Brenda Perryman’s blonde locks shake with delight, and a smile spreads across her brown face when she talks about the job she loves.

“I wanted to teach acting,” the drama teacher says. “As a kid, I would put on plays in my garage, but drama was never encouraged in my family.”

So Perryman trotted off to college to learn how to teach industrial art. “Then I got into this accident, and I was paralyzed from the waist down. The three months (that) I was in the hospital the doctors were saying I should go into drama. So I called my mom and told her I wanted to major in drama, and she said, ‘No, you’ll starve.’ I said, ‘But I’m going to teach it.’ ”

That was several decades ago. Now Perryman is the chairperson of the Fine and Performing Arts Department at Southfield High and teaches Acting 1 and 2. She has been teaching for 30 years and has been at Southfield High for 16 of those years.

She has staged dozens of plays, including her self-written favorites, which include “60’s Girl” and “Rhythms, Rhymes, and Rhapsodies.” She says, “It was a thrill to see my words and work come to life. I also liked doing 1997’s ‘Wiz’ and 2004’s ‘Fame.’”

As far as hobbies, she says, “I love writing poetry. I love writing short stories. I like performing poetry at clubs and parties. I love watching movies.”

Southfield High students and staff were recently treated to a poetry reading by Perryman on Feb. 6 in the school’s library. She read a number of her favorites before a standing room only crowd that gathered after school.

Why does she write?

“I write because I want to leave a legacy for my children and grandchildren about how life is. It’s my way of communicating about the past to young people.”

Her love for her job and her students hasn’t gone unnoticed. Frank Tramble, a 2005 graduate, says, “She inspired me to become a better actor. I love theater, and I learned everything I know from her. I enjoy the fact that she knows what she is doing and that I can learn from her.”

When Tramble thinks of Perryman, laughter comes to mind. “I think of laughter because she is just hilarious to me.”

Phillip Vails, also a graduate of the class of 2005, says that Perryman “taught me to never settle for what I thought was good, but to always try to be the best. She gives me what I need, when I need it. She encourages me when I need to be encouraged, and she yells at me when I need to be yelled at.”

Vails says that these things made him grow as a person and as an actor.

A broad smile appears on Perryman’s face as she thinks of her greatest accomplishment. “My children, my children. They truly are good people. I’m hoping I had something to do with that. Second to that, I would say the privilege to teach. It is a privilege.”