To My Body, With Gratitude

My dearest round little body,

You are my greatest friend and ally.

My feet who continue to support my increasing berth.

My legs who continue to push me when sleeping has been fitful, on a redeye flight, or interrupted by bloodcurdling screams from the hotel room next door.

My hands that type endlessly, drive rental cars at midnight, gesture with clarity to let people know where they stand with me and then still have the energy to sign my name over, and over, and over again.

My eyes that continue to see far, that without support of any kind, allow me to see the majestic mountains in the morning, the 10,000 foot view of farm fields from an airplane, my beautiful children's faces, and wondrous sunsets.

My stomach, that goes hours without any fuel and then fills up too quickly with ill-timed meals that are not quite right.

My mind that energizes me with funny things to think, surgically takes apart all conversation around me and then processes my thoughts in such familiar ways.

My mouth that generates words that execute all that I want to say and in exactly the way that will reflect who I am perfectly.

My heart that beats with steady perfection and continues to fill me with a feeling of warmth and love for   the people of my world.

I am sorry that I let you fall in that parking lot, that in my distracted and tired state of mind, I allowed you to slam to the ground in such an ungraceful way and leave an asphalt mark in too many little places.  I am sorry for the high heels, I am sorry for the cell phone in my face, and I am most of all sorry that I gave you no attention in any way over the last week.  I know, I owe you.

But you have beautifully managed a recovery and reminded me that with you I am nothing. Please, let me have just a few more decades with you and let me remember to treat you with more kindness and caring because in spite of all of the other relationships I have in this world, you are truly the one who has been the most there for me.

Ode to My Students

I have been touched by your kids... and I'm pretty sure that I've touched them.
-Dewey Finn, School of Rock

You know how you read online these warm and touching stories about teachers?  Well, I have never google searched it, but I don't often read heart-warming stories about how students have impacted the life of a teacher even though I believe it happens just as often, if not more.

I have blogged about what I learned from some of my students before (my journey learning about race) and you often hear about how a student, particularly a struggling student shames a teacher into repentance. Has anyone read the story that circulates about Teddy and how he gave his teacher some perfume that she thought was trashy until she found out his mother died?  I hate that story and I think most educators should if they think it is okay to take delight in failing students until you find out they have a deceased parent, are you serious people?

Well I am here to confess that I didn't go into teaching to inspire people, I went into teaching because I was moved by the young people I taught myself.

In another blog post (Paragraph 6) I wrote about my beginning teaching experience in LA Unified.  I often describe that time as like one of those movies (Dangerous Minds or Lean on Me) but without the inspiring teacher part.

I could write a novel on students that I taught in Delhi and how much I loved them as individuals and that I still remember my first experience when someone cheated on a test and I was shocked into reality that it wasn't a violation of the ed code.  Or how a student told me that he already made more money than me as a 15-year old drug dealer.  Or showing up at the house of three punk kids I loved because they stayed home from my boring summer school class in favor of playing video games.  Or how I became so close with some of the students there that it nearly broke my heart to leave the school when we moved.

But today I want to write about Stacee.  See that picture at the top?  The centerpiece to that picture with the white shirt and long hair? Stacee died this last weekend.  It was a jolt to me, to lose a young person--as a teacher, you are supposed to die before your students, all of them.  I sometimes live in fear--when I get a request on facebook from a name that is only vaguely familiar, am I forgetting my students?  Is this person someone who I really should know by name and face?  Will I forget the things that they taught me and the things that they said, and lose a piece of myself?

But when Stacee died, a sudden burst of memories came to me, a reminder of what a beautiful young lady she was, the times she made fun of me or her peers, the times she stunned me with her raw artistic talent, the times she scared me with how deeply she felt things.  I remembered my mistakes, I remembered her mistakes, and surprisingly, I remembered with perfect clarity being inspired by her on the first day of orientation:

We were standing in a group in the front of the room, a group of excited teachers introducing ourselves for the first time to parents and students in a pioneering school.  When the teachers came to stand up front, there was an audible murmuring about how young these teachers were.  And we were!  Tim, Kristen, Kris, Senna, Robin, Matt, Andy... we were all in the first 3 years of teaching, on the mature end of that spectrum.  Lorna had a few years on us and then Proctor--we don't count him though (sorry, once you get busted for drugs you are out of the picture, yo).  And while I had taught for a few years, I was still young.  And as we were introduced and I looked out on this sea of parents, a little shy that we didn't know what the ayche we were doing, I saw Stacee and Nicole, these two cute girls who I had met before the presentation, and I knew that we were going to be awesome.  I knew that these kids, especially the 10th graders, had left a secure and safe place in their previous school and pioneer or not, we had an obligation to do something for them.  It wasn't a teacher who inspired me in that moment, it was students, who gave me the inner strength to do the hard work.

I don't know why this stands out to me--but it is false to say that teaching is a thankless job.  It is fake to say that no one appreciates teachers.  That is bullcrap or no one would do it. It is the most appreciated job on the planet.  Every day I knew where I stood with my students, if they liked what I taught, if they learned in my classroom.  I knew if I had completely bored them to death, if I had not provided a safe enough environment, if I had wasted their time, or if they genuinely loved what they had done in my classroom.  I received gifts every holiday (once a group of students planned a surprise party for me during a particular class period), I received notes of appreciation, and was the recipient of random acts of kindness.  Most of all I was inspired.

By students who already knew everything but refused to be lazy, kids who had a killer work ethic.

By kids who had a better sense of humor, a stronger moral compass, a more righteous sense of justice.

By kids who didn't understand what they were saying but fought about it anyway.

By kids who didn't undersand what I was saying but fought about it anyway.

By kids who saw right through everything and realized that the system was not going to be on their side but gave it a go anyway.

By students, like Stacee, who had more talent by age 16 than most people will experience in a lifetime.

I am saddened by her departure, devastated on behalf of her family, but grateful too, that I knew someone like her.

That she reminds me that so much of the inspiration that happens in the classroom is generated not from the teachers, but the students themselves.

Evolution in Blogging

I have had been a faithful blogger for a decade before my posts slowed to a trickle.  At first I thought it was busier, but I have realized lately that part of the reason for this slowing down is that my life has becoming increasingly more private.

Not that I have much to hide, I am still just as open in person with my friends as I have historically been on this blog, but that there is more at stake in the written world.  Here are what I believe my reasons are for less blogging:

1) Children who can now browse the internet.  As far as I can tell, they have yet to happen upon this blog, but there is always a chance that that "hilarious"  parenting fail moment I have freely blogged about in the past will show up in therapy for my children in a couple of decades.  I can't have a written record of the conversations I had with them about their coming of age including appropriate internet usage or bodily development.  just. can't.  But believe me, there is some good material floating out in the universe.

2) I have further access to secret district stuff.  Did you know that existed? Yeah, it does.  And I can't tell you about it.  I would like to, though, see this post on how much I dislike secrets.

3) I am now spending time in public schools learning things that are not particularly positive. I can't write an exposé about the inner workings of teacher and student discipline, my take on whether or not large comprehensive high schools should even work, or how I really feel about mediocrity in instruction.

4) I am on a violently emotional roller coaster with grad school in which one day I am ready to write a novella on how ridiculous grad school really is and how little the institution can teach me and the next I want to share all of my new knowledge with the world.

I imagine one day I will return to daily or weekly blogging because it has historically been so therapeutic for me, perhaps when and if we move.  Which brings me to my last point:

5) The Way Things Are (Grad School Status):  Steve is applying for jobs whilst finishing his dissertation.  We haven't heard back from most of the places where he has applied and chances are high that we will move to the middle of nowhere for a year or two before we find our final resting place.  I think we initially wanted to move for a longer period of time so the kids wouldn't have to move a bunch more, but nothing like the application process to remind you that after all that you can do, your future is not in your own hands.  Uncertainty is not fun to blog about--it comes across as anxiety or whining, neither of which have a place in my blog.  I write this to record the joy and comedy of my life, not the dark shadows in between that frankly are boring.   Whether we move to some exotic location (East or West Coast?) or some less exotic location (anywhere in between?), I suppose that my friendship quotient will return to 0 and I will have no choice to embrace my old friend the blog, who has always been a listening ear in hard and happy times.

Cumpleaños de Lee

I had a birthday last week.

In keeping with my mother's belief that I was born with a happy gene, I will make my annual accounting here with a positive spin:

--Own property.  It is still standing and collecting rent.

--4 children and holding.  Children who I increasingly enjoy.

--Gray hairs few and far between, current hair color is au naturale.

--Enviable marriage.  Prefer to spend all free evenings with my husband and periodically become emotional thinking about how empty my life would be without him (usually during a country song or a cheesy romance). 

--Job that still cries out my name.

--Body is holding steady and taking care of me in spite of how I woefully abuse it by exposing it to hundreds of thousands of miles of x-ray exposure in an airplane.

--Live in an era of instant gratification of information so I can solve all of my problems through Google.  Thank you, thank you, thank you Google.

--Hundreds of acquaintances who care for me.

--Dozens of friends who love me.

--Belong to a religious community that gives me a deep sense of identity and purpose.

Not bad 37.  Let's keep on keeping on.