I’ve been saying “it’s gonna be ok” to people just about every day for the past two months or so. Because I’m a teacher, and I’m leaving my students.

I need to be more clear, and not just because I haven’t written word one on this page in, oh, a couple years? I worked at my current – no, my former – job for 8 years. I really, really liked it. No, I loved it. You don’t get upset over leaving a job the way I got upset if you don’t love it. I loved my job, I loved my students, I loved my coworkers.

But I’m leaving, because life does funny things to all of us, and sometimes opportunities arise that will never arise again, and because people on their deathbeds don’t talk about the things they did and wished they hadn’t, they talk about the things they didn’t do and wished they had. This is the kind of move that I would always wonder about if I never made it — so I’m making it. Even if it’s scary, even if it hurts.

The hardest part, by far, is leaving my students. I guess that might sound strange to any non-teachers out there, but I can’t even say I’m a normal teacher. I teach theatre. I don’t just have a student for one class somewhere in their 4-year career — I often have students for multiple years. Some kids I teach for all four years. Some I teach as freshmen, then not again until they’re seniors. Some, I never *actually* have in a class, but I direct them many times in our after-school performances.

Point is, I have *relationships* with these kids, and our group feels like family. And I’ve read so many letters in the last two months since I learned I was accepted for my new job — letters showing appreciation for what I’ve done, and who I was, and the things I’ve taught them, and all kinds of things. A thing I wasn’t quite ready to hear was, to how many of these students I became a father figure. (Yes, scary thought if you know me in any capacity, but that only goes to show how much these kids counted on me.)

So — my refrain, upon leaving them, has been: “it’s gonna be ok.”

Which it is. They’re getting an outstanding, well-respected educator to take over the program. I’ve worked hard to make them into confident leaders who can handle things even if their supervising adult doesn’t know anything about the theater (it happens). It’s gonna be ok.

And people leave, right? People come into our lives, and they impact us in big ways and small, and then a lot of them leave. Sometimes expectedly, sometimes not, but nothing lasts forever in this world. And that’s ok. And I tried to explain that, inasmuch as you can explain that to some very, very sad high school students.

What I didn’t quite realize — or what I didn’t want to realize — was that I was telling them that because I was trying to convince myself.

I’ve been in this job for 8 years. That’s well above the average term of employment in the building. I’m a *fixture*. I was ready to potentially play out the next 14 or so years of my career here, if it came to that. And I would have been happy to do so. I wasn’t *trying* to leave my position. And learning how much some of my students are hurting, how sad they are to see me go?

I wasn’t sure *I* was going to be ok upon leaving.

Because not only am I taking a new position, I’m moving. Out of state. To a place where I’ll know nobody (save my sister and her husband). I’m starting over. I’m leaving my second family.

I wasn’t sure I would be ok.

But suddenly, just a few days ago, I believed it. I believed it would be ok. I was shaving my head, and playing some 80s music, and maybe there were some chemicals at work, but I was thinking about leaving and thinking about what’s ahead and for the first time, I didn’t feel sad or worried or guilty. (The tracks were “Who’s Gonna Drive You Home”, followed by “Cruel Summer”, for the curious.)

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that the school year is officially over, the seniors have graduated, and the goodbyes are, by and large, behind me. (That part was THE WORST.)

But I think it’s gonna be ok. It’s a weird thought, for an eternal pessimist like me. But I can’t help it. It’s gonna be ok.

If I’m lucky, for all of us.