Penamoli

Through the eyes of my little T , he brings me both joy and peace. His cheeky smile can soothe the storms of the classroom, and on some days, he stirs a small hurricane of his own. With him, no day is ever the same. Teaching T has taught me as much as I teach him. I am still learning—learning how he sees the world, how he communicates, and how he finds his way through sound, movement, and connection . If T were to tell you his story in my classroom, if he could put his experiences into words the way he feels them, perhaps this is what he would say. This is How I Learn When I enter my classroom, everything feels big. Lights shine, chairs move, voices blend together. My eyes try hard to see, but they get tired sometimes. I look anyway. I want to know what is happening around me. I know each and every child in my class. I know their smiles, their favorite seats, even the way they hold their pencils. I love helping my teacher—giving out workbooks, arranging them neatly on the tables so ev...

The first day of the year always feels a little like standing at the edge of something infinite—an empty page waiting for ink, a road stretching ahead through unknown landscapes. Fireworks crackle in bursts nearby and far off, their sharp pops and fading echoes vibrating in the cold night air. The sparks cast fleeting shadows on the walls, shimmering across the furniture, as my husband and eldest son murmur and laugh softly, voices weaving a warm undercurrent through the quiet. Across the room, my little son sleeps, his slow breaths a gentle rhythm beneath the hush. The faint scent of winter—smoke curling from distant chimneys, pine lingering in the air—clings to the windowpane. I watch the flicker of light dance across the ceiling, letting it mingle with the sound and stillness, lingering on the space between what I assumed and what actually unfolded over the past years. At the start of those years, I believed time would be kind, slow, forgiving. I believed there would always be room ...