Sandy Hook

I'm not a very good writer but I want to not make this about me at all, and yet, I'm sure it won't come across that way. In the middle of teaching class today, I got a schoolwide email from our principal about the "incident" in Connecticut that she was sure we all knew about. 20 children killed. 6 adults killed. One mother killed. And one killer killed. I don't know if I've ever been so instantly shocked by news. I still can't believe it. I'm having real trouble dealing with this. Why? I just spoke a couple of days ago about how it only takes one person to ruin things so much for so many. I wish I hadn't. I wish there wasn't an even better example of what I was trying to say before. So many beautiful lives. Not just the 27 dead. But the hundreds and thousands of lives that are directly and indirectly connected to those lives lost. They are forever changed. And it just took one person on one day with one act. We have to do better. Maybe it's politics and gun policy, though we know that's not the only answer (although I will always believe it's a big piece), I mean look at Norway. Maybe it's talk about mental health issues and the lack of intervention and support in that area. Maybe it's talk about a million other topics. But whatever it is, we can't keep doing this to ourselves. Or maybe we will and we can. Maybe it's the human condition and it's a horrible matter of luck as to whether or not one of us is in the reach of someone who snaps. My heart is broken. I broke down in front of my students today. They comforted me when it should have been me that was strong for them. I came home and held my children way too long. I can not imagine what these families are going through tonight. There can be nothing worse. I want to believe that everyone in this country and maybe around the world are thinking about the students and staff at Sandy Hook. There's a natural push to try to think about something else. Distract yourself. Don't focus on something that is so upsetting and that hurts so much. But what's the alternative? Not think about them? No. What happened today should be what everyone is thinking about. And how can we prevent things like this from happening again, ever, in the way we love each other and take care of each other and look out for one another forever? There is nothing worse than what happened today.

12/12/12

It's 12/12/12. It just seems like I should say something about that. I can't remember. I haven't seen the movie. Is the world suppose to end today or on 12-21-12? If it's suppose to end today, we seem to be in the clear. If it's suppose to end in... 9 days, I'm clearly not prepared. It's kind of like the whole New Year's Eve 1999-2000 thing, but with much less attention. Maybe Prince could, or a lesser known artist, could make a song about this, too. What do ya think? Too bad I don't buy into it a little. Would be kind of cool to be one of those crazy survivalist people. I kind of want a bunker and some survival gear and some dried food. Ooh, and flashlights and water and first aid gear. I would probably make it about a week. I can see that now.

Click on My Ads

Sounds almost sexy, doesn't it? Click on my ads. That's right. Go ahead. Do it. You know you want to. Ok. So I'm not a real blogger. It's not like a profession. And since I can hardly manage to do it more than 4 times a month, I'd starve if I depended on it. But apparently, Google will pay me for every time you click on my ads. Now, I wouldn't want to jack up your computer or flood you with spam or something. So don't hurt yourself. But if you feel so moved, give it a shot. I'll share my $11 a month with you and throw a party. You'll probably have to bring your own booze... and food... and entertainment. But we'll have a good time!

It Just Takes One

Seeing the movie Lincoln got me thinking about how one person can really mess things up. I don't think I need to say "spoiler alert" here or anything, I mean, we all know how things end for Abraham Lincoln. So, he gets the 13th amendment passed, the end of the Civil War is in sight, things are looking up, he can maybe relax a little, start to be happy, the country can start to heal, and then someone goes and shoots him. One person. That's it. All that work, all the fighting, all the time, all the toil, to start to finally have some light and then one person doesn't ruin it all but sure hurts a lot of people and gives a major setback.

Or take September 11th. So it wasn't one person, but it was a small group of people, in effect, almost one person if we're comparing the terrorist group to the whole number of people on Earth. Things are going ok, they are what they are, and then the attacks. It changes everything. It doesn't destroy us or ruin our lives (at least not for those of us that weren't immediately involved), but it still changes everything. We don't feel as safe and probably never will. We can't travel with near as much freedom. We changed policies that limit our freedom now in all aspects of life: workplaces, airports, schools, post offices, etc.

Think about a marriage. Isn't there a saying about how it takes two to make it work but only one to break it? It's true. It takes both people doing everything they can to keep a marriage strong. But if only one of the two decides not to, it will never matter how hard the other works or how much they want it.

I also think about it in my classroom. So often I hear other teachers talking about the difficult students: the students that take all their time, the ones that won't listen, the ones that won't seem to try or don't care and so on. And I can't help it myself. I have between 38-43 students in each of my 6 classes. And 90% of them really seem to care, really want to work hard, really are motivated to improve and do their best, etc. And I know there's a whole discussion to be had about why the kids are showing the effort that they are, good or bad, and a discussion about their backgrounds and level of support at home, etc. But that's not what I'm talking about here.

I'm just talking about how easy it is for one individual or just a few to steal all of our attention and entirely change the path we take. Even when so many are doing so much right and working so hard, we can't look away from or sometimes recover from one or a few that are doing things so wrong. Life would be so much easier if negative actions had the same impact that positive actions did. Does that make sense? No matter what, we have to remember to try not to focus on the negative and those that seem to ruin things. We have to remember how many people really are doing their very best to make the world around them a better place. And we have to remember that we need 100 times more positive than we do negative. It seems like a lot, but I think it's one of the things that make life worth it.

Oscar Watch #3: Lincoln

Ok, it's been about a week since I saw Lincoln. So the feelings are not quite as potent as they were when I first came home, but I still know this movie is an Oscar contender. If Daniel Day-Lewis and Tommy Lee Jones are not nominated for Oscars, something is seriously wrong. It's a fantastic movie. It didn't feel like it was trying to impress you by shocking you with graphic civil war battle scenes, though I think that made them feel even more real. They were raw and ugly and primitive and intimate. But they weren't even the focus, in any way, other than to show you how horrible the Civil War was and how much hung on the decisions to end it.

I'm not an historian by any means, so my feelings are all just based on my own opinions, and well, feelings. But I was able to get into the movie so much, and Daniel Day-Lewis' performance, that I believed I was really seeing Abraham Lincoln. He was phenomenal. It made me wish I was more of an historian and made me want to run out and find the best books I can about him. He seemed like the best example of what a leader is in truly awful times having to make impossible decisions knowing any decision would be far from perfect. Go see it.

Ornament Hooks

The holidays are here and we just got our Christmas tree up. It actually went really well. We went to pick it out and it had just rained so the tree farm was literally underwater. The type of trees I like best were impossible to get near, so we had to look at different types of trees. I'm fairly OCD about the Christmas tree, but was so proud of myself for letting it all go this year. My daughter picked the tree, not my favorite, but who cares. She was thrilled. We got home and after getting it in the stand, it was time for lights. Again, I'm weird about the lights. It takes me like 4 hours and 50 strands and I wrap every single branch from the tip all the way in to the trunk. But my daughter decided to do the lights! I had a momentary internal stab of fear and a strange flash of stress about the potential outcome, then realized I'm insane, and told her to go for it. And she did an amazing job! She only needed a little help at the top. It was a very good lesson in not sweating the small stuff, focusing on what's really important, letting it go, blah, blah, blah.

SO, it comes time to put the ornaments on. We unpacked the boxes of ornaments and started putting them on the tree. But we were delayed because we couldn't find the ornament hooks. Eventually we found them and pulled them out and they were the way they are every year, a giant tangled ball. So I stood there untangling them, dropping the occasional ornament into the carpet where it instantly becomes invisible only to be chewed up by the vacuum eventually or stepped on painfully. And I began to wonder, does everyone do this every year with the ornament hooks? Am I doing something wrong? Is there another magic trick to putting the ornament hooks away that stops them from getting tangled? Or, and I never considered this before now, do people throw them away and buy new ones every year? Seems like a waste. So, if there is something I'm missing, please tell me. Who knows, I may just come up with the first tangle free ornament hanging device! Or not. I think I kind of actually like standing there and untangling them each year. I'm weird like that.

Oscar Watch #2: Silver Linings

Go see it. Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper were sensational. It feels so nice to watch a movie that doesn't feel like watching a movie. I mean you want to be taken away and entertained but also be able to suspend disbelief long enough to forget it's a movie. It was really good. I think it's the best role I've seen him in. And she's just good. She hasn't not been good ever. They're just crazy enough to remember they need help, but sane enough to not scare you. It's funny. It's heartbreaking. But ultimately, it's happy and feels good. And I'm the kind of person that needs to ultimately feel good. If there's pain in the middle, there has to be happy at the end. And there was. Go see it.