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Excerpted Inspirations #243

  • Writer: Linda Odhner, with photos by Liz Kufs
    Linda Odhner, with photos by Liz Kufs
  • Aug 10
  • 0 min read
[On Finnish Kirsti’s first day of school in America, she shows that even though she hasn’t yet learned English, at age sixteen she is an accomplished scholar.] Over her primer Kirsti bent her head studiously, whispering to herself the new letters with their odd sounds, but stealing glances at the board and the problems that Mr. Stanley was now setting his oldest pupils. One big American boy was certainly having trouble, and from the fact that he took every opportunity to sluff his work and tease Marja, Kirsti decided he must be Larry Mott, who Marja said was fourteen and the meanest boy in school. Kirsti could see the error that had set him going wrong, and her fingers ached to make the correction. In her eagerness she forgot to study her letters. “Kirsti,” the teacher called out suddenly, adding a question she did not understand. Evidently he had noticed her inattention to study and was scolding her. But no, he was making motions with his hand for her to come up to the board, holding out a piece of chalk to her and pointing to Larry’s problem. He must mean that he wanted her to try it. How could she walk up there in front of the whole school and do that problem? Sisu, she told herself, sisu. This time only the one little spurt that makes one do the impossible. Up she walked to stand beside the snickering Larry, take the cloth Mr. Stanley handed her, wipe out the big boy’s work, and quickly and surely work the problem correctly. Mr. Stanley nodded and smiled and said something to Larry that made all the others giggle, and then – oh, surprising, kind, and wonderful – in an empty space the teacher put another problem on the board, a harder one, and indicated that she was to solve it. She did, and he wrote out a still harder one. Everyone in the room was watching now, and there were smiles of pride on all the Finnish faces as she worked the problem correctly. After that there was a more difficult one, and she conquered it also. Making her a stiff little bow, Mr. Stanley without a word picked up her primer from the bench, motioned for her to follow, and walked to the back of the room. He gave her a seat on the bench next to Marja’s place, and as Kirsti slid in, her heart beat fast with exultation. On her very first day in school she had showed them all that she did not belong with the beginners! From now on, she decided, this young teacher could demand all her loyalty, and for him she would work as she never had before. -Helen Markley Miller, Kirsti (1964), pp. 106-107

 
 
 

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