walls. My library, the one I loved, was empty of treasures and full of cobwebs. And probably mice and spiders, I thought, as I shuddered.

I didn’t need to see any more. There was nothing left to prove, I had done more than I’d been challenged to do. Plus, it was creepy in there so I went back to the window and scrambled through to my friends waiting outside.

“What was it like? Did you see any ghosts?! Where you scared?” They gathered around me, eager for tales of fright.

“No,” I said, “no ghosts or scary monsters. Just a sad and empty library. Let’s go get more candy before we have to go home.”

As we walked away, though, I couldn’t help but glance back at that vacant place. And I realized, there are things that are scarier than ghosts and monsters. A shuttered library, one without books to lend and librarians to help, is perhaps one of the scariest things of all. I vowed, right then, to never let this happen again. To make sure that libraries are free and available to everyone. To make sure that no library in my town would ever close again. To become … a librarian.

The End

So, my question to you – is that a true story from my childhood? Or is it fiction?

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I’ve had a lot of good breakfasts in my life. Some of the great ones I’ve cooked and some I’ve eaten with friends in their homes and some I’ve eaten in restaurants. But today’s topic isn’t about good breakfasts. Today’s topic is about the best breakfast I’ve ever had.

And the best breakfast I’ve ever had isn’t so much about what I ate as it is about where I ate it.

Right here. On the porch of the Los Lirios Hotel in Tulum, Mexico.

Just looking at this photo brings it all back. The morning light. The warm breeze blowing and lifting my hair. The rustle of the palm trees. The warm sand under my feet as I walked the path to the restaurant – no shoes required, my friends. The smiles of the restaurant staff as they greeted us with buenos dias. It’s a perfectly lovely spot and each morning we would sit at our table and relax and look out towards the ocean.

Our routine was coffee first and then food. Usually a made-to-order omelet, Dale’s loaded with everything under the sun, mine usually with vegetables and cheese. And then a few things from the buffet. The fried plantains were golden and sweet and delicious and I often took a few and put them on my plate. The fresh fruit was beautifully sliced and presented, gorgeous shades of pinks and oranges and yellows. Maybe a small dish of their homemade yogurt with a spoonful of granola. It was all fresh and delicious and plentiful.

But still. As good as the food was, the setting was better. Breakfast was slow paced, the entire day spread out before us, full of possibilities, places to visit, new things to see, new experiences to share. Some days we would get right up and go out and do something – snorkely, visit the ruins, take a drive through the biosphere or head in town to shop. Other days we would linger over coffee, chatting and reading and sighing with contentedness – ultimately reading on the beach, swimming in the waves, walking in the sand, drinking cold cerveza and just reveling in our surroundings. Every day started with that awesome breakfast. Every day unfolded beautifully. Every day was magical.

Those breakfasts – a total of 3 weeks of them now – were the best I’ve ever had.

If you wrote a post for this week’s Think Write Thursday please click the button below to add your link. If you want to subscribe to the Think Write Thursday weekly email (it’s the only way to get the weekly prompt) please click here.

Today, the talented and very clever Kat and I are rolling out something new for all of you: a weekly creative writing prompt. It’s slated for Thursdays and we are calling it, as you may have surmised from the title of this blog post:

It will be very similar to Ten On Tuesday. You will sign up for the weekly email right here and you can then expect to receive the prompt for each week at the beginning of the week. We are aiming for Sunday but I don’t want to make any promises I can’t keep so let’s just leave that little detail flexible right now. Mmmmkay?

We are working on some really fun ideas and prompts for you, from topics ranging from tell us what you had for breakfast to write about someone you admire to an analysis of your worst school photo. We’re hoping we will hit on something for everyone and if not, hey, it’s creative writing. So you are free to just take our prompt and turn it into something that works for you. As in, you know, be creative.

So, who is with us? Ready to take the plunge and write creatively on Thursdays? Sign up now and join us!