Purple Sheets

Every Friday one of my teachers from high school that I love dearly, Mrs. Melba Murphy sends out what she calls purple sheets. Purple sheets are thought provoking, self-esteem boosting, and just in general brilliant yet simple concepts. I miss Friday's walking into high school and knowing that fourth period (or third my junior year) I would get purple sheets. Yet, her teaching didn't stop there. Mrs. Murphy is a teacher that challenges you in academics and life, and she encompasses and possess qualities that teachers should have. Her thoughtfulness for me and other students will never be forgotten. Yet, neither will her tests. If you talk to a WCHS student about Melba Murphy I can pretty much guarantee that you will hear at least these two things, Purple Sheets and Murphy Tests. It didn't matter what subject she was teaching they never were a History Test, Psychology Test, or Sociology Test, they were Murphy Tests. Granted, those things gave me some stressful and long nights but the fact that I face a "Murphy Test" with every single college exam I now take lets me know that she was thinking well beyond the confines of that high school and wanted to know that her students would be prepared for the challenge and the level of excellence that was expected of us at the next level. 


Not only did Mrs. Murphy teach me, but she also taught my brother Andy. When I was little he would stay up and study and he would tell me to get ready, the easy stuff was going to end. I was in fourth grade and was thinking that he was just lazy. But, like every other student of her's he not only talked about the academic rigor of her class, but the purple sheets and what he learned that would never apply in the classroom. She impacted his life and even though it was cut short, the impact she made very much counted. Andy took the life skills that he learned in her class outside of there and applied them to the people that he met on the street, on the soccer field, and even to the nurses and doctors that attended to him in the hospital. He always made the people around him laugh and he didn't even stop whenever he was told he was paralyzed and could never play soccer again. One of her favorite phrases is "Life is about accepting your new reality." And I think that thanks to this phrase, not only did Andy make the best of his paralysis, but also our family made the best of what we could when we lost him. 


So thank you Mrs. Murphy for what you have done and continue to do in the high school and in your community around you. I, for one, respect you and cherish the values that were taught in your class and even outside of it. Thank you for the advice, the laughs, the stress, and the Purple Sheets. They have touched lives of the people in your class, and I have seen first hand an innumerable amount of lives that have been touched outside of your classroom walls. 


For those of you that are curious as to what is on a Purple Sheet here is one that I received today.

The Nail in the Fence

There once was a little boy who had a bad temper.  His father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he lost his temper, he must hammer a nail in to the back of the fence.  The first day the boy had driven 37 nails into the fence.  Over the next few weeks, as he learned to control his anger, the number of nails hammered daily gradually dwindled down.  He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to drive those nails into the fence.

Finally the day came when the boy didn't lose his temper at all.  He told his father about it and the father suggested that the boy now pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper.  The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone.  The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence.  He said, "You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence.  The fence will never be the same.  When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one.  

You can put a knife in a man and draw it out.  It won't matter how many times you say "I'm sorry", the wound is still there.  A verbal wound is as bad as a physical one.  Sticks and stones can break your bones and words can break your spirit.  And though we may have the right to be angry, we don't have the right to be cruel.

In what you say of another, apply the tet of kindness, necessity, and truth, and let nothing pass your lips without a 2/3 majority. (Liz Armbruster)

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The Law of Life

The tree that never had to fight

For sun and sky and air and light,

That stood out in the open plain

And always got its share of rain

Never became a forest king,

But lived and died a scrubby thing.

The man who never had to toil

Who never had to win his share

Of sun ad sky and light and air

Never became a manly man,

But lived and died as he began.

Good timber does not grow in ease

The stronger the wind, the tougher the trees

The farther the sky, the greater the length

The more the storm, the more the strength,

By sun and cold, by rains and snows,

In tree or man good timber grows.

Live Today.