I knew Aaron Goldsmith for 32 years. We worked in the same school. He told jokes - good ones and groaners. I liked him. No, I loved him.
Many of Mr. Goldsmith's students didn't like him. They said he was mean, or he gave them work that was too hard. Some of the parents didn't like him either. They didn't like for him to call them at 9:15 in the morning and ask why their child was absent. They didn't like for him to call them the day after Open House or Parent Conferences to tell them how much their child had looked forward to having them come to school and see his work on display and say how sorry he was that they couldn't make it.
Mr. Goldsmith's students ALL learned their times tables. They hated that. They ALL learned to write business letters. They hated that, too. One family - great mom, smart kids, good kids - was notorious for truancy. I had known the family for years and years. One year, one of their girls was in Mr. Goldsmith's class. Every Friday, he would call me on the PA system and tell me (while the class was listening) that Frankie had been at school every day that week. Of course, I would make a big fuss over her. At the end of the year, I met the father of that family for the first time when he came to school to see Frankie get a Perfect Attendance award. He didn't want to come, but Mr. Goldsmith called him every day that week to remind him, to offer to pick him up, and to tell him how much it would mean to Frankie to have him come with her mom on awards day.
Through all my years in the office, I noticed that more former students came to see Mr. Goldsmith than any other teacher. So many of the ones who had said they hated him came back year after year to see him. Why? I wondered. They told me it was because Mr. Goldsmith cared about them. He didn't care if they liked him. He cared if they learned something, he cared if they had a good life. They mattered to him.
After he retired, former students gave me their phone numbers and asked me to pass them on to Mr. Goldsmith, tell him to call if he felt like it. When he died two years ago, his funeral was standing room only. Former students and their parents crowded in.
They didn't like him. They loved him.