Delta Winds: A Magazine of Student Essays A Publication of San Joaquin Delta College 1998

The Lesson of Indifference

Liliana Tikhonova

I was in third grade of an elementary school. Ms. Zotova, who was my first teacher, taught my classmates and me to read, write, and calculate. She also taught us such moral values as kindness and fairness. Each day after classes, I and some other students stayed at school with her. She helped us with our homework, and we played different games and went for a walk. In the evening, our parents came to take us home. While I was at school with my teacher, my parents were never concerned that something bad could happen to me. Ms. Zotova was a role-model whom I wanted to emulate. After school, when I came home, I played with dolls. They were my students, and I was their teacher. I tried to teach them the same things Ms. Zotova taught my classmates and me.

But one day events caused me to become disillusioned about this person whom I highly regarded. One school day morning, which seemed to begin the same way as all days began, I came to school and entered the classroom which was already full of students. A few minutes later Ms. Zotova appeared in the classroom. She turned to the class and announced, "Yesterday, somebody from your class stole money from my desk. I know who it was, and I can call this person, but I would like her to get up and confess to us her guilt." Nobody got up. After a few minutes of the ominous silence, the teacher called a name of one girl in my class. Ms. Zotova verbally attacked and blamed her. Lena -- the girl whose name was called -- did not answer anything. "If you don't confess to us that you committed this theft, I will have to inform the school committee about this incident. I don't want your misbehavior to stay unpunished," persevered Ms. Zotova. Condemnatory glances of all students in my class were directed on Lena. Her eyes became full of tears. She got up from her desk and ran away from the classroom saying nothing.

"There is no place for thieves in our class. If the thieves are here, it is our responsibility to penalize them," Ms. Zotova articulated. I was listening to my favorite teacher. I didn't try to analyze her words because I was sure that she could not say anything unfair. The teacher continued, "I think that Lena went home. I want you to follow her and to make her come back to the school because we didn't finish the discussion of this incident."

The whole class, which consisted of thirty students, was almost running to the street where Lena lived with her mother, younger brother, and grandfather. Her parents had divorced about three years before, and her father did not visit his two children. He did not help them with money. Therefore, Lena's mother had to work hard to support the family. She took care of patients in a hospital where she usually spent a whole day and sometimes even stayed all night. Lena's grandfather was always drunk. He spent much of the money on alcohol while his granddaughter sometimes did not even have money for lunch.

My whole class appeared in front of the house where Lena lived. A door was opened by Lena's grandfather who was blind drunk. The heart-breaking cry was coming from the inside. A few of my classmates and I went into Lena's room. I will never forget what I saw there! Lena was sitting on the floor. Her eyes and face were red because of tears that rolled down her cheeks. Her face signified nothing except pain and disaster. "Leave me alone! I didn't take that money!" she cried in voice full of despair. None of my classmates was going to make her return to school anymore. A few minutes later, Lena's mother appeared at a door. She already knew what happened. Lena ran to her. The mother hugged her shivery body trying to console her. Sobbing and swallowing tears, Lena said over and over again one phrase, "Ma, I didn't do anything wrong." I felt I was guilty for the suffering of this girl. The perplexity grasped me. I wanted to pacify Lena, but I did not know how to do that. I knew that I went there to chide her, but I felt unable to do that. Lena's mother turned to my classmates and me and said, "Thank you. I don't need your help any more. I will clear up everything by myself. Go home now."

In the evening of the same day, somebody called to my mother and said that Lena was taken to a hospital because of her nervous frustration. Doctors asked Lena's mother to stay with her in the hospital for several days because Lena had the fear of staying alone in a room.

I could not sleep that night. I was thinking about the morning incident and tried to understand what happened. I recalled Lena's eyes full of tears. I found it difficult to analyze this event. I was always told that people who committed thefts were bad. I had known Lena for the three years. She never refused to help anybody in the class. I thought that Lena may not have stolen the teacher's money. I no longer thought that the teacher was right when she publicly accused Lena and when she sent us to hunt down our friend in her home as an animal in a burrow. Since that day, I never saw Lena in my class. Her mother transferred her to another school.

Many years have passed since that terrible incident occurred. However, I still remember in detail everything that happened that one school morning in my third grade. At that time, my classmates and I were nine years old. We did not know yet how life could be cruel and how compassion and graciousness may be important in coping with its cruelty. I depended on guidelines from my teacher. She was supposed to teach my classmates and me to understand and respect each other. However, giving us the abstract lesson of kindness and humanity, she gave us the real lesson of indifference toward another person's needs and problems.