Come fall, Cindy Steen will miss the kids most.
Sure, she'll miss the front-office staff and her teaching colleagues. Ditto for supportive parents, and even the building where she has worked for more than three decades, strengthening bodies and minds at Rabbit Creek Elementary, always mindful of the education in physical education.
But, man, not seeing the kids is going to be the gut-punch.
Here Steen is, inside her final week of a 35-year career teaching physical education at Rabbit Creek, where the kids' energy, curiosity and growth have sustained her like a fountain of youth, and retirement beckons. She intends to travel, spend plenty of time here, but maybe do the Alaska-Arizona snowbird thing, and hike and bike and swim, and definitely work on her golf game.
There's only the slightest tinge of bittersweet to it all -- Steen by nature focuses on the sweet and the power of being positive, and always, on those kids.
"It has always kept me young at heart,'' she said between classes Thursday. "You come in every day and see their smiles, and it makes your day.''
In a storage room that doubles as Steen's office inside the gym sit two bouquets of flowers, three balloons bearing words of congratulations, and various notes from students – sample: "Mrs. Steen rocks.''
Joe Libal gets it. He's got 21 years in the teaching business. He spent this school year at Rabbit Creek, where he helped Steen teach classes, and he'll take over her gig come fall. He's seen Steen's energy and meticulousness, seen how much she cares, seen her gently, humbly deflect description as a legend, an institution. He's seen two-way respect between Steen and the kids, and the former students who return to visit her.
Some current students cried when they learned Steen was retiring, Libal said. Another two-way street.
"The kids, there were a lot of tears. You can tell her influence,'' Libal said. "And her – when she talks about the kids, she gets choked up.''
Libal soaked up Steen's knowledge and experience and marvels at how she instills courtesy in the kids, and how well-behaved they are.
"It's not discipline with a hammer,'' he said. "It's discipline with kind words.''
At the end of a class Thursday, after a Star Wars-themed game of dodge ball using soft, pillow-like balls – kids took turns being Princess Leia and Luke Skywalker -- Steen's students sat quietly, in neat rows on the gym floor.
"I like those smiles,'' Steen told them.
Row by row, at Steen's instruction, kids rose from the floor and lined up on the center-court line, ready to depart the gym.
"Look at that nice line,'' Steen told them.
Steen was part of the first group of physical education teachers in Anchorage elementary schools. She began teaching in 1981, lured here after two years of teaching in her native Illinois following graduation from Chicago State. She had visited a friend here in 1980 and was smitten with the state, and with the people who reminded her of growing up in Palos Heights surrounded by neighborhood woods that featured a creek and pond.
"I loved Alaska,'' Steen recalled. "Wooded areas, everyone helping each other, everyone friendly. The people drew me here.''
When her friend in Alaska let her know the Anchorage School District was hiring physical education teachers for elementary schools, Steen bit. She interviewed here and landed a job at Rabbit Creek, where the gym floor back then was tile and the gym doubled as a multi-purpose room. She returned to Illinois, resigned her job there, headed north for adventure, fell in love with her job and those kids – "great kids,'' she said several times Thursday, emphasis on great -- and never found reason to leave.
In Anchorage, woods were everywhere. Teaching was in Steen's heart. Rabbit Creek Elementary hooked her. She had found what she perhaps didn't even know she was searching for – home.
Steen started a running club at the school a couple of decades ago. She has taught kids skills and games, and an active lifestyle she hopes they carry into adulthood and transfer to their kids. And she loved it. Each fall, she wasn't bummed summer vacation ended. She was psyched to get back to the kids, to teach them to be good sports, give their best effort, support their peers and carve out an active lifestyle.
Some things have changed, of course. Steen still plays a recording of "Eye of the Tiger'' when the kids warm up for gym class, but the delivery system has been updated.
"I started with a 45 rpm record,'' Steen said with a laugh. "Then it was a cassette. And now it's a CD.''
As seriously as Steen takes teaching, she doesn't take herself too seriously, though she was sweetly adamant that she wouldn't surrender her age – and we'll give her a well-earned pass. She could have retired years ago but loved the job, and those kids, too much to leave before it felt right.
"I feel like it's time now,'' she said. "I want to leave while I have the energy. I didn't want to leave on a walker.''
She's not even close to that. She's got miles to go. Traveling, biking, hiking, swimming and honing her golf game, specifically off the tee.
Come next week, Cindy Steen will be gone from Rabbit Creek Elementary.
Gone, but surely not forgotten.
This column is the opinion of sports reporter Doyle Woody. Reach him at dwoody@alaskadispatch.com and follow him at @JaromirBlagr