I am going to tell the story of my favorite teacher, Miss Walker. She gave me hope and I pray that every child today will have someone like her in their life.
I haven't shared with everyone here, but I had a very challenging childhood. I was one of 6 brothers and sisters. Both of my parents drank and my Dad was brutal to our Mother and after she left, to us. I was in charge of the household at 8 yrs of age, and that experience brought me so low that I don't think I ever looked straight ahead when I walked or smiled much. I was a lean lanky child with long dishwater blonde hair and bangs that covered my eyes because it was so hard for me to cut them myself and because, I think I was hiding.
In the 6th grade of school, I had a particularly wonderful teacher. She nurtured me as a starving child needed and as she was a spinster and had no children of her own, I think that I fulfilled something within her that she needed also. She let me read to the class, write things on the board, pick up papers after everyone was done with their work, and for the first time in my life, I was Teachers Pet!
What a heady experience that was for me and I remember it as if it happened yesterday. To go from an unpopular skinny poor white trash kid to being teachers pet was tantamount to winning the Oscar in my book.
She talked to me as an adult should talk to a child. With respect and caring. It was the first time in my life other than my Grandma, that an adult had done that. I had been ruled with an iron fist and beatings but I flourished in this atmosphere. I started to realize that life could be different under her tutelage.
Because of this wonderful white haired lady , my life became bearable and I escaped to her room whenever I could to watch her kindness flow forth to me and others. One day when we were alone for a few minutes, she brushed the long bangs covering my eyes aside and said “ Someone with eyes that pretty should never cover them up”. That one moment will forever be etched in my memory, as a tiny bud of hope that I was special was planted.
Her name was Miss Walker and I have always said that if I find the right doll with her spirit and look, I would name it after her.
Since that time many years were spent in finding that right doll and as fate would have it , she came to me completely by surprise.
I had only seen a picture of her so I was not prepared for the rush of emotion that filled my heart when she arrived. There was my long awaited chance to name a doll after the greatest teacher of all time, my Miss Walker. Here she is in honor of teachers everywhere who give selflessly of themselves to our children everyday, with very little realized rewards and with my deepest gratitude to one that made my heart flower blossom into the person I am today.
Gloria Peacock Kimmel.. revised Nov. 15, 2015
(since the time of writing this many years ago, I found out that Miss Walker was indeed a wife and that she wrote books and lived in Pollard where My Peacock/Bells lived. I think that this is my 6th grade photo. I have them all but none of them are marked unfortunately so I can't say for sure. I also have to say that Daddy quit drinking when I was an early teen and he became the best Daddy that anyone could ask for. He apologized to me when I was 32, the year before he was in the automobile accident. When that happened every pain left and I forgave him and I also understood him)
(since the time of writing this many years ago, I found out that Miss Walker was indeed a wife and that she wrote books and lived in Pollard where My Peacock/Bells lived. I think that this is my 6th grade photo. I have them all but none of them are marked unfortunately so I can't say for sure. I also have to say that Daddy quit drinking when I was an early teen and he became the best Daddy that anyone could ask for. He apologized to me when I was 32, the year before he was in the automobile accident. When that happened every pain left and I forgave him and I also understood him)
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