Miss Ruby, he went back

"I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you." — 2 Timothy 1:5

There were eight children in the circle this morning and one of them called me Miss Ruby, and he is my grandson.

I teach the third and fourth graders at Trinity — eight chairs in the fellowship hall, beige carpet, crayons in a coffee can, and I have been doing it for forty-nine years. Caleb is my daughter Hannah's boy. He turned eight this month. He lives two and a half hours east of here and I see him about as often as you would guess from that, which is to say hardly at all. My eldest, Becca, has him over in Roanoke for a stretch just now, and her husband drives him the hour to Trinity on a Sunday morning. Nobody in that arrangement is me. I did not build it and I am not going to touch it.

Last Sunday he was in that room and I had not known he was coming, and I taught the entire hour without letting on, and I would not care to do it again.

This morning I knew the truck might come and it came.

And here is the thing I want to put down while it is still the right size, before I make it into more than it was.

It was ordinary.

I said good morning. I put the felt board up. The coffee can went around. Somebody's little brother had gotten into the crayons at home and there was a great deal about that. We did the lesson, which was the ten men who were healed and the one who turned around and came back. Caleb sat where he sat last week and watched everything, the way he does, turning his whole head to look at whoever was talking.

Near the end I asked who could tell me what that one man did that the other nine did not, and Caleb put his hand about half up, the way a child does when he is not fully committed to it, and I said, Yes?

And he said, "Miss Ruby, he went back."

That is all. He answered a question. He got it right. He has been in this world eight years and I have prayed for him every one of them, and this morning he called me Miss Ruby in front of seven other children and told me the man went back.

I did not do anything with my face. I said that was exactly right and I moved on to the next thing, because there were six minutes left and the lesson was not finished.

Miss Ruby. That is who I am in that room. That is who I ought to be in that room — he does not need a grandmother at nine o'clock on a Sunday, he needs a teacher, and there are seven other children in those chairs who need one too, and not one of them is mine.

Paul writes to Timothy about a faith that lived first in his grandmother. Lois. She gets one line in the whole Bible and it is the line that says it started with her.

I do not know what Caleb will keep out of that room. I am not going to know. I have made my peace with the not knowing, mostly, and I made it a long time before he was born.

But he was in the chair, and he had his hand half up, and he said the man went back.

Lord, he does not have to call me anything. Thank you that he calls me something.