My little runner has taken to carrying a briefcase. She is six years old. She does not like to stay in the classroom. After breakfast is served and cleared and the real work starts and things like learning and rules begin, she’s had enough. She leaves the classroom and runs the building. Last week I met her briefly  on the wrong floor, in the wrong wing of the school and I said, “Good morning, lady! What’s the plan for the day?” “Stay in the classroom”, she answers and takes off down another hallway. I think she has missed the point. Or maybe I have.

Unwittingly, this little one gives me permission to look briefly through a looking glass into her life; a snapshot with openings and closings of classroom and hallway doors. I look at her life each time I see her and wonder what it is exactly that I have seen.

Today I see this briefcase. I wonder where she found it. Somewhere, in this vast corner of the city with crooked and neglected side streets winding down at many odd angles to the public market and the railway, this little one has found a long shoulder strapped vinyl bag, worn and brown, with some sort of a clasp on one side. It fits around her neck and sags down where it bangs around her mid section as she runs. It must be empty because it flaps and flops wildly as she darts and dashes.

Last week she joined us briefly at our table at the end of the hallway. I did not see her and then slowly and softly I felt her sneak up behind me; the lightest presence of a small girl. Her hand is on my back and then she is on my left side and then her head rests briefly on my left shoulder. She sucks her thumb. We continue on with the class as if she is the slightest breeze whispered down the hallway and around the corner. She is simply and suddenly there. In a few minutes I ask her if she would like to tell us what she did over the weekend. She shakes her head no. She is quieter today.

Last week, when she visited us, she could not keep things together, bouncing in and out of our circle, going in and out of the hallway door, climbing and swinging off the large rack which holds huge rolls of construction paper. Finally, for her own safety and so that I could continue teaching, I call the main office and let them know she is on the lam. There is a bit of a time lag until an administrator makes her way up to the second floor. She is tired of this and carries her hand radio with determination. The little runner has made use of the minutes before the administrator arrived and has swiftly run a couple of laps around the A section of the building on our floor and has darted in and out of the cafeteria looking furtively in every direction at once.

In the course of the next few minutes with some fanfare, the administrator in heels successfully wrestles the little girl with the briefcase to the ground where she remains, relatively docile until the security guard arrives to take her away to the ATS (Alternative to Suspension Room). After a bit of animated commentary from my little ones at the table, I calm everyone by singing a quiet song and we go back to work.

Today I give this child a paper snowflake I cut out. She returns the gift with a hug. She asks me, “How do you cry in Spanish”? I think about this and am astounded at the profound depth of her question but before I can answer, she is suddenly upright; alert like a deer by the side of the road, sensing movement, sensing the heat from the beam of a far away car. I look at the side of her head. Her face is energized, twitching with motion and I know she will run again.

As she leaps away from me, she turns and says, “You should write a story about me and my sisters”! She swings open the hallway door and darts off to the right, down the hall in the direction of the music room. I note the school counselor heading down the other hallway in our direction. The little runner is long gone.

The counselor is not going to run after her. This catch and release and catch again story with this child is an old one and it is exhausting for this overworked woman. She rolls her eyes, stopping in at the classroom closest to where we are working and picks up the receiver of the wall phone. One of the school security guards is called. She leaves and heads back upstairs.

At the end of my class, I move toward the cafeteria and pass another child in the hall. I do not know her. She looks at me and states, “I’m going to get my head checked”. I think about that outcome and wonder about our little runner some more. I admire her spunk. At the tender age of six, in her own way, she is proactive. Life is not happening to her anymore. She is happening to life and is adept at making an significant number of adults run giant circles around this great big school of ours.

As I cross the cafeteria I see her suddenly out of the corner of my eye. She is scooting, skipping along the edge of the far wall; briefcase swinging. She is the smallest of mice, moving with stealth along the perimeter. She is headed to the third grade wing and I leave her alone.

In the midst of a cold snap, a large storm with wind chills hovering between minus 15 and minus 30, increases the intensity of wind chill and frostbite. So much depends on Lake Ontario, the 104 corridor, the Southern Tier and where one happens to be standing in any given area. It feels familiar. I have been here before.

Relatively mild winters in recent years have left me out of practice. Brutal wind on my face reminds me. The temperatures dip dangerously low, something stirs within me and I quickly resume old patterns of winter dressing. This is salt and memory. I hear family voices; “dress in layers”, and “watch out for black ice”.

I instinctively layer up to face outdoors. I start with undergarments, followed by a thin cotton camisole fitting snugly over hips and stomach. I swaddle. I add another stretchy, long sleeved cotton shirt which fits over the camisole and then on top of this I slip on a thinly padded vest. On top of these three pieces, I wrap up in my outside coat. I fold a thick, large woolen scarf around my neck; thick and long enough to completely cover my neck and chest area but not too thick so that it can’t be tied in some semblance of a knot. Since I am not going to be outside for too long, I only wear a pair of jeans with thick woolen socks and my boots which barely zip themselves over the socks. Everything I’m wearing is black or navy blue, except for the coat which is silver.

I look down at my jeans. In the winter I wear boot cut jeans. I like the fit and they do exactly what they are named for. They fit cleanly over the edge of boots. At the end of the day there will be a thick white ring of salt around the bottom of the legs. On top of the thighs of the jeans, there will be patches of smudged salt and snow spray which come from leaning up against the car door when squeezing out of a tight parking space. Salt. Everywhere. I know that if it is cold enough, even copious amounts of salt will not do much to melt black ice. Slow down. Lift one’s foot off the pedal and steer into a spin. My inner voice checks off a lifetime of warnings. Watch for hungry deer.

I tested myself last night when the wind chill dipped to below minus 20 and the neighborhood appeared silent and iced and glittery in the dry air. I’d been in the house for almost 48 hours. I donned a thick pair of woolen socks and I wondered how good they really are. I wanted to experience that startling cold again, to awaken the feeling of the past.

In the dark, I walk the length of the driveway to the mailbox with no shoes; only these socks. I need to go off the grid; out and away from the sanctuary and warmth and light of the house. I gasp as the air hits my face. I am returned to winters in high school during the blizzard of 1977. Western New York was paralyzed with ice and snow and my parents hired local college boys to shovel the weighty white mounds off the roof of our house. That winter my brother and I stood on the picnic table in the backyard and fell with outstretched arms, backwards off of it into the deep snow with fearless abandon. We disappeared into iced white fluff.; caught safely by frozen marshmallow. We missed two weeks of school because the water pipes in the school burst. We dressed in front of the kitchen oven. Mom purchased electric blankets for each family member.

One Sunday morning, I did not wear a hat and strode confidently down the hill to the local church on a day with minus 20 degrees and a ridiculous wind chill. I left halfway through the service to head home. I was engulfed in nausea; swimming, swirling black dots; shimmering waves and completely dizzy. The snow blinded me. I do not know how I got back home, up the long curving hill. Later, wrapped up in my warm bed, I smelled succulent barbequed beef roast with potatoes and carrots and gravy. My family ate Sunday dinner without me. I lay sick from cold.

In the driveway I am stunned by the acidity of black cold. Yes. I’ve got this. But only briefly. I cannot shelter out here too long. I cannot sustain myself. I pad to the edge of the yard, pry open the mailbox door, grab the mail and scurry back into the garage where I shake off the socks and head into the kitchen. My feet are dry. These are good socks.