I don't know whether to laugh or to cry..

* Grab the nearest book.
* Open the book to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
*Post the book title, author
* Post the text of the next seven sentences in your journal along with these instructions.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST.

Straight Outta East Oakland, If you don't know, you'd better ask somebody. Harry Louis Williams II

The woman shook herself and tried to rise, but Street Life kicked her back down. he plunged the instep of his sneakers into her windpipe. She grabbed his foot with both hands, but his iron calf muscles rose to the challenge.
        Gurgling and grating sounds emanated from deep in her throat. Spittle formed at the corners of her mouth. Life continued to groupnd her windpipe with his foot. Tears streamed down the sides of her face as life ebbed away.

It is so sunny in my office, I have to wear sunglasses at my desk.. I am slightly bored and just ate lunch, so now I want a nap.
Here I am today...

( Work Safe )

I am finishing up my year at my school. It is extremely emotional for all of my students. Their final exhibitions have been incredible, moving and serious rites of passage for them all as a group and individually.

Several of my students who have gotten in to 4 year colleges dont have the money to go. All of them are the first in their families to go to college, and many the first to graduate high school. Tonight I found out that the money I had been working on getting for 5 of them in scholarships has come through. A very wealthy, amazing mentor who has worked with out kids is going to give over 60,000 dollars in scholarships to my students. This angel is helping one of them with her full tuition to UCSC and another go to UCB because they are undocumented and cant get federal aid at all. the other three need housing money and tuition for state schools and to move to the south and go to school..
I am just in awe of this community and what it can bring together.

It makes me feel so scared to leave it, the revolution is right here and I am walking away... maybe it will just be a break..Meanwhile, I am trying to take it all in.

Eshem had stomach discomfort tonight as he was falling asleep. "Ughh, my belly hurts. I want surgery on it to take out my intestines."

E-Shem was super sad tonight. He holds so much emotion in. When he is falling asleep his body tenses up and complains about being uncomfortable. Often at this time he says very profound things, existential in nature, or reflective.
Tonight it was just cute, he said, "mama, when I am old enough to live by myself I am not moving out."
I said, "Really?"
"Yeah, you know how you live on your own now, I dont want to do that."
"Well, you can always live with me, even when you are old." I chuckled and he asked why I was laughing. I said, "Well, everyone gets sick of their parents and when you get older you might change your mind."
He said, "That wont happen, I always want to live with you. And besides, its too expensive to move out."
I did my little teacher thing next, "Well, that is why you will have to stay in school and study hard so you can get a good job."
He said, "But I dont remember anything I learned yesterday, I cant even remember what I did."
I laughed, and told him not to worry, he will remember what he likes doing and that is what matters.

There has been a lot of stuffity stuff in my life this last month. Please submit a request for which of the following categories /topics you want me to write about...
1. I have been spiritually queer retreated,
2. traveled to new york for work and play
3.  and hired for a new job next year,
4.planting my spring garden,
4.struggled with my students (one dropped out, another an expectant father)
5. Swimming with elliott.. he is a fish
6. Relationship and sex woes and excitements
7. Health issues, body trauma
8. Netflix movie reviews.. TV series : Tudors, Mists of Avalon, Dexter season 2, Top Chef

That is all I should bore you about. But, I do want to request that my friends write more too. It has been hella quiet out there.

Stumble upon is my new best friend..
This is a link from SU about kitchen myths! So interesting


http://www.pgacon.com/KitchenMyths.htm

Tonight I was talking to Eshem about masculine and feminine women and I was explaining the women who looked more like men were called butch by  many.
I said,"you can say butch to describe her,"
He replied rapidly, "if you take out the u and put an i you get the baddest word ever, 'bitch'."
Then he grinned wickedly.
Then I said, "that's a really bad word. You are right."
And he added, "And 'fuck,' that is another of the baddest words, 'fuck' and 'bitch,' yeah those are bad words."
I asked, "Do you hear me saying those words?"
He answered, "Just 'fuck.'"

After further investigation I found out that his newest friend at school had schooled him on these words and they know that you can't say them at school. phew.

Wow, the misogyny starts so early, and yes we talked about how and why bitch is such a bad word. But, alas, what this makes me want is to put him in training for a spelling bee.

I met with Eshem and Rudabega's teacher today for our first conference with Felix. The teacher had "report cards" to share. It was very interesting, the kids are so different from each other. But I didnt feel the need to compare, even though I just made a comparative statement about it.  I got the feeling that she liked our kids however difficult that they can be.

Then walking into the other K/1 class I was listening to a parent talking to the other teacher and was saying, "I heard on the radio that schools are not really teaching science well, and that their needs to be more science curriculum, what are you doing about this?"
Woah! That is so not what our was like.. being a teacher I have a sense of parent teacher relationships, but elementary teachers field some crazy shit from parents. Mine are brow beating and pretty much over parenting by the time i know them. I tell ya, after tonights homework making a Kwanzaa collage, I think I will join the ranks by high school of being over / conferences!! HAHAHA.

I went there today for a follow up breast exam and to check out some blood work and I have to go back again!! including hormones and fasting blood sugar and oh yes cholesterol!

The part that was interesting was that I got on the scale... I havent paid attention to the scale since the time before the last time I was in which was 5 years ago, a year after eshem was born. Although I didnt take off my shoes, which I was tempted to do, I did take off my coat. I asked the nurse if she would tell me my weight from 5 yrs past (post birth), I am 20 pounds lighter.. dude. Dont worry fat friends out there, I still am fat, just that I never know the number and have weight dysforia(sp?) sometimes.  I only gained 35 lbs during my pregnancy (compared to 65 my skinny friends on average gained).. So, the weight I am now, is pretty relative to what I have been over the last 10 years... hmmm, interesting.

Eshem read a chapter book in about an hour this weekend. It was one of those books from the Magic Treehouse series. He read another one of them at school last week. We went to the library and he picked two chapter books. He is hesitating reading the other once because it is new and not part of a series he knows. I thought is was amazing. He reads to himself, so I am not sure about his reading comprehension. It seems that he just reads over words whether he knows what they mean or not. I tried to get him to stop and ask when he came across a word he didnt know. But he will pronounce a word wrong in his head and then assume a meaning, like "hull," for him turned into "hole," which changed the meaning of the story about a mini-sub, which he also didnt know what it meant.
Still though.. super exciting time to be his mama.

Even though I had a mild fever and a crazy cough where I gagged at every one, I had a pretty great day. After a long day of teaching the Constitution, and getting kids to revise surveys, and listening to them stress out and then leading a sex ed class, I relaxed a bit and then right back to work and hung out with my seniors and wrote college essays. Friends and other advisors came and we all read and edited and worked to get some amazing writing done. We sang, and farted and cried and wrote some more...

The process was brilliant and helpful and the personal stories were so moving and powerful. It was a moment where my kids were really there to work and i wasnt nagging and cajoling anybody, just enjoying their company and engaging in some great editing of hugely important essays. My night ended at 12:45 am when we all were crazy and laughing till we peed. Ha!!!
Today i liked my job. This made me think it would be better to teach college than 6th grade.