When We Finish Testing

I'm testing a group of boys who "can't test" in the other special ed classrooms due to behavior issues. When they're testing, I'm circulating, watching the bubbles. I'm tense and teetering toward drill sergeant. I make sure they fill in bubbles all the way and show their work and circle words and stay quiet and quit tapping their pencils. But when we're all finished, we the testing materials back in the box. Each of us takes out our sketchbooks - though the word "sketchbook" is a sketch in the case of three of the boys who stapled papers they found in another teacher's recycle bin. Sometimes I give them tips, answering questions and answering a few of my own. Twice we've had deep conversation. Most of the time, it's quiet. We draw. When we're not drawing, we're studying other people drawing. And when that's not happening, we're dreaming. There are two of them that have a reputation for destruction. It's not an unfair reputation. Still, I wonder how many people know that there is this creative side to each of them. Teachers have seen their empty notebooks. Have they seen their filled-up sketchbooks? The hard part is that the world isn't made for creative types. I've seen it happen to former students. They get crushed or they get violent. Not all of them, but too many. Art doesn't promise healing. It only promises a language. So, I leave the testing session exhausted and depressed and hopeful in ways that I can hardly understand. So, this is completely unrelated, but Wendell the World's Worst Wizard will be on sale tomorrow for $0.99. Go download it if you haven't already. The deal last twenty-four hours.