Tuesday, December 2, 2025
After Woodbury Junior High changed to Woodbury Middle School 15ish years ago, there was a potluck before school started gathering those interested from WJH. The group continued to meet every summer until pandemic – then we increased the backyard visits! There are now nearly monthly gatherings. Tonight, we celebrated 60th birthdays for two of our friends. I was so pleased that I am part of this group – different ages, different points in our careers, different subjects taught – but we come together and have such good conversation and laughter. We are all lucky.
Somehow we had the best ambience—-culture—vibe—atmosphere at Woodbury Junior. Somehow we had the best, most positive work environment. I wish we could have put this essence into a bottle to share it. We were able to transform our coworkers into friends.
It helped that we were a smaller staff, I think. As compared to the high schools I worked at, we didn’t draw lines, like by departments. We weren’t territorial. The fact that we all ate together in the same staff lunchroom helped, too; paras and office and teachers lunched together. In the high schools, we ate by work groups.
We didn’t eat only our little bag lunches in the staff lunchroom. We celebrated with pot lucks, too. I count it as a successful work group when I come home with recipes. For example, I used up Thanksgiving’s turkey leftovers by making Judy Lieffering’s wild rice soup on Sunday. She had brought this delicious soup to a pot luck once and then shared the recipe. And we also celebrated with birthday lunches in the library’s back room. (I’ll never forget how for my 50th, Sharon Haley rewrote the lyrics of “Brigadoon!” to become “Ivanhoe!” honoring my previous life in that remote Lincoln County town.) People did things like that for each other.
We also had great kids and supportive parents and a principal who let us do our jobs.
Barbara said we were lucky, and I agree wholeheartedly. We built friendships that have endured long after we quit working together.
☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️☘️
What a wonderful essay on our friend beginnings. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.