Wherever you are Ms. Tmarsel, thank you!

It was Ms. Tmarsel, whose spunk made me think not all teachers were the same (boring). Ms. "T", who did not talk to me like a child, but used the same tone with me she did with her colleagues, and made me feel more mature than my age. When she saw my penchant for brooding, she did not condemn it, but used it to steer me artfully, I thought, towards self-reflection. "A Psychologist Boni, that's what you should be" she said with every smile. She even took me to see Rain Man when it first came out; just me and her, a student and a hero. If only she knew that I never wanted to be a psychologist - that I wanted to be her. The first day I stood in front of my very own classroom, I wished she were there to see it.

In a 2x2 note Ms. Tmarsel wrote to me before I graduated, she said that I was competent, but not competitive. I always felt like I had let her down when she said that, like I had not been who she intended to mold. After all, she didn't explain what she meant to any of us when she slipped these little pieces of paper in our books as special farewell messages. Without clarification, I was forced to find my own meaning. I supposed now, that's exactly what she wanted me to do.

Google tells me that Ms. Tmarsel is somewhere in South Korea with YWAM. She is probably doing the same thing, changing more lives as she transforms herself. It is National Teacher Day and I remember one among the many teachers who have touched my life inextricably, inexpicably. Thank you Ms. Tmarsel.

If you are a teacher you need to know that you'll never know how much you'll impact lives. On behalf of children like me who had teachers like you, thank you too.