How to Grow a Nation ~ Election 2020

I wrote this in 2016 on the eve of the Presidential election. My thoughts that day are identical to the thoughts I'm having in 2020 about this election.  My, how some things never change. So, I'll say it again...

 How to Grow a Nation

Are you watching the Democratic National Convention? I'm obsessed with the whole political scene, even more than in 2008 when I wrote a post on the magnitude of electing the first African American President. It was snowing the day of the inauguration. I remember it well. I put on a white hat and gloves with a teal scarf around my neck and went for a walk, excited about the dawning of a new day for our country. 

Eight years later, things have turned downright bizarre. When the current President's own brother pledges to vote for the opposite party in the upcoming election and the Republican past presidents won't endorse the Republican nominee, you can sense how divided we have become. At this moment I am perfectly at peace with the fact that the "party" doesn't matter to me.  I am having my own party and asking myself these questions: Who is moral? Who is ready to lead? Who is experienced? Who would I trust with the the nuclear button? Who is simply a good person, an honest person? 

Who is the well-seasoned soul in the room? 

Even with all the rumblings of fear and displays of violence and uncertainty in the world, I know we'll be OK if we keep moving forward.  Positive progressive movement doesn't only apply to politics - it's vital for groundbreaking research, innovative manufacturing, idealist entrepreneurship, excellence in education, social and equality movements, foreign policy goals, and the conservation of our beautiful planet Earth.  

But how do we get there? Where is the standard?  How do we begin? 
You don't have to look very far for the answer. Change and evolution happens every single day in all our lives, mostly in the dynamic and hard work of personal human relationships.  It looks like grace when you don't deserve it and sounds like kindness when you didn't earn it. 

It walks like love just because love is love. 

It moves into something bigger. Something worthy of every stakeholder in the room.
 And it digs down deep into the walls of dirty dirt to bring up a new handful of roots you planted long long ago when nobody knew where love was headed. 

 Human interactions are the model for great nation building.

Because moving forward is just as organic to the sustainability of great relationships as it is to the forming of the world's finest models of peace and prosperity.  You can't have an unbreakable partnership without the desire to grow a deeper commitment to the one you love, a willingness to understand and forgive again, and a pot full of dirt. 
 Then you put in seedlings for birthing and expect them to grow.

You can't have a strong nation without fundamentally good and moral people willing to do the same.  

My life isn't perfect. 

Our world isn't either.

But I'll keep planting.

And digging.

And getting my hands dirty.

And tending my own garden.

Because when I find myself planting seeds in window-boxes in the silence of the hot southern sun or during a snowy inaugural walk, I feel a growing in my own soul. And a voice with the deepest strongest wisdom of all saying...

"Just plant, Mimi. Plant."

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July 4, 2020 ~ Which Flag Will You Wave?

What's important isn't important anymore. This is how I feel in the land of Covid-19.  On this July 4, 2020 we are not the land of the free - not today. Let me just speak for myself. I'm tired of the phrase "We're all in this together" by now. Because we're not. The all part isn't working anymore. Nice try, but it never did. When millions of individual families on planet earth are facing this kind of economic and personal uncertainty, we are fragmented by default and circumstance. This virus is 911 on steroids.  There are two kinds of fear I am seeing so clearly - fear of the virus and fear of each other.
 If you are trying to feed your family and keep them protected in the midst of this hell, then you are on an island of fear all by yourself. Where IS that together part? We can look around and see our neighbors suffering, try to help the best we can, but right now we all have our own oar to row. 
 If you are offended because you're afraid someone is going to take away your liberties by trying to keep you safe, then you are the one living in fear, not the other way around.  You won't make coronavirus go away by pretending you don't see it. The virus won't magically pass you by because you refuse to respect its peculiar DNA.   And if you piggyback your political agenda and your hatefulness to this already sobering event, you're even more of the problem. It's what bullies do.  It's a thirst for power covered in fear.  Fear of anything is still fear.  Feel strong now?
It's important in this time to mitigate fear as well. I have a healthy respect for what the scientists and doctors are saying. I have a healthy respect for this virus. But you have to do that with common sense action, not reaction to every little trigger word your opinion wants to jump on. Me?  I want to jump on this virus and I'll support any scientific protocol that gives me the best chance of doing that. Do I have opinions about all the other noise I hear right now? Of course I do.  But now is not the time. Not the time. Not the time. I'm not feeling free or happy today. I feel like we're obliviously waving at a cunning enemy as it floats on by with a wink and a nod while we're waving this flag and that flag and his flag and her flag. Where is our flag?   And for those of you who feel that 50,000 new cases a day in the United States is not enough for you to believe in the reality of this monster, then I ask you to say that to the 525 million families of those who have died alone without comfort or hope. Say that to the coffins stacked up in morgues and left on Rikers Island until further review. Because doctors and nurses don't have time to sort out your opinions before they try to save your life. Your beliefs don't matter when they're gently wrapping your body in a white flag of final surrender. Ask them how real it is.    I  I am an American and I love my country. This is my home. But on this day I see more division than I've ever seen. Why? Because we're not taking care of each other. The only thing at this moment we should be unified in is stopping this virus. But we can't. We're too busy waving flags of opinion to see the devil at our door.  The only flag I am waving today is the white flag of surrender - laying down my fightin' words in this moment of crisis, saving my opinions for a better day and taking up the common sense God gave me. It's been in short supply in the world lately.  We need a huge double dose right now. When this is contained and over, I'm going to throw a big 'ole party with the people I love, those I'm missing right now who are breaking my heart, those I haven't touched or hugged or kissed in months. When the masks come off, I'll gather them anew with mountains of food and music in a yard full of laughing kids with lemonade and baseball. There will be new things to celebrate and we will fly the stars and stripes. But today is not that day. First, I have to focus on surviving.  I can't speak for you, but I'm waving a flag for humanity too.  That we will SEE what's important so that we can finally cross this bridge whole and in one piece - truly free. It starts with me. Wearing my mask. Washing my hands. Staying home. Listening to doctors and scientists. Doing my own research. Listening to my healthcare team. Being careful. Doing my best.  Loving my neighbor as myself. 

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The Dirty Laundry Truth

I don't know why today has been particularly vexing. Well...maybe I do.
All God's children got problems. That's right. I said problems.

Big glaring ugly problems with a capital P.  Can we be real?  People don't want to talk about their real problems. Myself included. I'd rather you think I have it all together all the time, that my nails never break and my heart is always singing Disney songs I actually despise most Disney songs  and nobody, not nobody, leaves dirt on Bloggingham's floor. I don't want to tell you about the latest romantic disaster (he-who-abruptly-left-in-a-rude-asinine-manner) and the way I deleted my dating profile for the umpteenth time out of disgust for men in general, nor the frustrated way I war with myself over feeling guilty because I'm feeling guilty that I'm feeling guilty (did you get that?) because I might let a selfish thought waft right into the castle walls and into my heart because dammit I don't want to cuss on the blog

and be real

And then the day got worse. You can't go anywhere or read anything without people judging you or breaking off friendships based on the color of your politics or the length of your skirt. Enter sarcasm.  Enter snark.  Enter hate.  Enter division.

And just when I thought I had had enough, the universe callously reminded me I hadn't.
So I'm walking back and forth in my house today trying to answer multiple phone calls from dentists and doctors, nursing a toothache, making appointments and trying to find huge amounts of money to finance the dentist's yacht apparently and wondering all the while how people on fixed incomes survive in this economy when a couple of porcelain crowns cost more than a used car. I don't want to admit to anyone I'm struggling to deal with this. How embarrassing. Right?

A full grown woman shouldn't be worried about a few thousand dollars in the scheme of things. Should she? And why did I have to open the mailbox today and find my projected Social Security earnings for retirement summary? I don't need anymore bad financial news today!! Did you know, Bloggy People, that by the time some of us are ready to retire they might make us work 'til we're eighty??!!


Meanwhile the dentist can't see me for two weeks and my eldest and only son is having a meltdown on the phone needing his mama and mama ain't no good to nobody today.
Which brings me to the real crux of the dilemma for me:
I can't do anything about any of this. It just is.
I want to fix everyone's problem and make it better.  I'm like The.Closer.       The.One.People.Come.To.Talk.To         First.Born.Strong
I should be able to handle a little porcelain scandal, right? Knock over the cobwebs of bad dreams at fifty-something-or-other. NOT care whether or not anyone sees the dark circles. Right?
Nope. Not today.

Any one of us could name dozens of people and situations where life is really hard. I mean losing-your-children hard. Hunger hard. Jobless hard. Dying hard. Addiction hard.  Heart attack hard. Gunfire hard.
Staying alive gets in the way of life.
Have you noticed?

We live in a world where every neighbor you have on each side of the street usually IS the he-who-has-it-harder person in your life. And you just want to run from your car into the house and cover your head with a blanket and a pint of alcohol so you don't have to see one more day of bad news in the neighborhood. Or in the world.
But the truth is that some days I just can't get by with my standard other-people-have-it-worse-than-you-do-Mimi schtick to make myself feel better or more grateful. That theory took a turn for the gutter this afternoon. I wanted to roll around in it for awhile and see if it would work. But I just couldn't make it stick.


I popped this status up on social media, whining about Mercury Retrograde, and let the Universe send what gifts I knew my friends to possess. Thankful to receive them and blessed to have such friendships.  Then something happened on Facebook.

It was Janice. That cookery one.

and on and on they came to my rescue....




And I was just about to call it a day when Janice said,
"If you have any leftover good thoughts, can you share?"
and that comment pushed me right over the edge to the little window I'm typing inside the Bloggingham blog. Where I belong. See what I told you? That Janice is always talking about cooking. Leftovers. Indeed.
'Cause here's the deal.
We're all in the same leftover boat. Swimming in the greasy gravy. 
It wasn't her mission today to send me a lifeline or solve my problem. It was her mission to be real...by admitting that she needed some help too. While she was being real drowning in the greasy gravy, she also put a boot up my whiny skirt and challenged me to do the same.

Nobody likes a public drowning more than the Internet.

And I'm doing a fine job of that today.

There's not enough soap in New Zealand to clean my dirty laundry.

It really doesn't matter that I had a possessed cellphone disaster of epic proportions today because truly it wasn't epic at all. It was just piled on top of a bunch of other emotional things in the laundry basket. And I'm not going to hell because I had a huge gigantic small twinge of jealousy over the romantic trip my Canadian mon ami Dawn, is taking with her love right now to Niagara Falls.  And let's face it, nobody's going to fire me from peace globes just because I can't walk on water today.
And even though I wanted to cry a few times today over the frustrations of REAL LIFE - oh, wait - let's be real. I did cry. 
Like a baby.

And no it didn't make me feel better. It made me feel like a baby.

See? Nobody was here to hear it but Homer and he didn't want to hear it either. 

"Somebody else always has it worse than you do, Mimi. Buck up," whispered the voice of Jonathan Edwards. (look it up)

OH. SHUT. UP.

You see... the trouble with Pollyanna thinking is that Polly never gets a break. And Polly is human. She has laundry too.
Which led me right back to that cookery woman's question. Could I find a good 'ole leftover thought for her or anybody else today? And isn't that my real mission?

'Cause here's the dirty laundry truth:
We might not be able to always fix the steady diet of carpe life throws at us, but if we pay attention to what our neighbor needs instead of covering up and running in the house, we might be able to fix theirs. Isn't that what my brother's keeper means?
 I'm not going to wait around 'til I'm too old to swim in a little grease now and then. I'm gonna make a few gravy waves in the neighborhood and shake up some status quo. I'm gonna make some noise when noise needs making.  And even though I've cussed on my blog two three times today,  the point really is that the somebody-else-has-it-worse mantra only matters when it's followed by a plan to serve. Them. Not you. 

 Otherwise, I'm just greasing a squeaky wheel feeling sooo superior that I don't have their problems.  
No one should have to fend for themselves in a world this big. 
  Janice with her cookery ways and me with my words and you with your wholly personal gifts that only you can give. 
Now that's gravy. 

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Mimi In A Minute #32 ~ I Blame It On The Polar Vortex

These things keep me up at night. They give me a headache.

I just need sixty seconds of your time to unclog my pencil brain so that I can get some sleep. 
Do you mind?

I have a few things to say. This is Mimi unplugged.

Hide your children.

The cost of propane is rising, the temperature is dropping, California is scorching and no one on the face of the earth can stop the Arctic from Arctic-ing or that mysterious ghost ship of cannibal rats from drifting across the sea. I'm sick of the cold!!! And I'm scared of rodents. It's the end of the world. I want to hibernate.

We should simply switch coastlines and north and south poles for awhile.  Have you ever wondered what would happen if the world tipped over on its axis and we got the reverse effect of the Arctic blast? That's not a stretch for some people in the news this week. They're in so much hot water even the Arctic air can't fix it. Let's catch up on the news, shall we?

To Justin Bieber:

Stop! 

You have the right to remain sober.  I don't agree that you should be deported back to Canada. I think you should be escorted to Rehab. Yesterday.

Chris Christie: Here's your problem...
If your people had called Justin's people you could have coordinated a lane shutdown on the George Washington Bridge. Instead we have to watch both races come to a screeching halt on opposite sides of the country. The toll fee for his fancy car alone would have paid for the rest of your campaign. Think next time!

Dear Polar Vortex: I cannot afford toe socks right now, much less another tank of propane gas. Please go back wherever you came from. 

Mike Huckabee: who unbelievably said this week and I quote,"
(women) ..."they are helpless without Uncle Sugar coming in and providing for them a prescription each month for birth control because they cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of government."

As I recall and if you wanna get Blechnical (that's blog + technical for all you non-blog readers)... God banished naked Adam from Paradise first for disobedience.  Eve and her naked self stood alongside Adam's naked self by the Tree of Good and Evil. He blamed the woman (she did it!) as soon as he got in trouble with God in the first place.
That yin yang still does not fall far from the tree.

Is there an app for that?

And please, Adam and Eve, for the love of all that is Republican and Holy,

put some clothes on

It's cold.

Whew! I feel better. Thanks for listening.
Sixty seconds flew by. I think my blogsomnia is cured.
Lights out.  

Brrrrrrrrr!!!


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Mimi In A Minute # 31 ~ Nuclear Rutabagas

These things keep me up at night. They give me a headache.
I just need sixty seconds of your time to unclog my pencil brain so that I can get some sleep.
Do you mind? I have a few things to say.
This is Mimi unplugged.
Hide your children.

The Iranians have a new president, the National Security people are apparently reading my grocery list and everywhere I turn people are talking about Kim K's cute baby Kimye. Congrats to her! The Midwest and Alberta, Canada are about to get more rain than the Great Flood and nobody thought to build an Ark. It is not a good day to be from the South either. Chef Paula Deen used the N word sometime in the 60s, George Zimmerman lands an all-female jury, and even with the new security secrets unearthed by what's-his-name who skipped out to China, we still can't find Jimmy Hoffa's body. And if it rains, that could be a big ole' mess. I'd say things are about normal around here. What a crazy news week.

To the new Iranian President: I do not know you personally. I am only an American pretend Queen. We have a lot of those here...but I digress. I would only ask that you make peace with the world and keep your nuclear weapons to yourself. Good luck.

To Vladimir Putin, former President of Russia: I do not know you personally. I am only an American pretend Queen. Maybe you accidentally forgot you put the ring in your pocket when you started to shake hands with someone. It happens to me all the time! And please make peace with the world and keep your nuclear weapons to yourself.

To state lawmakers who want more of my paycheck: Keep your hands to yourself

 To the United States of America: Please give Robert Kraft another present to replace the ring he lost to the Russians. I just want him to stop causing an international incident.  Is it his birthday soon or something? I am worried that the show-and-tell that went awry will be the undoing of us all. And could we please make peace with the world and keep our nuclear weapons to ourselves?

 Dear Congress.... If you have a violent criminal history or documented mental instability ( I don't mean you personally, really I don't...let me start again). If a person has a violent criminal history or documented mental instability, they should not be able to legally buy a gun. Wait. That didn't sound right. If mental criminals with violent historical instabilities (I don't mean you personally, really I don't) apply to legally purchase a gun, they should not be allowed to do so.  It's still a spit-in-the-wind attempt, but it's something. 
Why is that so difficult?

To The Supreme Court: "Human genes cannot be patented." You got that one right. Applause. Applause.


To NASA: Thank you for discovering a new series of black holes in the relatively close Galaxy of Andromeda.  What if we propelled all the nuclear weapons, assault rifles, demon people, Super Bowl bling, flu viruses, rutabagas (I hate rutabagas) and whoever patented pantyhose into the center never to be seen or heard from again?
  Wait. Let me ask Congress.

Dear Congress:  I've found a new loophole.  FYI: A black hole is a dense region of space that has collapsed in on itself in such a way that nothing can escape it, not even light.
It's perfect for holding things we no longer need (I don't mean you personally, really I don't). It's so secure you won't even have to allocate for Secret Service.  Think of it as the Universal Time Out Chair. Nuclear war heads! Troublesome viruses! #Annoyinghashtags! Think of the possibilities. NASA told me it would be fine with them. They're not using it.
What is so difficult about that?

Oh. I will personally pay the rent on the rutabagas.

Whew! I feel better. Thanks for listening.
Sixty seconds flew by. I think my blogsomnia is cured.
Lights out.

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Monday Mimisms ~ How To Avoid The Fiscal Cliff

I am tired of hearing about the Fiscal Cliff. 
 I've decided to jump. 


Before Congress has the dubious pleasure of pushing me off and watching me tumble into financial oblivion, I've decided to save them the trouble and hurl myself over the edge. If there's going to be another Recession I'd like to get a jump start if you don't mind.  If we all did the same before they were required to come up with more plans to save us and newer agendas to ignore us, it might save enough money to balance the checks and balances with enough left over to see the next generation through retirement and then some. Think about it. Then they could all stand on the imaginary edge and push each other off the imaginary cliff and be done with it. 
We won't mind.



The "Fiscal Cliff" is now more popular than Madonna and not exposing half as much. It probably has its own Wikipedia page by now. Mothers-to-be everywhere are scrambling to change the names of their baby boys previously named Cliff in utero as not to jinx their prosperity. 

And what about all those holiday vacation plans and Walmart layaway accounts already activated? Santa made a deal with scores of middle-class customers whose kids want an iPhone under the tree and a pair of Uggs. This is how it works: When you live paycheck to paycheck, you pay paycheck to paycheck. The North Pole understands that, why can't Congress? People don't have the time or energy anymore to worry about how much of their hard-earned Washington-bundled money is going to be left for some faraway retirement. They're just worried about how to get that toy out of layaway. It would help if there's enough left over to light the Christmas tree and buy Santa some cookies. 'Cause that's what they promised their kids. And they'll do a darn better job keeping that promise than you ever did managing their well-earned futures.  That's what they trusted you to do. 

 I am weary of listening to people predict how we're all going to fall down and get majorly scuffed up at the stroke of midnight December 31st. Please. Do you think I'm scared of a little fall? I am not returning anything I bought for Christmas after Christmas. I am not eating beanie-weanies and I am not taking this hat back either!

Time has a price tag.  And I am watching the clock.

So just in case...Come January 1, 2013 if you do not have this problemo solved-o, you'll find me staring up from the abyss in my not-paid-for Toyota with my resume in hand and my hair flopping out the window as usual. First stop, Washington D.C.  I am bringing large glass empty 5-gallon pickle jars to the Federal Reserve Building. I want all the money I've paid into Social Security for the past thirty years funneled into the containers in loose change. I don't trust you with it anymore. After I have properly pickled and preserved my money as any southern girl worth her cucumber rinds can do, I will then drive it back to Bloggingham in my not-paid-for Toyota and bury it in the ground where it won't have to worry about the price of a dollar in China. And since a paper dollar is now worth 4 cents in America, I only want metal coins. At least I can make earrings.

 

 While the rest of the world is panicking at the bottom of the black hole of doom, I will be accumulating lots of interest and a bunch of attention from nutty people who want to know my secret for success. I will be debt free and my money will be dirty -  but who cares? 

At least I'll know which way the currency flows.

And where the pickle jars are buried. 

Sticks and Stones and The Story of Karen Klein

This is the story of Karen Klein - a woman made sadly famous because she was bullied and harassed on her job. Due to the advantages (and I use that term loosely) of convenient technology, we have this incident on video. That in itself a violation of her dignity. Karen Klein, the school bus monitor from Greece, New York, who was verbally bullied and physically threatened by the same middle school students she was charged to monitor and protect. This account is one of the most disturbing things I've ever witnessed.

But not for the reasons you might think. Take a moment to watch.

Then I'll tell you why.

Shocked? I wasn't. And that is what bothers me most.

While Karen Klein may seem like a defenseless woman who can't speak for herself, and who has every right to strike back in anger, we see none of the usual coping mechanisms we teach children who are bullied to use in play from Karen's seat on the bus.  She told no one. As we find ourselves gasping at representations of twisted adolescence bouncing around on that bus, we watch a resigned adult, one seemingly coping with her everyday existence as if it's normal. Her quiet command and self-control is amazing. And heartbreaking. This is an anomaly, we say, an uncommon event like the one that took Matthew Shepard's life in the nineties or the cruelty that pushed an emotionally tortured New Jersey Rutgers student off the George Washington Bridge.

That couldn't be further from the truth.

Karen Klein is far from weak.

And this is far from a rare occurrence..

Why did she sit there and endure this torment? She had no choice. Stuck on a bus. She's the adult. And although the perpetrators received a year's suspension from school, those are consequences I personally believe were doled out due to the public nature of this event and are far from how these situations are normally handled.  Most of the time there is little or no consequence. Because adults are much less apt to report bullying than kids - unless the child is the victim - and then they are legally required to do so. But when it happens to them? No.  It's embarrassing. They're adults. They're supposed to handle it quietly or ignore it. The sadder truth is that they are expected to endure it. "They're just kids," after all. And within the always-do-what's-best-for-children internal mantra ingrained into public school teachers heads from day one - no one wants to say it.

Apparently, what's best for children is bad for everyone else. 

Only when it came to the attention of a nation did we sit up and take notice of what it's doing to the culture of our schools.

But what is it doing to the souls of our teachers?

I sometimes wonder when I'm going to turn on the news and hear of a suicide note left by an educator, who chose to end the shame instead of quietly resign. How many times in the course of a school year do you think this happened to Ms. Klein? How many times in the course of a school year do you think this happens to other adults in a school building? How many times in the course of a school year do you think this happens to teachers?

Everyday.

I am here to tell you it is everyday. Not once a day. Not even twice a day. Many times a day. Every single day. Somewhere from the back of a classroom, on an activity bus, in the hallway, at the football game, on a Facebook page - it's happening.
Do you think it is a lesser hurt because it falls from the mouths of children?

How many times in the course of a lifetime and a career do you think Karen Klein and every other adult in charge of adolescents who freely insult, disrespect and bully them will think about the abuse they received at the hands of children?

Everyday.

How long will it affect them?

Every day of their lives. On an unconscious level, they will pay for it somehow. 

We know from research that verbal wounds from childhood shape the psychological and physical destinies of people for most of their lives. We know that words are powerful. Somehow we stopped counting the stones when we became adults.

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Monday Mimisms ~ Social Band-Aids

 It seems to me that even in this new world of technological learning and advanced pedagogy, a few things remain true to the old. Students are not students first; they are sons and daughters in a single family structure. At the age of five they are merged by force into a new family, of sorts, with several hundred siblings crammed into the same building, eating from the same kitchen, learning from the same books - and all must instantly get along. Does this make good sense to you? 

Who walks through the doors and what values and personal angst they bring with them creates an instant microcosm of society with one world under one roof for 180 days a year. Educators must juggle psychology with mind reading and DNA with duty, hoping that the social band-aids applied en masse will buy enough time for some knowledge to seep in. No matter how much progress we make in researching the way kids learn, nothing prepares us for the way some of them live.

On any given day, in any given town, in any given schoolyard, these are the thoughts on the minds of many kids before the first bell even rings. How is anyone supposed to get an education?

I want the kids in my class to like me. I just want them to like me.

I wonder if anyone will notice that I wore the same clothes twice this week.

I hope I make it to breakfast on time in the cafeteria this morning. I haven't eaten since I left school yesterday afternoon.

My parents told me not to tell the truth about where I live and where they work.

If I can avoid that mean guy in the corner hallway today, it might be a good day.

I'm so angry....and I don't know why.

I'm a liar. I had to fake my absence note because my mom was too drunk to write an excuse last night.

I told everyone that I don't want to go on the field trip. I told my parents the same thing. I know they can't afford it.

We had to move out of our house yesterday because the rent was due.

I hate Parent Night at school. My mom is in jail and it's hard to explain.

I wish I could go to the baseball game this afternoon instead of babysitting my little brother and cooking his dinner.

There's a hole in my shirt.

I don't care how I behave in school. My parents told me it's OK to say whatever I want to the teacher.

If I'm very very quiet and don't make a fuss, no one will ask me what's wrong. 

I am afraid the teacher will ask me to read aloud.

The guy next to me keeps drugs in his locker. But I am not a snitch. I will never be a snitch.

I'm glad I wore a long-sleeved shirt. I hope no one notices when I have to change for gym class. My dad lost his temper last night.

My parents are getting a divorce. I heard my mom cry herself to sleep.

I am not going to bother making friends.

We are moving again next week.

I hate myself. I hate my life.

I hope nobody sees me.

Until we accept that children not only learn differently they also live differently, there's no hope for reading, writing and arithmetic on a grand scale. Schools are failing because society is failing. Society is failing because families are failing.

I don't think our buildings are large enough to house all those problems. 

Perhaps they never were.

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