Where do we go?

It just cost me $52.00 to fill my truck with gasolinge. A barrell of oil topped out this AM at $102.00 - I want to be responsible and buy a hybrid - but I cannot afford to purchase one. When I was looking I wanted to buy an American made hybrid...only problem is they can't compete with the Japanese cars in quality and price. We are going into these presidential elections limping on broken promises and weak knees. Many American workers are checking their time cards for pink slips - teachers across the country are bracing for larger class sizes as education funds are cut and cut. Our healthcare system is broken but there are no doctors who can fix it. So, where do we go? Do we grab the tail of the kite of hope that Barack Obama is sailing or do we cling to an established player like Hillary Clinton - and are there really people in this USA who would vote for a man who said, "We may need to be in Iraq for 100 years."? Please tell me that is not possible. I don't know what to do. Just don't know where to turn or who to support or how to begin moving this large pile of rocks that stands in front of me. Our country, which for my whole life, was strong and independent and a leader among leaders has become a sississified, whimpering, bully. When we don't get our way we cry and then we bully. I won't travel outside the US because I don't want to be ridiculed for the sins of my family. We were attacked on September 11, we have men and women on the front lines in a war, yet as a whole we seem oblivious to these facts and we seem to have forgotten what made this country strong. Personal freedom is being snatched from us inch by inch - we give up nothing and ask for everything and as long as we make enough money who cares about the guy behind us. We criticize other countries for occupation yet we occupy, we criticize other countries for human rights violations yet we violate human rights, we criticize other countries for restricting personal freedoms, yet we viloate personal freedoms. If this is going to stop we need to get the heck out of Iraq. We need to fix our own house before we try to help others - I often refer to the instructions given to you on a airplane, you know the ones no one really pays attention to, but maybe we should...in the event of an emergency oxygen masks will automatically fall from the ceiling, please place the oxygen mask over your own nose and mouth before attempting to help others - as a country we need to adopt this plan...we need to put that oxygen mask on first, to get some oxygen to our brains - then we might make democratic decisions and then we might once again become a leader among leaders and a nation of proud, independent and self sufficient citizens.

Why the rich get richer

This weekend I had the displeasure of car shopping...I own a truck - I need to get with the times and by a hybrid. I know a Prius is the best to buy so this is my plan. But I cannot afford a Prius. As a teacher I don't make a lot of scratch and my partner is a TA so she makes even less - we have purchased a condo and that is great! However, at the end of the month there is no money left for an additional car payment. I own my truck, so there is no payment - but my point is this - the rich get richer because they can spend money to make money. In the long run I would save money with a tankless water heater and a Prius but I cannot afford to save that money because I don't have the money to begin with. I want to go back to school so I can earn more money but I cannot afford to do that either - I can't get ahead so I fall further behind. The rich they can get ahead and they can stay ahead because they can afford to. Those of us in the middle we cannot even get even because everyday we go back two steps - time is not on our side. No one is, I can't get financial aid for college because I make too much, ha, ha, ha, ha - they need to redefine too much. And in the next year the middle people will be squeezed tighter than a puritan in a chastity belt! We will keep plugging along and working as hard as we can to make it happen. We will try and try to get even so we might even get ahead and have a day or two where we can just sit on our little patio and breathe easy. Until then, I need to get back to work because we need groceries for this week.

Zero - Tolerance Policy

I am reading a report written by the 106th congress in February of 2000 regarding the adoption of zero tolerance policies in schools. The report is condemning such policies and for the most part I agree. A first grade student who stands to my knee and says; "I am going to kill you." This little one is not a threat and should not be treated the same as a 10th grade student who stands over me and utters the same words. However, if that first grade student says; "I am going to tell my brother and he is going to kill you." To this I might pay some attention. It is frightening when we have to consider threats from a third grader as serious and credible - but we do. Our children are bombarded with violence from every angle, many times they believe a simple push of the reset button and all is fixed. Our children come from homes so broken and live with aunts, uncles, grandparents, maybe a mom or a dad - Our children are exposed to sex, drugs, and violence - just by watching the 4:00 news. The world is gone mad and our children, with the innocnence long washed from their faces, grow up much too young not prepared for life in any manner. I am a teacher, and I see this everyday. I see the empty eyes and I feel their pain, and I hear their cries - and I don't want it to be true but it is; and I don't want to fear walking to my car after school! I don't want to worry about what is in their backpack, or what they passed to another student, or what happened to them last night for they can't stay awake this morning - I do not want to worry about any of this, but I do.
The 106th congress back in 2000 - is out of touch if they believe the zero tolerance policy too harsh. I wonder how much time and money they spent coming up with the report. They should have just asked any second or third grade teacher in America - they would have told you the policy is over the top and too broad and needs latitude and good judgement from teachers and administrators. Any teacher would tell you it is not applied across the board without consideration and thought - and any teacher will tell you there are times when they lie awake at night afraid for what might happen the next day or dwelling on something that happened already. They are many children's faces whom haunt my nights, children who live in foster care, or with a relative, children who know their mom lives somewhere around here or whose dad is getting released in June. These children who arrive to school at6:30 in the morning, just to wait for 7:20 and breakfast, who are dirty and tired or worn out from the night before - children who can't read or tell time or don't know how to spell their name -and their morning play involves wrestling moves, or paper-mad pretend guns with which they shoot one another - or holding a girl down because "I am you pimp and you do what I say." Right now outside my door I hear a child saying; "RAT A TAT TAT TAT, I SHOT YOU MAN YOU DEAD. FALL DOWN YOU DEAD."
No zero tolerance in schools isn't the best we can do. My question is when will congress do a similiar study on drug addicted parents, or welfare moms with eight kids, or incarcerated dads and how any of these things effect a child's development. When will they study the impact of poverty and hunger and disease of urban youth and how this effects their actions? When will congress declare that zero tolerance for hunger and homelessness is a good policy and one we should adopt and then will congress put forth the money to fix the problem - or will they spend more time and money to determine what any teacher in America knows - education can always get better, should always strive to improve, but if we don't get in the streets and fix things in our homes - it will not matter what education systme we have - there will be no children left to educate!

Hmmmm, Valentine's Day

It is not that I am opposed to celebrating Valentine's Day. For those who have a difficult time expressing emotions, or for those who need a mark on the calendar to remind them that they are in love with someone, it serves a great purpose. For me...I don't need a reminder. I am in love and the best I can, I show my love every single day. No, I am not a great romantic. Far too practical I guess for great romance, but I am a romantic darn it - just that my view of romance is more practical. When I cook supper, all your favorite things, and do the dishes, and make your coffe and prepare your lunch - this is romance. This is love, the day in and day out love that brings us to tears with laughter and to ecstacy with love. This is the bag of hot chips you buy me because I have had a bad day - or being extra quiet on Sunday so I can sleep in. This is the matinee movies, because we can afford that - and the home we have purchased and the way you look at me that makes me smile. Romance, from my pragmatic viewpoint, does not come on a single day in a grandiose gesture of monetary proportions - it is in the countertops, and the carpet, and turning the heat on so the bathroom is hot. It is making breakfast, and paying the mortage on our home, and dreaming of the day we can buy that RV and leave this all behind. It is the quiet dreams I see in you while you sleep. OK, I am not a great romantic...not in the make believe made for television Hallmark hall of fame Meg Ryan movie kind of way - Maybe more in the "Were in this together, lets have a BBQ, can we cuddle, I'll vacumn, do you need me to stop at the store, don't worry I got it...let me vent - I love you every moment of every day kind of way" - that isn't so bad is it?

Faith and Death

There is much to be said for living a life which is good and honorable. It takes a lot of work and continued effort - but in the end, if there is a heaven, it will have served you well. If faith is believing in what you can't see, then why do so many have none? Believing in what we can't see is all we do in life. We believe if we work harder we will earn a promotion. We can't see that promotion, however we believe in it. And that cruise around the Caribbean could be ours if we just have faith. When it comes to faith in a higher power we often scoff at such nonsense. I don't know if there is a heaven, and I don't know if when I die I will be carried by angels to the pearly gates - I don't know if this is true or just a story to make dying appear more pleasant - but if there is a heaven, and if there are angels to carry me away from here - If it does exist, I don't want to find out on that day when I die. I would rather believe it for all the days until then, and live my life attempting to earn a place there, so if it does exist I can go there. And if it does not exist, I have not lost anything-I will be dead. But I will have gained so much. I will have lived my life in a manner that made my parents proud. I will have lived my life so that I left things a little better for my having been there. Hopefully, I will have helped some people along the way and maybe opened some doors for others. I can "die" with that. I can rest eternally, however that is, knowing that I lived peacefully.
What is the real pain in my backside are those who claim to be living the "right way" while they judge and criticize and condemn others - If you are of deep faith and religious conviction - you don't need to shout it from the mountain tops. Live your life as such. Let your actions speak for you. Stop telling others how to live and just live your life better.
I believe there are those among us who have been called to a higher purpose, but they are not the ministers I see at 2:00 am on my television, they don't live in million dollar mansions, and they don't have private planes - Mother Theresa lived a life of such purity without a doubt she fulfilled a higher purpose, and perhaps even Princess Diana was meant for similiar greatness but circumstances were such and God took her home early just to save her the misery her life had become. It is not however only the famous, there are those who work with people dying of aids, and those who go to Africa, and those who serve our country, and those who teach our children, and those who feed our hungry, and those who cloth our homeless - Oh, yeah, I remember Jesus said something about what you do for the least of my brother - I don't recall him talking about having the biggest ministry, I think he liked to keep his down to 12 loyal people - and though he could of asked for anything he did not. He wore a simple robe and sandals and walked among the people - not surrounded by guards. Don't give me the BS about it being a different time. Yeah, it is a different time, if Jesus came back today he would be locked up in a psychiatric hospital. He might make the cover of some grocery store tabloid - but how many of you true believers could leave the comfort of your insulated ignorance long enough to walk the same streets Jesus would walk. He might be down here on Skid Row in Los Angeles, or over on Hollywood Blvd. with the runaway teens - I don't know how much time he would spend in Simi Valley but I am sure there are those there who are in need of help.
I have heard many "Christians" say what is wrong with the world will never be fixed until Jesus returns - you know what, he may already be here but you are too busy pointing out what is wrong you can't see him. Jesus may already be walking this great Earth and we don't even know it because he has already been locked up. And seriously, of all the lands why would he come to the US where we are nothing but a self-righteous, self-indulgent, pious, bighoted, capitalistic, ignorant lot of heathens if ever there were any. And that goes for all of us, Jesus would not come to the bible belt to tell ya'll to get off your self-serving behinds and start living your lives with a purpose and meaning. He already showed us how to do that - he already taught us, and we didn't learn. We couldn't possibly be like Jesus because we are just human - the truth is, it would be really a lot of work to be 1/100th of the man Jesus was - and we just don't want to do that much work when we can sit in fancy churches and give money and cry because we are weak humans. Sounds like a lot of excuses for failure instead of reasons for success. So you can hate me because I am a lesbian. (Whom God created in his image, by the so and so). And you can fault me because I don't get up every Sunday to go to church, and you can judge me for every time I fall down the road of sin - go ahead. Because in the end, when that time comes for me to go wherever it is I am going - I know, I know, I know I lived my life as close to what Jesus asked me to do. I lived my life with kindness, and forgiveness, and charity, and truth. I lived every moment of my life thankful for the moment, accepting of the challenges, and humbled by the mercy - so when it is time - I know Jesus himself might give me directions to the pearly gates. And I know this, if Jesus were to stop me and ask for a $1.00 - I would give it to him - Would you?