I know you are lonely tonight. Being alone for the first time. As adult. As a professional. Please don’t let that sinking feeling overcome you. Last night you may have a disturbed sleep. So tonight please keep calm. Do your solah. Make doa alot more. What a pity. Being away from home this time around is very much different. Yet you come to terms with reality. This is life. This is your chosen life. Whatever it is, being a teacher is a predetermined choice. A noble profession. It may not be the best. Indeed it is a boring profession relative to other profession. That is what people perceived. Yet here you are. Stationed to a school very alien to you. Away from home. That conmfortable home. How you wish to be there forever.
All this while you aspire to be in technical or vocational school. To do all the technical skills that is so dear to you. Wishing to be in workshops or laboratories around the school. You were used to the thinking that as a graduate of the Faculty of Technical Education should entitled you to a technical and vocational school. Alas that dream is not true. Your aspiration did not coincide with the planning of the Ministry of Education. Anyway it still feel good to be here. There is no reason to cry.
Now, the reality is far from comforting. Everything is so different. What is this? Am I doing the right thing? Do I fit this situation? Wait a minute. Rest assured that you are not alone. Everyone of your friends feel the same. In fact all individuals feel the same. The feeling of being new. Every new personnel feels the same. Asking the same question over and over. There is no simple answer to that. You can search and search. I do not think anyone can give you that answer. The answer is inside you. You and you alone can dig for the answer.
Did you remember when you learn to stand and walk? I bet you remember anything at all. It was so distant away. Years of yesteryears. A blurr in your memory. Maybe not by chance that you remember any of those classic moments. Every parents recorded those moments in their minds. It was fun. It was blissful. It was simply a tremendous feeling of seeing you learn to stand on your wobbling legs. Falling for upteen times. Undeterred you tried and tried. Again and again. Pain after pain. Smiles and cries, it was the ecstacy of success. Now that moment is relived. Of course in a different form. But the process is the same. The same painful thing.
What did your parents do? They clapped. They laughed. They encouraged your every move. Every step you took. You stumbled, winded and cried. Nevertheless you were so adorable. So lovable. Touching your tender skin was so sensational. Wishing that time never changed. Stood still so that you never grow. Permenantly adorable. Very dear to their hearts. And that scene is being played over and over again. To any parents you are always their small adorable child. You still need to be encouraged. Need to be coached. Need to be cajoled.
Until you reached your tertiary education, you were being coached all the way. Your discrepencies being corrected. All the incongruencies set right. When you went astray, you were counseled. Shown the right way. The right path. You were tested and tested to perfect you. You were given all the help you need. All the encouragement you need. We let you do a role playing. Pretending to be teachers. Learning to be teachers. Acting like teachers. We let your mind consumed that feeling. Teaching has to be learned. It has to be dopted and adapted. Perfected. More precise.
Not many of you are born teachers. Has the knack of being a good teacher. Thus you toil and soil. You read and pondered. You reasoned and thought. And of course as John Dewey propogated, the best way of learning is by doing. Accordingly you enrolled at UTHM. At The faculty of Technical Education. By all means you were lucky. You had undergone under technical and vocational school. Your endeavour at various polytechnics around the country helps you alot along the way. It is the skill now that is eminent. You must be skillful. That is the in thing.
Now the time has come. You are now alone. Very much alone. Your parents must have worried to death. Why must you be posted so far away from home. I shared that feeling too. Deep down there I know the feeling. I was there like you. I had the opportunity of experiencing that feeling before. 41 years ago. I was at a place so alien to me at that time. Over time I survived. I progressed. I thrived. As a retiree I fell contented. I am happy with my life. Sharing this experience may soften you situation a little bit. Hopefully it is enlightening enough and to some extent could be entertaining.
I acknowledged your feeling of being lonely. It is part of growing up. A process of reaching maturity either physically or mentally or spiritually. You will discover later on that life is full of promisses. Happiness is around the corner. Wait for your first salary. You will feel the world is yours. A totally wonderful feeling. For the first time you earned your own money. Remember the days you toil and soil? This is the reward.
In restrospective, being alone is not the end of the world. If you scrutinised closely, a new world is opening up. A new window to see the world. So wide. So promising. So inviting. Yes dear go to the world. Assimilate yourself to the world. Along the way accomodate whatever that comes you way. Be part of it. Live it. I am sure you will be elevated to a better person. Full of self-esteem. Achievng all the superlatives. All the good things in life.
When you are in distressed just call over. I am eveready to extend my hands. My both hands. I assure you I am patient enough for all that. Let us share the feeling. The experience. A long long time from now, you can tell your children how wonderful life was. You have no regrets. Life was so rewarding. All those difficulties were just a speck in your life. Nothing significant. They were there to make you a very much better person.
Do whatever you have to do. Do whatever you were bid to do. At the end of the day you will be a great teacher. Adorable by all. I always be there to applaud you.
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