Legacy custodian Nona Airheart walks the empty halls: No light streams through the windows. No sound other than the echo of her own footsteps. No people except for the rest of the night crew. Continuing her work she thinks back to when she became a mother.
In her senior year of high school, twenty-one years ago, she met Charles Havens in the entrance of Kowbell Rodeo, where Legacy now sits.
A year later she had his son, William.
“That was a lot of struggles, to go to school and have a child at the same time because, more or less, I didn’t have time to grow up. I automatically had to grow up,” Airheart said. “But that’s the past.”
Airheart had trouble throughout high school and went to Venture High School, an alternative high school for pregnant teens. Though Venture helped Airheart get her diploma and make it into college, she dropped out before earning a degree.
Airheart later married. After ten years of life as a housewife, she and her husband divorced.
“Society raises you to think you get married and have kids, and then you live happily ever after. But everyone has to make their own American dream. That wasn’t my American dream,” she said.
After the divorce Airheart had no choice but to find a job.
She wanted to try everything. She wanted to act, sing, dance, become a fashion designer and – her dream – to teach history.
But instead she found work as a cake decorator, a teacher’s assistant, a secretary, a custodian – even a warehouse worker.
“I think, when someone has a job, maybe there’s an underlying dream job they really, really want,” Airheart said. “I don’t want to be seen as just somebody; I want to be seen as somebody [whose opinion matters].”
Her son, then in high school, also had trouble in school. During a meeting with his principal, she found out about job openings in the district for custodial work. She applied and found a job working the night shift.
She no longer decorates cakes. She doesn’t sing. She doesn’t dance. She doesn’t design fashion. And she doesn’t teach history.
Instead, she stays at Legacy until 11:30 at night cleaning the floors students, administrators, and, yes, history teachers, walk on.
“If I could go back and whisper in my ear I’d say, ‘Think about it. Think about it,’” Airheart said.
