I have recovered from a disastrous end of the school day on Friday.  I enjoyed my night out last night.  I get such trepidation about heading out, but when I get there, people are nice, happy to see me, and sometimes I see a face from many years ago.  I didn't dance as much as I had hoped, but that was only due to socializing.  I did sweat a little, but my bones don't ache.  A good night.

Then today was Brooklyn with the parents.  I wimped out and let hubby drive us.  Sometimes I get a feeling in my gut that luck is not going to be with me (as if it ever really is).  The drive to Brooklyn was one of those times.  However, we had a fabulous time.  We had brunch a couple of blocks from the gallery.  Mom and dad loved the food and the restaurant is not chi-chi and expensive at all.  Then, a short walk to the gallery to see my photo.  Amazingly, my mother loved the image.  I was stunned.  It is from my summer project with the dead bird and string.  I cannot get over how positively she responded to it.  I was floored.

Now on to thoughts for tomorrow.  And period 5.  Another thing the students are irked about is the fact that I set the groups up.  They want to pick their own.  I tried to explain the pedagogical reasons (in laymen's terms, of course) but no one wants to hear it.  I considered the groupings very closely when putting them together.  Last year, in my evaluation, how I group students was discussed.  I took that into account when doing the zine assignment this year.  But the students do not get it.  All they know is that they want to be with their friends.  And if they aren't with their friends, well, they aren't working.  But I know the kind of job that would get done if they were with their friends.  I would not be happy with it, and I doubt they would be proud of it in the end.  I put kids together based on personalities and strengths.  Who would respond well to being nudged on by this person or that person?  But how can a teenager get that?  They don't.  And they rebel against my cruelty.

They are probably also bugged that they cannot pick any random topic.  I make this assignment deal with contemporary societal issues that affect them and their peers for specific reasons.  I believe the coddled kids I have are too apathetic.  They have no idea what goes on outside their safety bubble.  Those who have a harder life, do not speak of it.  This can jump start some awareness of issues that exist right in their neighbourhoods but they are too ignorant to see.  I also want them to understand how they can impart change in society.  They have to come up with a way to solve the problems they are addressing in the zine.  It is about awareness, research, reflection, and action.  I do not want to have my kids graduate to be complacent and ignorant.  I don't look for them to have the same political ideals as me, but at least have some ideals.  And so the fight will continue tomorrow.

At least I will end the weekend on a high note.  I plugged the bass into the practice amp and did a full practice session plugged in, not acoustic.  For only playing for a month, I was proud of myself.  I sound better plugged in.  Fingering the frets is really helping the arthritis in my right fingers.  They are still swollen and stiff, but it is improved.  I like how some of the techniques I was practicing sounded.  I am still struggling with some faster songs (Don't let anyone delude you into thinking that you can be a bad musician and play punk music.  Some of my favourite bands are so challenging) but I am ok with mid-tempo stuff.  Now, off to brew up some coffee and settle in with my new mug and some British television.

Something really big happened Thursday:  I paid off our house.  It took us twelve years to do it.  I was so nervous after school.  I went to my bank, got a check made, went to the mortgage bank....  And shook and twitched.  I was as nervous and excited as I was the first time I met Duran Duran.  The ladies in both banks were so happy for me.  I do not normally let super personal information like this out, but I want to show that it can be done.  And yes, I do want to shove it in the faces of those relatives who made my sister and I feel like crap growing up because we didn't have enough money for a huge house and all the cool clothes.  Well, I am the only one who had a fully paid off house.  And it feels damn good.  We worked our asses off and live without many things most people see as necessities.  So many people are so happy for us.  It's kind of nice.

So even though it was spirit day at work, I dressed up a little extra spiffy.  I was feeling pretty happy (not a common thing for me) and celebratory.  My euphoria lasted until fifth period.  I moved the zine project up a bit because a couple students who have been struggling with inspiration were interested in this assignment and I wanted to jump start their inspiration.  They were ecstatic when I introduced the assignment.  They are not in period five.  Period five is revolting.  There are a couple of people who are being so cruel their behaviour stopped my co-worker in her tracks this week.  It's a classic case of mean enough to be a distraction, but not mean enough to warrant a misconduct.  And they know it.  And so my happy scale rating went from 10 to 0 in ten minutes.  And the rebellion spread like a virus.  But I am working on switching gears for Monday.

So after a celebratory dinner at Thai Ping with hubby, I hibernated Friday night.  Then I went to Dover this morning to pick up three photographs I had in a show.  The woman who runs the exhibits is so nice and warm and kind.  And she remembers my name.  I feel like I matter and my art matters when I see her.  The spring was back in my step.  Tonight I am going out.  I will dance off all the anger and frustration from the week at work and dance to celebrate being 100% debt free.

Tomorrow might be another story.  My parents want to see the photo I have in a show in Brooklyn.  But my mother is having knee problems and cannot handle the walking that taking the subway entails.  And she does not want my father to drive.  And hubby doesn't feel like going.  So who does that leave behind the wheel?  Me.  I am taking Sparky into New York City.  More to the point, I am driving in New York City for the first time.  Ever.  Through the Holland Tunnel. across south Manhattan, and across the Brooklyn Bridge.  Now, I hate driving.  But I can handle driving and even enjoy it in some cities or towns.  I love driving in DC.  I drive in Jersey City and Newark on a regular basis.  NYC has always been a no-go for me.  It's the cabs.  Well, tomorrow, I break that.  Hopefully that will be the only thing that will break.  Ugh.

On my way to work I drove through a horrible accident scene.  It had just happened.  On Route 80 right by the Sheraton Tara in Parsippany.  A Pathfinder or 4-Runner on its roof, smashed in.  It was so horrible.   Car parts everywhere.  It must have just happened.  People were pulling over.  Snow everywhere.  The vehicle seems to have hit the snow bank on the side of the road and flipped.  Skid marks everywhere.  I knew that by the time I pulled over and turned on the cell phone to call the emergency people, those already pulled over would have already made contact.  The cops were on their way from Totowa by the time I got to Fairfield.

It was so horrible.  But here's the thing, there were still people driving erratically and aggressively after having passed that.  Besides that acquaintance losing family to a drunk driver, two friends were in a bad accident that same day, Friday.  A woman blew through a stop sign.  I have a hunch based on things said that she might have been on her cell phone.  At what point are people going to stop?  When are they going to stop being so self absorbed that they neglect the safety of others?  When I would be the passenger in the car with a former friend who was always fiddling with her cell phone, I would say I would handle it.  The response?  "No, I got it."  Really?  That "friend" nearly ran over an older woman in a crosswalk one day.  I asked if she would be more careful and attentive.  The answer?  "Yes, of course."  The reality?  She was not.  We can refuse to ride as passengers with people who drive like that, but that does not stop their reckless driving.  They just have one less passenger.  When we express our concern, we are treated the same way as those of us who do not drink (I know, so elitist of me).

They are untouchable.  They never get hurt.  They only hurt others.  I remember waiting to hear why hubby was late and could not be reached after work one day.  A lady blew through a stop sign because she was late for her hair appointment.  I cannot fathom what it is like to drive by such a scene and see someone you love has been hurt.  It is bad enough waiting to find out why someone is late....  And those who constantly do things that put others at risk are never the ones to get hurt.

Killjoy

Someone I know received horrible news recently.  Two relatives were in a car accident.  One died, the other is in ICU.  The driver who hit them was drunk.

Now, I know far too many people who drive drunk.  They might be students, colleagues, acquaintances, cops, or relatives.  I will not specify so that if someone happens to read this, they cannot know I am talking about them and squeal on me.  Suffice to say, I know a lot of people who do it.  That number grows as I meet more people and grow older.  And it makes me sick.

I try to socialize with a variety of people.  I give up most of the time.  Going to Happy Hour only to know that while I try to leave first, someone is certainly going home drunk, does not make me "happy".  I try to be friends with different people.  But when someone thinks it is funny to say "We'll have to get you drunk sometime", I am not laughing.  I get bored sitting around listening to people's stories of drunken escapades - recent or in the far past - when they come from people who cannot respect my sobriety.  I have been left out and dropped by people for my refusal to partake in this.  They claim I am closed-minded, unaware of the hypocrisy.  And that is fine.  I do not want to ever have to worry about whether someone I was hanging out with could later kill someone.  In addition to the fact that so many people drive drunk, I know far too many have had encounters with police who were too stupid to notice the drunken status of the individual or chose to let them go due to some privilege.

I do have a drink.  I limit it to one in one day, and rarely multiple days in a row.  It's funny.... The reactions I get and the difference between respect for my decision or disrespect depend on the reason I give.  When I tell people I take medication that limits my alcohol intake, I get nods of approval.  When I tell people I just don't want to be drunk, I get arguments and derisive comments.  I have many reasons for never having been drunk or having done drugs.  Some are things I will say, some are private.  I recently met a person who receives a huge gold star from me.  When he asked if the reasons I don't drink heavily are private or not, I replied "mostly private" and he let it go.  No condescending comments.  That was truly a rarity.

I have found that I have to play along with the whole drinking culture thing to not be called a killjoy.  I spent my eighth grade alone without a single friend.  I do not look to repeat that.  I nod and smile at people's drinking references and jokes.  But it gets on my nerves.  I would like people to just accept the fact that I will only have one drink, if at all.  I would like to know that I will not be made fun of for my choices.  I do not preach to anyone.  I have never implied that my choices should be adopted by anyone else.  They are my choices.  However, when I express dissatisfaction with letting people drive drunk I have been told "Well, that's his/her choice" and that is where I wish I could speak up.  Instead, tired of fighting and arguing, I clam up.  I have heard all kinds of excuses for driving drunk:  It's not that far; I won't get pulled over; My boyfriend/husband made me (yeah, that one is a pisser); I focus better.  None of it works with me.

I ache knowing about this person's loss last week.  Many drunk driving acquaintances will nod sadly at the news, wish his/her family well, keep them in their thoughts.  That's nice.  But how about this:  Do not drive drunk.  Ever.  And while we are at it, here is a simple request:  respect someone's choice to not drink.

2 Reasons

I have a few things that drive me to rush the hell home after work.  I recently had two more reasons:  hubby gave me a bass guitar for Christmas and I was reading a book I had trouble putting down.

When I go see bands, I tend to stand right in front of the bass player, watching his/her hands equally with watching the singer.  I watch the hands and follow the rhythm.  The bass line is what hooks me to my favourite songs.  My favourite musician is probably John Taylor.  I had an organ for decades but it was in disrepair and took up an awful lot of room in the house.  Millie kept hiding inside it.  We had to get rid of it.  I missed playing an instrument.  Hubby knew I missed it.  He found a lefty bass, black, small enough for this short gal.  He also got me a small practice amp - with Mike Watt on the box!!!! - so I don't have to play acoustic all the time.

I started to teach myself over the break.  I found a video online with a darling British boy showing the bare bones basics.  And so it began.  I found a couple of sites with bass tablatures for lots of songs I like.  I also found a site with lessons on stuff like fingering the frets, playing with a pick, plucking, etc.  It's all so new to me because I never played a string instrument in all my life.  And I am hopelessly hooked.  I practice every single night starting right after dinner.  I practice for 45-60 minutes.  I practice so much that the first two fingers on my right hand are callousing and numb.  Fabulous!  What is even better is that there a points when I am playing that hubby recognizes the song.  Pretty cool.

So if I am in a meeting and it is cutting into my practice time, I get antsy.  My local Main Street Design Team meeting has a blowhard on the team.  During our last meeting, it was dragging on and on.  I believe she just likes to hear herself talk.  She's yammering on and on about things we have no time or manpower to do, I am watching the clock tick-tick-tick, and I know that a couple of us wanted her to just shut the hell up....  But she is a church chum of the team leader.  So I sat, glancing desperately at the clock, squirming.  Once freedom came, I raced home, got in the pj's, and practiced.  It felt so good.

And once practice was done, I settled in with a book I bought on the field trip to the Eastern State Penitentiary.  I happen to be interested in the school-to-prison pipeline and all the other racist issues going n in this country.  I was appalled by the racist environment here at my school when I started working here.  The book was "On the Run" by Alice Goffman.  I could not put it down.  I have read a bit of the "controversy" about the book and I don't buy any of it.  In order to completely obscure the identities of those in the book, things have to be scrambled in such a way as to not put any of them at risk.  I viewed the book not as fact, but as a story of the general atmosphere and threats faced by those in situations such as those the authour lived with for six years.  And while some people quibbled about facts and chronology, here's the thing: it was all familiar.  I knew all of the situations based on what I have read from people who work in and with those communities and neighbourhoods.

The book was so upsetting, distressing, infuriating.  The kids I teach seem to have no idea what it is like to be born in an area like that.  When our kids here get pulled  over for drunk driving or get caught with drugs on them at a party, mommy or daddy has a connection to get them off with a slap on the wrist.  That privilege keeps them so isolated and ignorant.  They make judgments about who goes to prison and why with no clear understanding of how the system works for some and works to suppress others.

That was evident by the answers some of the students gave during our tour of ESP.   I really enjoyed the closer examination the guide and the site gives to the prison industrial complex in this country.  I was happily surprised by the educated opinions of some of my students, sadly not surprised by some of the prejudicial opinions of others.  So what am I doing to open their minds to other viewpoints?  I am using my journal entry assignment.  I am using prompts that come with a different background story that they might otherwise never be interested in reading.    Maybe it will work for the rest of the year.  But, I just know that once they get out of my room at the end of the year, they will most likely go back to the same way of thinking.  It's a futile effort, but I keep trying.

And here we are, one of two districts I know of in session today, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.  Yes, we do end out year earlier than most districts, but we also are contracted for five more days than most districts.  Five extra days of instructional time does nothing for the students whatsoever.  In fact, keeping the building open and running probably costs the towns more money than it is worth....

But oh well.  Here I am.  I cannot print the myriad of projects I need to print because we cannot connect to our Epson.  For nearly a f-ing week.  We have two art shows coming up.  I have a major assignment due from my Photo II class.  But no worries. Just a lot of stress

I must keep calm.  And I do, for the most part.  I read a classroom management blog post yesterday on gentle teaching and discipline.  It truly grates on me when kids and teachers bark "write 'em up!" for any infraction.  What has doing that proven over the long term?  How has that worked for you?  My opinion based on experience?  It only causes animosity and tension between you and the student.  Every single one of the points made in this post was a method I use in my room.  I don't scream, yell, write up the kids at the drop of a hat.  I might not even let the student know they earned a zero for the day.  Let them find that grade on the portal and reflect on why that happened.  If they ask me, I let them know calmly and firmly.  If they dispute it, I don't say that I am the teacher and that's why.  I calmly discuss my reasoning with them.  It works.  Why?  Because I am giving them the respect they deserve as people and explaining how their actions led to that consequence.  We can sit down, let the anger dissipate, and talk about how behaviours and actions affect others, not just the individual.

A colleague's comment sums up the day yesterday:  "I only had one kid fall asleep in class today."  And that is shocking.  I had one nodding off and he admitted he was exhausted.  So not bad for the first day back from vacation.

The students responded positively to my hand made thank you cards.  I was happy with that.  I have become increasingly frustrated with the quality of people I meet in my general age group.  There is a lack of maturity and respect for each other.  There is a selfishness of opinion reflected in a lack of ability to see another person't viewpoint or side of things.  People also do not realize that being self-absorbed is very close to being selfish.  People like the idea of being able to say they care about others, ask each other how they are doing, make frequent contact in an attempt at friendship.  However, when you scratch the surface, you come to realize the the intentions behind these actions are done with the hopeful end result of self congratulatory attitude.  "Haven't I done this for you?"  "Haven't I always asked about you?"  Well, the thing is that we have lost the ability to show this through real, meaningful actions.  People do not realize that subsequent, unrelated actions either support or negate those claims of caring and respect.  It is not merely what we say and how often we say it, but also how we treat the people in our lives.  How quickly does one lose patience with another?  How often do you look to put effort into seeing that person?

I think people are more focused on how their friendship performance benefits them and makes them look to others.  Resentment and impatience are abundant.  There is little real understanding of how to relate with and deal with others.  Personal connections are very surface, not deep at all.  Once a difficulty shows up, tempers flare, cruelty abounds, and there is little opportunity to give the other party any defense.  The person on the receiving end?  Most likely the one is truly the most giving, emotionally.

How does this relate to class?

All the kids care about is the end grade.  Did they get an A?  How does that end grade make them look?  Are they looking smart?  Will that get them bonus points at home or with prospective colleges?  The process, the learned lessons, all the incidentals - they mean nothing.  If there is a stumbling block in the learning, they want someone to come and fix it immediately.  They have no patience to work through that difficulty.  If they ask a question, there is no patience to hear the reasoning that accompanies the answer.  All that matters is what is on the surface.  They do not see themselves as beings that are part of a whole world with various experiences and beliefs.  They do not understand that all the incidentals in our lives matter to how we relate to each other.  There is no attempt to try any understanding.

The way we run our classrooms - how we interact with each other as teachers and students, how we present the information and processes to the students, how we want our students to go through the process of learning and connecting - all contributes to how they develop as people.  If all they care about it being able to say they got the A but there is no other experience or feeling to accompany that, will they move on to be those people who can regurgitate the correct phrases but not back it up with anything substantial?  How will anyone make any real interpersonal connections in life?

So today we begin the new calendar year.  I am excited to see the students again after a week and a half off.  I am not sure sure anyone will be in a mood to work.  No worries.  We will be discussing the new project as well as preparing for the QBAs next week.  Plenty of ways to ease them back into working?  Not exactly.  We work right up to break and get right into it upon return.

I did finally get my butt in gear and write thank you cards for the students who gave me gifts.  I always run out of time.  But this year I received stuff from nine kids!  At the high school level, that is unheard of.  I made it extra special by using blank Christmas cards I hand made many years ago.  My kids are worth it.

I would like to write something reflective and honest but I want to wait until after the first day back.  I might be in an even more reflective mood.    Plus, I think I need to mix chemistry for the darkroom.....