Fairness and Equity (or, Teachable Moments Gone Bad)

Last night I made the mistake of trying to teach my children about equity and justice by taking advantage of a "teachable moment" when my eldest daughter's civil disobedience took the form of dereliction of duty on her chores.

Bridget didn't understand why she had to do her chore three times (dishes) and her brother only did his twice (cleaning off the counter tops).

The following conversation ensued:

Mom: Look, it is spring break, you are generating more dishes so when it is your day to do that job, you will do it more frequently.  So will the person who is on garbage, that is just the way it works.  I believe in equity, not fairness.

Bridget:  What is the difference?

Mom:  Equity means that every person has an equal shot at society (this is where I start to degenerate and change the point of my argument with her).  Say a family has their house burn down, the parents both lose their jobs, and the kids don't have anything to eat.  Then another family, with parents who have a good job and a big house, they are eating a frosty for dessert (gesturing to our own frosty desserts on the table).  They both go to the food bank, who should get the dinner?

Bridget:  They both should get the same amount (said with sarcasm).

Mom: You are a jerk.  I am not raising kids who believe that.

Casey:  That is a bad example.

Bridget:  Why would the rich family be at the food bank?

Casey: Duh, because they are giving the food bank food

Steve:  Wait, what if they are at the food bank because they feel entitled and just want more food?

Bridget: No, let me give you an example, there is a short guy, a medium guy, and a tall guy.  There are all these crates and they are trying to watch a game.  They each get a crate.  And then someone comes along and says "Hey, those guys didn't even buy tickets to watch the game, why are they getting to watch it for free?"

Needless to say, I did the dishes myself (though I did guilt trip her the entire time, resulting in a clean living room.)

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.

What is Important

Sometimes when I tell people about my travels, I get a response like this "Wow that must be nice."

When I get an upgrade, when I am stuck in a town due to weather delays or cancelled flights and I stay in an upgraded suite, dine on room service or Häagen Dazs ice cream, when the car rental company gives me the newest model of a black sleek car, and when I get to skip security it does feel like I get my own little mini-vacation.  I can't pretend like being alone in a hotel room with room service is "stressful" or "sensory overload" like my house often is on a regular basis.

And yesterday at church, someone posed the question: "What is your holy place?"  and I had to admit to myself that unlike some other women whose response is "the bathroom",  I actually have a quiet and peaceful place where I spend time on a regular basis.  That is since my "no TV" policy I established a few years ago (due to excessive Seinfelding at 11 every night).

But when I sit down to look at my travel schedule and find that I am going to be away from my family for at least some portion of the week for weeks on end, I wonder if it really is nice.

My children are growing up.  My two oldest are in fact away from home already much more than I anticipated, spending time with friends, or extra-curriculars and as they grow up, I miss them tremendously.  And I wonder what long-term effect my travels will have on my children.

Will they report to their therapist that their mother was always gone and neglected them or will their sense of independence and ability to make choices be greater and healthier psychologically?

Will I look back on my life and wonder if my sense of purpose was skewed in wanting to serve so many children over serving my own brood on a regular basis or will I feel a sense of satisfaction at having done both?

Will my husband look back on our marriage as a one-sided effort or will he feel closer to me because we made a great effort to spend time together precisely because of my schedule?

If I were working for a standard for-profit industry, I feel that the moral dilemma I face would not be so complicated.  Though I doubt I would be able to recognize it, I feel that in my heart I would know that my time of jet-setting was to come to an end once my husband had a job and we had another income.

But now, I can't imagine giving up the work I am engaging in nationally and by the way being paid for it any more than I can imagine not being a mother.  It is who I have become and who I want to be--so the question becomes even more complicated.  Were I not working for pay, I would still spend hundreds of hours a month in schools, school board meetings, or some other nefarious volunteerism.

As I recently said to a co-worker, we are all busy doing a certain number of things.  Some of us do more things and do them less effectively--I am one of these individuals.  No matter what anyone says, I am certain that my effort to raise my children is less efficacious than a woman who is at home with her children full-time.  I am positive that my home would be cleaner, my medical bills more organized, my budget in better shape and my church service would be greater.  I know I would be a better intern and grad student if I weren't doing 10 other things, a more committed friend and a less needy wife--but these are not the choices I have made.

What I still can't decide is whether more is less, or, as my mind and body insist, more is more.

Hampton Inn, I will see you this evening O my Holy Place.

Early Adopter

I bought myself a lovely new dishset from IKEA this weekend and I am thrilled to pieces about it.

Steve thinks it was a waste.

Anyway, I was trying to show it to someone today, and to my chagrin could not find it on their website.

But THEN I found a picture of it here:

And to my DELIGHT I discovered that they are new, as in 2013.  And I, a woman of no home and no decor of my own, have become an early adopter of IKEA dishware.

I just wanted to share.  Come over for dinner some time and try out my new dishes.

Paleo Review

So I have been doing this paleo thingy--here is a summary based off of this site

It is a somewhat scientifically untested diet but based on an interesting theory that our bodies have not evolved to handle all the processed stuff, many refer to it as the cave man diet.  Some people think it is like Atkins, but it isn't--the meats are lean, they focus more on veggies and I don't recall Atkins people cutting out grains.

I am sure I have blogged about in the past, but as a refresher, every year from October to December 25, I don't eat sugar or refined flour.  Or chocolate, but that is kind of redundant because I can't afford to buy chocolate that doesn't have sugar or flour.

Why do I do this?  Well, I use this dieting approach called attrition:

See that blue dot?  Well, if you are 30 and you weigh 150, you are somewhere in the 60th percentile for weight, kind of on the tubby side.  But if you wait it out at 150 for 10 years, suddenly, you find yourself hovering right above 50th.  If you wait it out for 10 more years at 150?  You drop down below, so suddenly you become trimmer than the average woman.  And all I really want is to be a little less fat than everyone else.  Isn't that the American Dream?  So I just need to maintain my weight in an effort to lose the appearance of weight each year.  Brilliant, no? (I don't know what I will do when I hit 70 and the average goes back down but I am thinking that is just because the older generation aren't as obese as we are so I am counting on that going back up as we age)

In my effort to win this normalizing war and shave off a few pounds during the holidays that I may have gained from my busiest travel season, I simply go without foods I really love.  Abstinence, very effective (mostly).

This year, I discovered that after 3 years of going without sugar and flour, I have replaced those foods with other yummy things that have rendered the change in my diet almost useless and I wasn't noticing any difference in my weight or the way I felt.

So this year I needed something different, a change that would help me shed those extra pounds and stick with my general short-term policy.

As a periodically avid pinterester, I had started to see reference to paleo recipes.  And aside from the cashew cheesecakes, most everything looked like good foods, things I believe in eating.  I started stalking browsing their forums and I was impressed by the paleo community.  They don't seem to be strict like other kinds of communities--no letter of the law involved for the most part.  In fact, the majority of the questions about "are we allowed to...?" on the paleo forums most often yield a "well, here are the reasons to avoid that food, but listen to your body to know if that food impacts you in a negative way."  Any community that goes with a more spirit of the law approach and encourages one to listen to the body sounds like one I could be a part of for awhile.

So I decided to try it.

The biggest changes for me?

Dairy products.  I didn't know I was eating so much cheese there, whoops! It was easy enough to give up, but made all my concoctions slightly less yummy.

Corn products.  Long ago I cut out corn syrup with very few exceptions and I haven't eaten the fake corn stuff from chicken nuggets or other hidden ingredients (thank you mucho to Michael Pollan for forcing me to read every single label ever).  But tortilla chips?  And yummy corn tortillas??? What the heck was I going to do about this one?  I did it, but it was hard.

Whole Wheat.  I thought this was going to be hard, but given that I think it impacts my reflux so I had cut back over the years, it was actually not too tough. Missed a few almond butter sandwiches, but I was strong.

Rice
What the.. no rice?  Do you know even KNOW how many foods contain rice?  Or how many tasty and healthy meals can be enhanced with rice?  And how rice makes everything cheaper?  Yes, I make quinoa but not a real replacement.  And I am not making no cauliflower rice.

The results?

Well, I did shave off a few pounds so good for me.  But, like any other change over a period of months, I learned a few things which were of value:

1) I used to have to blow my nose every morning.  Like, I would get up, get my drink of water and a box of kleenex.  Since I cut out the stuff, no problems.  After December 25 I have had a bit of ice cream and, whoops, blowing my nose again.  So, perhaps bye-bye to dairy for awhile.

2) I have completely lost my appetite for whole wheat flour.  I am even LESS tempted by processed flour (like flour tortillas, once a former favorite food even seems a little gross).

3) I have no idea what to eat now.  I love the paleo foods but they take so much effort!  So I have gotten into a rut with a few foods but I haven't come up with many "quick" dinners other than the same old soups that my kids are tolerating.  I have dropped certain habits but haven't picked up new ones, how annoying!

4) Eating right is expensive.  I don't care who you are or how amazing of a cook you are, I have come to the conclusion that unless you have unlimited time, eating right is costly.  I am not a woman of leisure who has hours to prepare food, I am full-time employee, full-time student, and full-time mother. I can either come home exhausted and then spend hours cooking or I can do something quick and expensive.  What would you choose?

5) I am still not going organic except for corn chips.  Sorry.  I am still not good enough at what I put in my body in general to get to that refined state of being.  If it is around the same price, I will do it, but other than that, count me out of that movement.

So I think I will stick with the no sugar policy, I like it, I feel good, and it keeps the weight off.

Moving forward I will keep most of what I gained from the paleo people and stick with mainly those foods, but I reintroduced the corn chips (organic to avoid the whole GMO thingy).

My resolution for the next several months is to require 30 minutes a day of exercise. I am hoping to keep the habit as long as possible before reality sets in.  If I can keep up the self-control of the food thing and then add the exercise, maybe I will feel great, stay trim, and beat the death threat of age 55 (average age in which my parents died) that my husband thinks I face.

Overall score for the paleo diet: 8 (until I get a few recipes under my belt).
Overall score for the paleo community: 10

Last Travel of the Year

I had a horrible flight experience today and to commemorate this and appreciate that it was truly my only really bad travel for 2012, I will bore myself and any potential readers with a travel story.  
Seriously, travel stories are like dreams, no one really likes to hear about them.  But here we go:

I overslept.  To be precise, I told Siri to set my alarm for 5:30 AM.  I always verify the alarm because she sometimes ignores me but I was so exhausted that I forgot.  Did I mention I had a redeye the day before and then worked all day after landing in time for my morning meeting?  Anyway, this morning, I woke up at 7:30.  The time my flight was to depart from Columbus, Ohio, and discovered that Siri did not hear me because my alarm was not even set.  Obviously, I missed the flight.

And this detail doesn't make any sense to normal people but is important for frequent flyers--I am not on my normal airline (Delta) but US Airways.  I used to be on their preferred list but I never did like them.  Now I am a Delta girl, all the way.

So the US Air people tell me in Columbus that it is unlikely I can even get out of there today and all flights from all cities are booked so they can't promise I will arrive in SLC until at least Sunday.  They sent me to go to other airlines to ask about additional flights (what?  awesome).

In the end, US Air did get me out of Columbus to Charlotte, but they had to de-ice the plane so we left 30 minutes late.

As is usual for bumpy bad weather flights, I contemplated my own mortality, particularly when, about 20 feet off the ground, the pilot suddenly pulls up and instead we do an angled, wild, and rickety circle around the airport.  We landed so late that I only had 15 minutes to get all the way across the airport.

So I hop on one of those beepy golf carts and make friendly conversation with a fellow passenger who is blind and has a seeing eye dog.  The golf cart stops us at the bottom of an escalator and tells us to take another golf cart to make it the rest of the way, but blind man says he will instead follow me since we are both headed to Phoenix for the next leg.  I look at my ticket and see that it says C-16 and walk quickly over there while the blind man and his dog are trying to make it across several moving walkways and through thousands of holiday travelers, go carts, etc. It was a very stressful experience to go fast enough to get there but slow enough where he can literally blindly follow me.
We arrive to the gate finally, 5 minutes before the intended departure and I look at the gate which says "San Francisco", not Phoenix.  Well, rather than trying to work it out at that gate, I grab the man's ticket and it says B3.  B!!! That is all the way across the terminal again!

I race across the terminal with him madly following with his little doggy and I am on the verge of tears because know that I have ruined his holiday!! He is now going to miss this flight because I must have gotten the gate wrong, you know?  So we arrive to the gate and it says Dallas, so then I start crying and explain to the gate agent that it was my fault that he missed the flight and she says "sweetie, the Phoenix flight is not leaving for another two hours, he didn't miss it you are fine."

And I am so relieved I cry more, and then realize that I missed my own flight and have reduced my own possibility of getting home today.

I should have just talked to the people at the gate like I would have if I had been myself.  I didn't realize that he and I were on different flights!  But what kind of person doesn't help the blind guy? I mean, after I have just searched my soul on the near-death airplane, I figure it is better to miss a flight and help a blind person than to selfishly run ahead, right?

So I go the bathroom and just start crying uncontrollably.  Like, sobbing.  What the heck, you know?   A few ladies in the bathroom were worried about me, which was kind of annoying but helped a little since I realized I was wallowing a bit.

But here is the touchy-feely ending.  I go to eat lunch (because now I have like tons of time) and eat dessert for the first time in months because I am just tired, so tired, and so frazzled.  And I call Steve and I start crying again (so much crying!!!)  Well, I go to pay for my meal, and the server tells me that the lady who had been sitting across from me felt sorry for my travel troubles so she bought me lunch and wanted to wish me a Merry Christmas.  So what do I do?
Cry of course.

Can you imagine?

I am a chump.

Oh the Drama

Oh what a roller coaster ride it is to have your child set her heart upon the lead role in the school musical.

Let me start by making it clear that I have never tried out for a play in my life.  I have never auditioned for a singing opportunity--though I have sung a few solos and duets, I never tried out for them (LDS congregations are highly forgiving of off-pitch soloists at church).

So to say that I was unprepared for the drama of it, I really was quite unprepared.

I hesitated to share this given the nature of the experiences, but if I can help some other unsuspecting mother out there who thinks that she, too, is supportive of her daughter auditioning.  Names have been changed to protect the drama.

Because honestly, that is what it is--drama.  I understand now, when people use the phrase drama to explain some steep emotional roller coaster, they are simply referring to audition-like feelings.

Here is my story... rewind three days (remember this for the ending):

Eldest daughter:  What piece shall I sing?

Mother:  What part do you want?

Eldest daughter:  The Wardrobe!!

Live-in Auntie:  How about Shy from Once Upon a Mattress?  That completely fits this kind of character that you are aiming for, goofy but confident.  It is perfect.

Everyone:  PERFECT!!

We had a great time, she enjoyed practicing, I gave her some bad advice about body language (apparently you are supposed to plant your feet and keep your hands to your side, I told her to use the stage, etc.) and in the end she did get a callback.  And she worked pretty hard to get the piece down in a short amount of time.

But the callback was for Belle.  BELLE!  The LEAD PART!  And all of her friends got really on board with her playing the lead, their own shattered hopes placed firmly upon her shoulders as one who could get the lead part.

So alas, my beloved daughter, first time around for an audition, built up a 24-hour dream that she would get the lead.

Expectancy theory gets you every time.

Was she confident?  Yes, probably more than most of the other young ladies.  Was she a wonderful singer?  Competitive, perhaps not the strongest.  Was she physically belle-like?  Well.. you tell me:

(hello, time to update these pictures, sheesh!)

She has brown hair.  And that my friends, is enough of a detail to make a little girl feel that all her dreams will come true.

Well, back to my her emotional roller coaster:

After the callbacks yesterday, I asked my lovely who was the best singer and she very clearly stated that it was Rose (pseudonym, claro).  Rose, she said, "shattered all my hopes and dreams."  So, of course, she knew that Rose was a contender.

What she was not prepared for was Rose approaching her in the middle of the day (before the cast was listed) and saying "prepare to be my understudy" in the way that only a 5th grade girl can.  Honestly, it is a great line, even if a bit cheeky.   We added it to family lore of hilarious things to say when facing someone as a professional wrestler.

But the fragility of the 6th grade constitution cannot handle such comments at this tender age.  I can imagine my daughter started thinking that this little girl would get her comeuppance as soon as the casting list came about and she could even start to imagine some pretty snappy comebacks.

When the final cast was posted:

Daughter: Wardrobe
Rose: Belle

You remember that my daughter was seeking the part of the wardrobe, right?

And that we picked a part that would highlight her silliness so that she could get that exact role, right?

Remember that whole expectancy theory thing?

Needless to say, she was devastated.  She sobbed and crocodile tears fell as her little developing body shook in my arms.

I can't handle this story, can you?

I was a little parental at first about it, trying to talk her out of saying mean things about Rose.  But I tried to remember myself at that age and decided to just validate her feelings instead of trying to make her empathetic.  I lasted about 5 minutes before I tried to remind her that she had told me that Rose was the best singer (which she immediately and violently refused to admit) and that she wanted the wardrobe all along.  She cried periodically throughout our conversation and tried to come up with every excuse under the sun to explain the nepotism/politics/dumb reasons why she did not get the lead role.

Interestingly, little Rose called up about an hour after said conversation and apologized.  As in, my daughter got off the phone and said to me "she sounded really genuine."

Several hours later, these are the golden, beautiful words that came out of my daughter's mouth:

I am happy for Rose.  I know that I said she wasn't very good earlier, but that isn't true.  She was really good.  I am glad I did not get the lead, because SO many girls are disappointed and that would be hard.  And I think when she said that to me about the understudy, maybe what she meant was that she thought I was second best.  I am really grateful to my two best friends and for my mother who helped me today.

She finished off her little soliloquy by saying "Am I a bad person? Because I was really mean earlier when I said she didn't deserve the part.  She did."

My little mommy heart strings pulled so hard I thought I was going to cry again.

Thank goodness I can go to bed now, aren't you exhausted?