Fourth period.
Moral Education.
The teacher closed the textbook.
“Today, I’m not going to talk about the textbook.”
She wrote nothing on the blackboard.
“There was someone I knew who raised cows.”
A few children looked up.
“Cows?”
“Yes.”
The teacher smiled.
“He had raised cows for decades.
He woke up early every morning and fed them.
Rain or snow, it didn’t matter.
Cows get hungry at the same time every day.
They don’t wait for human circumstances.”
The classroom became quiet.
“In the area where he raised his cows, there was once a cooperative created by local dairy farmers.
One person alone could not easily do business with large companies.
So they gathered their milk together and protected each other’s livelihoods.”
The teacher wrote a small phrase on the blackboard.
Helping each other
“Back then, they truly helped each other.”
She paused.
“But as time passed, things changed.
Feed became more expensive.
So did fuel.
So did electricity.
But the milk payments stayed almost the same.”
One student raised a hand.
“Then why didn’t they just reduce the number of cows?”
The teacher nodded.
“Some people might think that.”
She paused.
“But it wasn’t that simple.
The loans remained.
The equipment remained.
The work remained.
The cows remained.”
The teacher looked at the blackboard.
For a moment, she said nothing.
“Then one day, his payment to the cooperative was delayed.”
The atmosphere in the classroom changed.
“The cooperative stopped doing business with him.
He could no longer order feed through them.
But cows need to eat every day.
They don’t wait.
So he bought feed from another company.”
The teacher looked out the window.
“Two years later…
The cooperative acquired that feed company.”
She erased the words on the blackboard.
“Two separate things became one.
He tried to place an order with the cooperative again.
The same place where he had delivered milk for decades.
But they refused.”
The children remained silent.
“There was one way, though.
He could place orders under the name of another farmer he knew.
They would accept the deliveries if they were sent to a different farm.”
One child raised a hand.
“Why?”
The teacher thought for a moment.
“I don’t know.”
The classroom became quiet.
“He was very angry.
Extremely angry.
He said he was afraid of how angry he had become.
He said…”
The teacher paused.
“‘I thought that place was mine too.’”
The teacher sat down.
“But the next morning, he still fed the cows.
Even though he was angry.
The cows could not wait.”
The bell rang.
Chairs moved.
Textbooks closed.
The children began preparing to leave.
On the blackboard:
Helping each other
No one erased the words.