For the first time in six years, I was home with my family.
Not in my literal home, with my literal family, but it feels the same. I was back with about half of my classmates from Goodwillie Environmental School at our old building.
Clad in our Goodwillie blue, we made a procession from Forest Hills Eastern High School to our home. We walked down the woodchipped trail that led us to our teachers. It felt like we were the same ten-year-olds that took that trail every day.
Goodwillie blue is the joy on our faces when we first got our sweatshirts. A Goodwillie sweatshirt with a nickname on the back is essentially the Goodwillie uniform since we all wore them so much. We saw the sixth graders wearing theirs and couldn’t wait to be a part of the tradition. They arrived, and suddenly, we were a sea of blue and shining smiles. We felt like Goodwillians.
Goodwillie blue is a packed bus. My first day of fifth grade was the first time I’d ever ridden a bus to school. I waited in the FHC Tennis Court parking lot collecting loose tennis balls before my life was forever changed. The bus pulled up, full of kids I didn’t yet know, but would never forget. There wasn’t an empty seat on that bus. The first ride was scary, but after that, getting on the bus felt like the start of the school day. Everyone was in my class or in the grade that sat down the hall. The bus was laughter and screams, songs and dreams.
Goodwillie blue is the brisk fall air. We spent a night each fall together at local camps. In fifth grade, it was the true bonding of our class. In sixth, reunion after a summer away. We learned how to build fires after the rain and paddle a canoe. We learned how to play nine square and perfect talent show skits. We were told scary stories that we swore were true as drums beat in the distance of the night. Goodwillie felt like summer camp on the first day of school, but fall camp solidified the unreal feeling.
Goodwillie blue is the storytelling ballad of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. It’s the songs that I still know the words to when I now attend the show. It’s heavy stage makeup on young faces and being taken out of the room to rehearse. It’s the start of a theatrical experience for some, or a fond memory of the past for others.
Goodwillie blue is always having a home and a family. I know that even though I may not talk to all of my Goodwillie family now, nothing will be different when we come back together. The Goodwillie teachers call it a family for a reason.
Goodwillie blue is everlasting. It’s not just the color of two years that become followed with rumors about what we filled our school days with when we got back to middle school.
Goodwillie blue is the color of a chosen family’s love.
