My Merry Way

The first supervisory position I ever held, straight out of my graduate work, was as the Director of a group home for emotionally and behaviorally disturbed latency age kids.  The staff dynamics were pretty turbulent; I had been hired over the very popular Assistant Director, and during that first summer I had a lot of resentment and low morale to deal with.  The Assistant Director became so disgruntled and inappropriate that my boss finally fired him.  

 

Naturally, these overtones washed over onto the kids and we had a lot of acting out, by adults as well as children.

 

One afternoon, frustrated with my managerial ineptitude and the stifling passive aggressiveness of the staff, I decided to mandate an outing, something to get everyone out of the house.  I reasoned that a walk through the woods in the nearby mountains would at least work off some energy.

 

We drove up to Cumberland Knob, one of my favorite haunts back in my North Carolina days. The day was crisp with the early hope of autumn.  We emptied out of the van and I began walking toward my favorite trail.  My little irritable band followed me silently.  Our masks of dissatisfaction were etched firmly, resolutely on our faces.

 

I walked rather briskly, and in short order, as walks through the woods are prone to do, I was feeling more relaxed than I had felt in the last two months. The better I felt, the quicker I walked.  Though I didn’t look behind me, I noticed that the group began to talk and I was certain I even heard laughter.  I barely recognized the sound, but yes, I was sure it was laughter.  Maybe giggling.  Either way, I smiled as I forged ahead.

 

After a couple of miles, I stopped at a large rock and we all took a break.  I noticed that the sourness in everyone’s faces had relaxed away.  The kids ran through the woods, the staff talked among themselves but didn’t separate themselves from me.  A couple of times they even deliberately included me in their conversation.

 

Paula was the de facto leader of the staff.  As Paula went, so went the group.  Late that evening, I ran into her in the kitchen and we sat down at the table for a few minutes.  She was very pleasant, as if there had never been a moment of tension between us.  Finally, my curiosity bested me.

 

“Paula?”

 

“Yes, Kit?”

 

“What’s going on?”

 

“What do you mean, Kit?”

 

“I mean, for two months ya’ll have acted like I am the devil incarnate, and then all of a sudden, this.  You’re friendly.  What’s changed?”

 

“Oh, nothing,” she said looking down at her cup of coffee.  “Except,” she looked up at me and I saw true admiration and respect in her eyes.  “It’s just that when I saw you step right over that huge snake in the middle of the path, I thought, ‘Man, if Kit’s brave enough to walk over snakes, she’s okay by me!”

 

I never did tell Paula, or the staff, or the kids that I never saw any snakes that day.

 

I have learned that when there’s a snake in any form basking in the middle of my path to simply step over it and go along on my merry way.