Mrs. Maday, a lifelong lover of language arts, was a figure of spirituality, so much so that you could sense it from the top of her head to the tips of her toes. Her soul was warm, caring, passionate, and she loved and respected people of all kinds. She devoted her whole life to educating children of all kinds, not having a care about what other path in life she could have followed. Her heart told her to teach, no matter the circumstances. Mrs. Maday, a woman that has an impact on me everyday, would take an opportunity to educate for the smallest salary. She would snatch up any chance to give an underprivileged child her love, her attention, her soul. She was not just a teacher, she was a strong woman who grew up with many siblings, but persevered through the many excruciatingly tough times in her life. She always says that her students, her heart songs, are her life.

Mrs. Maday was my Language Arts teacher for three years—6th, 7th, and 8th grade. Along with her many years of experience with thousands of kids, she could retire. There was no doubt in her mind that she could not retire, because teaching was Mrs. Maday’s calling, and only sickness or death could pry her away from her heart songs. Everyday, she came in singing, laughing, talking to herself, or showing some sort of emotion. She never let her outside life get in the way of her teaching, often teaching was her therapy. It is impossible to imagine her as anything else than cheerful, with love in her eyes. The clicks of her black heels or her raspy laugh often alerted us that Mrs. Maday was coming, she was down to business, and she was ready to teach!

Deep pink nail polish, light pink lipstick, and the blackest of black masara were often her favorite accessories. She could not go a day without any one of those three items. You could often find her in her free time chewing a piece of gum in her classroom, reapplying her lipstick, and grading papers. Nothing slowed her down. I remember in my eighth grade year, she broke her foot—which required a bulky, black boot, but it was also no match for her. She put on a short heel on one foot and her hefty boot on the other almost everyday so you would hear, “clunk, click, clunk, click,” in the morning, going just as fast as she normally would. Her bleached blonde hair and her deeply bronzed skin would catch your attention from a block away as she waltzed into the classroom. Her hair, once down to her hips as a teenager, was often blown back by how fast she walked, even with a broken foot! Speed was, and still is, her best friend.

Mrs. Maday had the greatest teaching impact on me as a young teenager. I was never fond of writing, it did not come as naturally to me as it did come to others. Mrs. Maday opened up my eyes to how beautiful writing can be, and shaped me into the writer I am today. She taught me the importance of condensing, annotating, and structure. Everytime I write something for a class, Mrs. Maday pops into my mind with one of her silly sayings, “the comma comes before the but,” or “the enlightenment is not in the answer, but in the question,” and even, “subliminally, deep thought.” After three years of being apart from her teaching, I can still remember vividly her lessons and how they have stayed with me. Mrs. Maday called me her “angel girl,” because we connected on a deep level. She showed me how to open my heart to all types of people and how to embrace sad times. I discovered that I did have a desire to write, and that I will forever connect that to Mrs. Maday.