Aim For The Stars

I loved my job as a classroom assistant, though my dream was to be a teacher. But I knew it was too late for that now . . .

HAVE you seen Mr Barker?” Maggie, the school’s admin assistant, asked with a raucous laugh as she entered the staffroom. “I can’t believe he’s the new head teacher.”

I looked up from where I was sitting in the corner and rolled my eyes.

Staff had come and gone at the school where I’d been working as a teaching assistant for almost 10 years, but Maggie, who had joined a couple of weeks ago, was the worst person I’d ever come across. She had one face for talking to you, and another nastier one for behind your back.

“His beard looks as though birds might be nesting in it,” Maggie went on, now scooping coffee granules into a mug and topping it up with boiling water. “And he’s wearing an orange tie with red braces, would you believe?”

She guffawed, almost spilling her drink on Carly Parsons from Year 3, who had dropped in with a note for the secretary. “He should be signing up to a circus rather than taking on a position of responsibility in a primary school.”

I wished I had the courage to cut her off and put her in her place. But I hadn’t. I was too deep in my shell to stick my neck out.

In fact, my insecurities were the reason I’d never had the bottle to apply for teacher training.

Despite my father always insisting I had a wonderful way with children and would make a perfect teacher, I had never been brave enough to make that leap.

Maggie went on with her character assassination, and eventually I tuned out.

I looked out of the window at the children scooting around the playground, playing chase.

A row of little girls huddled together on a bench caught my eye, and I imagined them talking about computer games, or perhaps what they’d watched on the television yesterday.

They were so young, and I wondered what they would be like when they were older. Would they be happy and confident as they set out on life?

I had been confident once – determined, in fact. When I left university I was going to follow my childhood dream to become a teacher just like my dad.

But life hadn’t panned out as I’d hoped. My father was taken ill when I was twenty-one, so I had put my ambition on hold to care for him.

It had always been the two of us facing the world together, after my mother ran off to Spain with a younger man years before. I’d wanted to be there for him.

And then I had met and married Calum. He didn’t encourage me to pursue my dream.

“We’ll be starting a family soon, Imogen,” he said. “It hardly seems worth it.”

And I agreed. I couldn’t wait to have children, so I felt sure he was right.

What followed, though, was a difficult marriage, with Calum leaving a few years after we discovered I couldn’t have children.

That sounds as though he was cruel, but he wasn’t. It was a painful time for both of us. I knew there was no way it was going to work.

In fact, I respected his honesty, wished him well, and hoped he would find someone who could give him what I couldn’t.

The trouble was, somewhere between leaving university and turning twenty-eight, almost 10 years ago, life had taken away the confidence I’d once had.

My dream to be a teacher felt more like a climb to the top of Everest – impossible without the right equipment.

Now, I shuffled in my chair, and Maggie’s voice began to pierce back into my thoughts.

“What do you think of the new head, Imogen?” she asked me. “I saw you chatting with him earlier.” I smiled.

“I really like him, actually.”

“Well, each to their own, I suppose.”

Sometimes it felt more like a playground than a staffroom since Maggie had arrived.

I said nothing, just tuned out once more, biting absently into a digestive biscuit as the squeals of the children still playing outside warmed my senses. I wasn’t about to let Maggie bother me. I loved working with the little ones far too much to let her ruin it for me.

In fact, I was happy. I had remarried two years ago to a wonderful man, and there wasn’t a single moment in the school that I regretted.

I loved it, although, being there, surrounded by children and working with them, often the nagging doubt in my head would arise again. Could I have been a teacher?

But it was too late. In less than three years I would be forty. And it wasn’t only that. Where would I gain the confidence I lacked?

“I thought Mr Barker seemed nice,” one of the teachers remarked, dragging her blonde hair into a ponytail and grabbing a whistle from her handbag. “A bit wacky, perhaps, but he seems like a nice bloke.”

“I agree,” I said as she headed from the staffroom to help supervise the children on the playground.

“Well, he looks ridiculous to me,” Maggie argued, tipping a pack of biscuits on to a china plate and snatching one up.

“He’s fifty-eight, apparently, and it’s his first-ever post as a head teacher. Talk about cutting it fine! I’d have thought he should be thinking about retirement. What were the governors thinking?

“I’m not sure if I’m going to be able to work with him, to be quite honest.

“Well, you do have a choice.”

Maggie turned towards the door, her cheeks suddenly burning red.

“Mr Barker!” she exclaimed.

In fairness, her descriptions were pretty much spot on. His rumpled grey hair looked as if he’d been pulled through a hedge backwards, and his beard was wild.

He was wearing a bright blue suit, and his red braces clashed with his orange tie. I smiled, admiring his attitude. He really didn’t care what people thought.

“I was only joking, Mr Barker,” Maggie continued, her voice nervously high pitched, and brushing biscuit crumbs from her cashmere jumper. “Would you like a coffee?”

“I’ll give it a miss, thanks,” he said, and turned to leave. But then he turned back.

“Come to my office in an hour, Maggie. I think we need to talk and get a few things straight.”

Maggie’s eyes widened as he disappeared. She turned to look at me. “What’s up with him?” I opened my mouth and closed it again. I wasn’t sure I could cope with being on the wrong side of her.

But then a sudden strength came from nowhere.

“Maybe he thinks you’re a bit rude.”

The staffroom fell silent, and all eyes were suddenly on me in surprise. I didn’t usually say boo to a goose.

Even the teachers hadn’t confronted Maggie, for fear she wouldn’t order their exercise books or book them a school dinner.

“I beg your pardon?” Maggie said, crossing her arms across her plump body.

I rose, knowing I was taller, and looked down at her.

“You’re quite rude about people at times, Maggie. It’s not very nice.”

My voice was a bit weak, and I was already regretting the words when

“Come to my office. We need to get a few things straight” “I’ve been watching how well you work with the children”

Delia Brown, the year 6 teacher, chipped in.

“Imogen’s right, Maggie. You need to tone it down a bit. This is a lovely school, and we thrive because we all get on, respect each other and are nice to each other.”

There was a rumble of agreement throughout the staffroom.

“Well, excuse me, I’m sure. I was only making conversation,” Maggie said with a huff, her face flaming again, and she left the room without a backward glance.

I wasn’t sure what effect my words might have, but over the next few weeks, Maggie became a secretarial angel, with never a wrong word crossing her lips.

“The head wants to see you,” she said to me when I went into her office to collect a delivery of coloured pencils.

She tried for a smile. “You know, he’s actually a really nice man,” she said. “And that time in the staffroom – well, I’m sorry. I hadn’t realised . . .”

“It’s all forgotten,” I said, meaning it.

I headed down the corridor, and looked at the sign on the door.

Mr Derek Barker – Head Teacher.

I knocked and entered his office. It was a big room with a light-coloured wooden desk laden with paperwork and a laptop.

Two low fake-leather chairs were near the window, and a wooden chair was situated next to his desk.

“Take a seat, Imogen,” he said with a wide smile.

I did as he asked. “The thing is,” he went on, closing his laptop, “I’ve been watching how you work with the children since I arrived, and, as I’ve said before, I think you’re fantastic with them.”

He paused for a moment, his grey eyes meeting mine.

“Why don’t you give teacher training a go?”

I fiddled with my hands, trying to extinguish the voice in my head that had told me for so long that it wasn’t for me – that I didn’t have the confidence.

“Look at me, Imogen,” he said. “I know I don’t much look like many might expect a head teacher to look, but I didn’t let that stop me.” He laughed. “I’m even heading towards retirement, yet I still went for this promotion. Better late than never.”

“I don’t know if I have the courage,” I said.

“Well, you confronted Maggie, didn’t you? In my book that makes you pretty fearless.”

I laughed and he took hold of my hand across the table.

“You really would make a great teacher, Imogen. I’ve told you that so many times. And it’s never too late. Surely if I can, you can.”

I felt sudden tears burn my eyes. He was right. It wasn’t too late.

And if I didn’t at least try, I would live my life wondering, “What if?”

I nodded before I could change my mind.

“OK, I’ll go for it. What do I have to do?” I said.

But I knew the procedure. I’d looked it up so many times before.

“I’ll set everything in motion.”

“Thanks, Dad,” I said, keeping hold of his hand.

He was my inspiration. He’d been my rock when my mother left; he’d shown such strength when he’d battled through his illness and won; and he’d always been a brilliant teacher, both in school and at home.

And now, he was the head of a primary school.

Yes, I knew, without question, that if he could do it, so could I. n