David Menasche - The Priority List: A Teachers Final Quest to Discover Lifes Greatest Lessons

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Touchstone

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Copyright 2013 by David Menasche

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information, address Touchstone Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

First Touchstone hardcover edition January 2014

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Interior design by Ruth Lee-Mui

Cover Design by Marlyn Dantes

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is available.

ISBN 978-1-4767-4344-8

ISBN 978-1-4767-4346-2 (ebook)

To Jacques Menasche, who taught me that there was no need to be brave and then showed me how to be.

Prologue

Allow me, if you will, to borrow the words of the great Lou Gehrig in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium, shortly after being told at thirty-six years old that he was looking at the end of his life. Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.

I do, and I am.

I was around the same age as Lou when, in 2006 and at the pinnacle of my teaching career, I was diagnosed with a brain tumor and given months to live. It is seven years later and as I sit here in my home in New Orleans, crippled and nearly blind, I feel lucky that I am still able to appreciate the beauty of the pink magnolias outside my window, and behold my loved ones, and laugh with my friends, and have this chance to share my story.

I am realistic. There is no reason I should still be alive. The disease never lets me forget that it , and not I, will ultimately win this battle of wills. I know the cancer will have its way, and sooner rather than later.

But as my vision diminishes and my world grows dark, as my arms weaken to the point where I can no longer lift a fork to feed myself, and my legs wither beneath me, I have chosen to spend what limited time I have in the only way I know how. With joy.

I can no longer command a classroom, as I once did. But my hope is by sharing my experiences and lessons, especially as I die, that others will be reminded of the preciousness of life. I have never appreciated it more than now when I have so little time left.

And again, I borrow from baseballs Iron Horse in his farewell speech:

So I close in saying that I may have had a tough break, but I have an awful lot to live for.

Until I cease to breathe, I will.

My left ear buzzed. I didnt think much of it, except that it was as irritating as one of those pesky gnats that ride your head like a Wave Swinger at an amusement park. Only this buzzing was inside my head. I tried ignoring it, until one day, a few months after it started, the sound turned into a tremor that ran from my face, all the way down the left side of my body, and later to the tip of my toes. Time to see a doctor, Menasche , I told myself. Paula made the appointment. She took care of anything in our marriage that involved organization. Without Paula, the lights would go out before I remembered that the electric bill hadnt been paid.

I went to my general practitioner, who sent me to an ear, nose, and throat guy, who decided I needed to see a neurologist. His name was Dr. Paul Damski. He was young, not much more than my age at the time, thirty-four, and he seemed cool and direct. My kind of guy. I was hoping hed chalk up my symptoms to a pinched nerve or a nervous tic, but instead he ordered a battery of tests. All of them had acronyms. EEG. EKG. CAT. MRI. I felt a huge sense of relief when the first three came back okay. The last one, the MRI, magnetic resonance imaging, was certain to tell a story, Dr. Damski said. Id have to wait a few days for the outcome. No one likes the waiting part and Im no exception. So I concentrated on the one thing I knew could occupy my mind in the meantime. I threw myself into my job.

Coral Reef Senior High is called Miamis mega magnet school for good reason. Students from all over the country compete to get into one of the six preparatory academiesInternational Baccalaureate, Agriscience and Engineering, Business and Finance, Legal and Public Affairs, Health Sciences, and Visual and Performing Arts. Selection is based on a lottery, except for the Visual and Performing Arts Academy. Those students have to audition to get in, and the competition is fierce. With so many aspiring performers, the atmosphere is a lot like what you see in the movie Fame . Girls and boys are always practicing songs and dance steps in the hallways. You just could not help but be in a good mood when you were there. Until I got sick, I had never missed a day.

I was one of the original staff when the school opened in 1997. It was my first teaching job, and honestly, at twenty-five, I wasnt much older than my students. I spent most of my sixteen years there teaching eleventh-grade honors and advanced placement English. I loved watching these fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds grapple with their first major life decisionsfuture careers, relationships, where to live, which colleges to attend, and what to studyat the same moment theyre learning to drive, getting their first jobs, and experimenting with drugs, alcohol, sex, identity, and freedom. Its a transcendental time for kids. Miraculously, even though theyre beginning to gain independence and are often eager for more, most arent sick of school yet. And I felt very privileged to be part of their metamorphoses.

One way I tried to signal my eagerness to not be just another teacher to these kids was to have my classroom be always open. There were usually a half dozen to a dozen students who hung out there during lunchtime. Many days, someone would be rehearsing lines or singing or dancing, or playing the violin or guitar. Except for the times when a student came in crying over a boyfriend or a bad grade, and that was usually before or after school, it was a jubilant environment.

Thats how it was the day I got my diagnosis.

It was the day before Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday. I was sitting at my desk with my best work friend, Denise Arnold, who taught senior honors English. Denise is petite and eats like a bird. When she did eat, it was usually a few M&Ms from a bag she kept stashed in her desk. Id usually buy something healthy at lunchtime and try to shame her into taking a few bites. That day we were splitting a salad from the cafeteria and kidding about how lucky we were because this time we got cucumber with our plastic container of wilted iceberg lettuce and soggy croutons. Kids were milling in and out. As we were finishing up, my cell phone rang with the ringtone from the old Mario Brothers video game. I flipped it open and saw my doctors number on the screen.