Friday at Capdau

On Friday, I visited Mr. McDonald at Capdau. His sixth grade won a pizza party because they designed the best poster on the floor (he claims to have had nothing to do with their victory). He invited me to stop by at lunch and be an on-looker in his world, but he made it clear that I must not let them know who I was. So, I was ready with my Tulane badge and my "you should go to college and become a doctor" lecture. I was very excited, but arrived much later than anticipated because it was hard to get away from Tulane.

After arriving at Capdau and signing in, a student walked me to his classroom, where he was standing outside looking perplexed. Just as he saw me, a female student saw him, and ran up to him exclaiming "Mr. McDonald, I have to change clothes. I spilled juice all over myself." She was absolutely correct, she had a bright red stain that began at her neck and covered her shirt and her pants all the way down to her knees. He looked from me to the student, and asked her "Okay, do you have something to change into?" Of course, she did not. He sent her to the office to ask for help.

He quickly told me that things were not going well - the pizza was an hour late, so the students had numerous meltdowns while waiting. I was following him into the classroom when a student spotted me and yelled "Oooh, Mr. McDonald - Is that Heather?" She looked from him to me - I was surprised that he told them my first name, so I didn't respond. She asked again, "Are you Heather?" Mr. McDonald tried to recover, "No, this is Ms. Barrett." The student, Brianna, saw my name-tag and moved in for a better look. "It IS Heather! Everybody this Mr. McDonald's girlfriend!" She invited me in and offered me pizza and something to drink. After which, she and some of her friends did little dances around me while asking me a variety of questions. They seemed extremely pleased that he had a partner and that I was willing to come to school to meet them. They invited me back on another day and told me I should come earlier before all of the pizza is gone and maybe we could watch a movie together.

Mr. McDonald was certain that the day was a dismal failure, but I thought it was pretty great.