The Empty Chair

There is a story going around right now about a middle school history teacher who always has an empty chair in his classroom. I was drawn to it having been a middle school history teacher and curious about the chair. The reason for it was not what I expected at all.

When the teacher was a young boy, he and a friend went together to a birthday party for a classmate. When the classmate's mother opened the door, she hesitated and then said to the boy, "your friend can't come in." The boy said why and the mother said, "because we don't have enough chairs." and the boy said he can sit in my chair; I don't need to sit. and the mother said, "no we don't have enough chairs."

The boy looked at his Black friend and said, "let's go back to my house because we have plenty of chairs there."

Still today many many years later, this history teacher insists that there be an empty chair in his classroom, and he teaches his classes why.

An empty chair will never be the same for me. Do you have enough chairs?