a drive in the sunshine on a nice day

i went to the V.S.T.E. conference in roanoke sunday, monday and tuesday and stayed with my old friends tom and cindy. the conference is rotated between roanoke and virginia beach, so i get to stay with tom and cindy every other year. this year they had added an addition on to their house, which was fabulous! we had a great time catching up, and i am always reminded that when i am with them, i am relaxed. that doesn't seem to happen everywhere unfortunately. i actually did sleep for the two nights i was there.

the conference was ok, nothing special. i gave my presentation to a grand total of 4 people, which didn't seem like it was worth it, but maybe it was. at least those 4 really must have been interested. i packed up and left around noon and decided to take the back roads home instead of the dreaded interstate.

i listened to several cd's from church on the way back, and i decided in appomattox to get off and take the 2 lanes home. it was a cool, crisp day, with a lot of wind, but things were bright and clean and i appreciated where i was and what i was doing. i was reminded how many times i took this route 30 years ago when i came home for weekends from college, and how much the road has changed. only once did i do the back route from appomattox. usually we just went to amelia and my parents came up to pam's house and picked me up. this time i was actually traversing the road and looking at things.

i went past the historical park where the civil war ended and made a mental note that it might be the place to visit with austin, maybe over spring break. i also noticed that there were still places where there is nothing but trees and fields, with few inhabitants. it is still hilly up there, and i enjoyed the sense of being "rural" and then slowly reemerging back into the hub-bub of richmond. i wasn't in a hurry, and that was the best part of it. i didn't feel like i had to be anywhere, and somehow being on the interstate subconciously i think makes you feel that you need to get home quick.

i was ready to be home when i got there, but i went outside and fed my ducks and sort of walked around with my ipod stuck in my ears listening to more of the church music. i have tried to keep this feeling going over the last couple of days, which is to say that i have continued to listen to the music and take my walks with the ducks and just sit outside when i can. i like the calm. being back in school has made me aggitated, and i don't much like that at all.

it goes to show, i guess, that you can carve out a little peace and sunshine when you think about it. everyone should try and capture those little moments when you can.

big austin...a duck, and a boy

one of the librarians at school gave me her collection of frozen bread because she knew i had ducks out on the pond. i spent an hour or so processing the bread into small enough pieces that the 3 males and one female duck could at least have a small feast on occasion. some of these pieces of bread probably were excavated from an egyptian crypt, as they were hard enough to kill someone if you threw it at them. as it was, when i tossed a couple of these grenades into the pond, they floated around for a long, long time, and 3 of the ducks wouldn't even give these bullets a try...but one did, the duck i now call "big austin."

i had a lot of things to think about as i sat there on my bench on the berm. there has been a lot of drama in this house for months, most of it centered in some way around austin. bebo has broken up with jacquie and it has been ugly. austin, unfortunately, has been affected by all of the goings on in that area, and i have had to spend time trying to make it ok for him. i fell in the street about a month ago when walking, and that has set off a flare with my fibromyalgia. that has resulted in my not sleeping for about 3 weeks now, along with the other symptoms of pain, fibro fog, and IBS. that affects austin, as i am too exhausted to be able to do all the things i want or need to do. then austin himself got into a fight at school 2 weeks ago, resulting in a suspension of 10 days from the premises.

it was the fight and the circumstances i was thinking about as i sat by the pond with my bag of duck bullets. i was noticing the way the ducks were interacting with each other and saw a parallel to my life, and most especially, to austin's.

the three mallard males are quite lovely, with their teal colored heads and beautiful feathers. two of the males stayed in a group with the lone female, but one of the males, the biggest one, was by himself, sailing on the periphery of the other three.

when i threw out the first of the duck bombs, the larger one sailed over immediately to get the bread. the others were a little slower to come and there was plenty of bread. however, one of the smaller mail ducks sailed immediately over the the big one and started pecking and chasing him. the big duck moved away. the little duck didn't immediately go for the food. in fact, he didn't seem all that interested in it. the girl duck was eating and seemed to be oblivious to it all. the big duck sailed around sort of nonchalantly and then sailed back slowly. i threw bread to him and to the others. everyone had bread. but the little duck who was attacking seemed determined to make sure that the big duck was not a part of the party. and then i laughed.

i named the big duck "big austin" because he reminds me so much of my austin. what was happening to him was the same as austin. big austin was most interested in food; in fact, he was the only one attempting to try and eat the cement like golf balls of bread that i was throwing in the pond. my austin will eat anything and mostly doesn't care if the others around him tease him over the food quantities or types of food he eats. the little, mean duck reminds me of his tormenter at school, chris, who stays in the background and then either "pecks" himself or sends another "duck" (boy duck #2) to do the pecking. the girl duck is pretty oblivious to the goings on's of the fighting dufus ducks. big austin doesn't fight with the little ducks. he just sails away for awhile and then comes back. he doesn't exactly try and join the group, but he is definitely not a part of the inner circle. he follows them, but sometimes he just ignores them and does his thing. he was the first up on the bank to get the good duck bread, and of course, the others came up and pecked him. he hung around on the fringes and i threw him stuff for him, but the other 2 brat boys wouldn't let him too close. he was tolerated, but not welcomed.

this is how my austin is with kids. it makes me a lot sad. he is bigger, and not accepted 100 percent. however, he, like big austin, seems to be able to sail away on his own and recover. he comes back, but seems to know he will be pecked if he gets too close. sometimes he does deliberately get close, full well knowing that he is being annoying and he will cause a problems. however, he knows that the pond does not belong to just these other 3 ducks. big austin swims around on his own, he climbs out and walks around, and he is the prettiest and most graceful of the 4 ducks. you get the feeling that he doesn't know this, which is part of what makes you like him best of all.

i have a lot to think and smile about when i visit big austin and the rest of the ducks with my big bag of bread.

Unitown

a couple of weeks ago i left the safe harbor of school and home and ventured to the 4H camp at jamestown, va for 4 days of what i thought would be just a little diversity training with the kids. boy, was i wrong...actually, i think i knew what was coming, and that was why i was so apprehensive about it...but nonetheless...

Unitown is a program sponsored by the national council of christians and jews and is designed to make people in all sorts of situations aware of the diversity around us in terms of race, gender, sexual orientation, body image, etc. it is a very skillfully set up program, and i would say it is akin in idea and thought to going to boot camp. basically, you are broken down and then you are brought back up. and when you are back up, you aren't the same, period.

i wasn't expecting that little change at the ripe old age of 49. i figured there wasn't much left in these areas for me to mine; my job was to facilitate that change for younger people. wrong. there were 39 students of all races, background, and abilities, all chosen for their leadership qualities, be it already displayed or potential. about a third of the students were black, and the rest were from varying religious and socio-economic backgrounds. some were discipline problems, some had learning difficulties, some were quiet, some were loud and out there. regardless, at the end of 4 days, they were all one.

there were 10 teachers, and we were the perfect mix. we, too, have bonded, and we are now trying to help these 39 kids go back into the mainstream of 1,500 students to facilitate the idea that we can all get along, and we all need to be more sensitive to the kinds of things we say and do that can be divisive and hurtful. these 39 are having a tough time. so are we teachers. not only are we helping the kids, but we are challenged with the job of also delivering this message to our colleagues. the kids' jobs are to do what we call an "ouch and educate" which means that you point out what the person has done that has hurt/bothered you, and then you "educate" them as to why and what you hope they will do in the future. the kids are doing this, but the "ouches" are mostly coming from the teachers. We had a meeting with our principal on wednesday, and he had already dealt with 3 incidents that day alone. pretty remarkable.

people came back from unitown changed. two of the boys broke up with their girlfriends. one of the teachers broke up with hers as well. we have gathered together to talk to each other about the formidable task of educating our peers. we have gathered to discuss the action plans we are implementing in our school. the rest of the kids in school are curious about what we are doing, and the 39 delegates are keeping contact with each other and with the staff faciliatators. we have become a small family in a sea of turmoil. it is disconcerting, yet gratifying. i am still processing the whole thing, and will write about it more as i think of things.

The Pennies From Heaven

being spiritual is a tough thing when you are a human with six senses all working at the same time. yes, six senses. the sixth one is the intuitive one, the one least developed and recognized by most of us. i believe we all have this sixth sense, and we have the ability to develop it. not all of the first five senses are equally developed. we rely mostly on our sense of sight and sound, which gives the other three (touch, taste and smell) a bit of a break. but when robbed of one of these major senses, our other ones over compensate to make up for the difference. and so the blind man can hear a pin drop in another room and the deaf person can feel sound through the floor.

developing faith in a world where things are tangible and immediate is difficult. the very factor of our bodies is a huge roadblock to believing in things that cannot be proved, touched or verified. and this is where my penny stories come in.

there have been many dear abby columns devoted over the years to the stories of people finding simple pennies and seeing them as signs from those passed or angels that we are being looked after and thought about. ( click here to go to the actual column of may 3, 2001 http://www.uexpress.com/dearabby/?uc_full_date=20010503). i really grasped this concept. i feel it is upbeat and a way to develop some communication with those beyond and also to develop faith that there are things out there we can't always touch and see.

my communications with these spiritual beings began years ago, but in recent months has become more frequent as i start acting upon my sixth sense. while i have always had this, i has waxed and waned in power due to my devotion or lack of it to its growth. i have worked in places where i was in the company of other "sensitives" whose presence heightened my radar so to speak. in those cases, this was not a good thing for me, and rather than embrace this ability, i tried to ignore it. however, you can't run away from what is part of you.

i have taken to talking out loud to these angels. i don't know who they are, but i have spoken and told them i want to deepen my relationship with them and to come to know they are always with me. i have landed on the penny exchange as a way of communication. when i need one, i ask out loud for it. usually this is in the morning when i anticipate a bad day, or if i have been in a troublesome spot for a number of days and need some divine light to get out from under.

the angels are not failing me. as a matter of factor, it is getting to be like penny email! i look for them everyday! this week has been fun. i went into WaWa last sunday looking for the penny. i knew it was there, but didn't see it on my way in. while i walked around picking up my stuff, i had my head down looking for it. it appeared as i was leaving, right in the doorway that i had passed through yesterday. i have found more than a few of my angel pennies at WaWa. yesterday's penny was no different. i had actually been in the store, out and back in again and was finally headed home, but decided to fill the car up with gas while i was there. i pulled the van in on the wrong side of the car. i got out to fuel it, discovered this, and then discovered the penny next to the passenger side of the car in the bay next to me! the date on it was 1974, the year i graduated from high school, which made this particular penny over 30 years old. i had a good laugh.

the day before i was shopping in Wal-Mart and was looking for the penny, although i was thinking i probably wouldn't get one that day (my grandmother had appeared to me in a dream the night before, only one of about 5 or 6 times she has done so since she died in 1997. i thought that was likely to be my sign of the day). i was putting my shopping cart up in a place that was further away than i needed to go. as i had been walking around the store and parking lot, i had been peering up and down aisles and between cars. just before i got back to my car, i noticed something that looked like a penny roll to me next to a car. i walked back after glancing at it, and then bent down to see exactly what it was. it was a half-eaten vienna sausage and immediately i said YUCK! but then noticed, right next to it...a penny. i really laughed out loud then and said "thanks guys!"!

there have been pennies next to cars and in and out of the FasMart this week when i stopped for coffee. i have found them in the cafeteria at school twice this week as i did my lunch duty. last week, after telling a staff member about my love of the pennies, i found one on the floor of the teacher bathroom. it was so coincidental that i asked her the next day if she had put it there for me to find (no). i found one in austin's room yesterday after i had broken the cat water dish in his room and was mopping up the water from the rug. it was under the edge of his dresser. that made two yesterday!

today it is snowing and pretty outside and i have been happy to watch it come down and to watch the cats viewing the birds and squirrels feasting at the feeders. i have had cups of chai tea, made a crockpot stew, and have yet to pick up my ny times and richmond sunday papers out of the driveway yet, but i will. the pennies make me happy and make me feel more connected, and in the flow. they slowly and surely have helped me start to believe in what i feel inside, and i am coming more and more attuned with relying on my inner guidance system, and not just on the touch, feel, see, hear and taste world.

the pennies i find are turned over to an old red dinosaur piggy bank that was austin's. it is my hope that eventually i will have enough to give each one of my students or people who are special (i have given two away this week to people i thought might need them). the concept is so simple...you gotta believe.

saving fish from drowning...a view on the parable

A pious man explained to his followers: "It is evil to take lives and noble to save them. Each day I pledge to save a hundred lives. I drop my net in the lake and scoop out a hundred fishes. I place the fishes on the bank, where they flop and twirl. 'Don't be scared,' I tell those fishes. 'I am saving you from drowning.' Soon enough, the fishes grow calm and lie still. Yet, sad to say, I am always too late. The fishes expire. And because it is evil to waste anything, I take those dead fishes to market and I sell them for a good price. With the money I receive, I buy more nets so I can save more fishes."

I really like the story above and it has a lot of relevance to my life. i think it means that we are all well intentioned in what we do, but we are single-minded in our enthusiasm to make things turn out the way we want them to. society is the fish market...we "make a profit" through its endorsement of our actions. we then go back out, flush with the "cash" of this endorsement, and proceed to expand what we have done before...spreading our version of the truth. we are well intentioned, but blind. we aren't concerned with the status of our "fish." we are fixated on the rightfulness of our intentions, and thus don't see the proverbial forest for the trees.

i see this happening around me with parents and their children. the pious man states that it is evil to take lives, and noble to save them. so he saves them from themselves. the parents i see, including myself sometimes, take away our children's life choices by making things "right" when there is trouble. we think by fixing it for the kid, we are being noble and doing the right thing. actually, i think we are being evil by robbing them of the opportunity to grow through dealing with adversity. the fish, of course, die out of the water and they become "calm and still." well, kids do that too. they stop fighting for themselves and become dead to the possibility of dealing with their own problems. all these dead fish go to the market, or out into the world, as examples of doing the right thing. but they have not improved the world a bit by becoming pawns. those who consider this action a success are buoyed by the others around them doing the same thing. if everyone is saving the fish kids from drowning, it must be a noble action. the fish become the vehicle by which we continue to ruin the society we live in. at some point, there will be no fish left and we will have to face the consequences of what we have done...we have killed off the independent idea gene pool, the very place that is the heart of what makes us human.

a gripping morality tale about the consequences of intentions-both good and bad-and about the shared responsibility that individuals must accept for the actions of others.

god's law vs. man's law...ANTIGONE lives on

i am currently teaching sophocles' play ANTIGONE and i have started my discussion of the play with the theme of god's law vs. man's law. the major players, creon and antigone, represent the two sides, and the end result of the play is that no one wins when you are trying to win. in this case, everyone loses. antigone kills herself to make a point. creon's son, haemon, is engaged to marry antigone, but kills himself because she has, and he does so after trying to stab his father for having driven antigone to her death. creon loses his son and his wife, who kills herself and curses him for having driven their son to his death. all of this comes as a result of pride, and our inability to admit we are wrong.

what i taught my students today was that this play is worth reading because we are living this same conflict. certainly the current crisis over the mohammed political cartoons is a point in fact. the islamic law calls for no pictures or portrayals of mohammed. man's law says we have the right to draw, publish or question anything. nothing, however, is mentioned about respect for another's opinions. man's law says we can, so we do. another issue of god's law vs. man's law is unquestionably the ongoing debate in this country over abortion. a few truly crazy christians believe it is quite ok to uphold god's law by killing off the abortion doctors. they are no better than the islamic terrorist who flies a plane into the trade centers to avenge allah. the issue of the death penalty rages on, with conflicting "god's laws" being debated. on one hand, thou shall not kill. on the other hand, and eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. then we have the even more controversial issue of gay marriage/civil unions. the religious right say that we must make man made laws prohibiting gays from marrying or having civil unions because it is against god's law. clearly, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of separation of church and state in that one. in virginia, this will be put to the vote in november. our state is likely to join the ranks of 19 other states putting the ban on the books. but is it god's law to deny a certain element of the population the ability to have what all other people have? very interesting how people's "truths" get changed and twisted to meet the needs of the day.

the u.s. government, and likely the population for the most part, seem to be culturally ignorant in our zeal to let everyone in on our great gift: democracy. however, not every culture needs or wants to be democratic. why do we need to put our belief system upon others? if the saudis suddenly bought the u.s., would we be angry at having to worship at a mosque and wear the burka? yes, i imagine we would. so why are we so suprised when other cultures rebel against our presence and our insistance that our way is the right and ONLY way? why is our truth the ONLY one?

i am predicting that within a week those political cartoons are going to find their way to the front pages of some american papers, and likely on the television because the american "need to know" is going to trump over the respect for the religion. so far, only ABC news has briefly flashed a picture of the cartoons, and that was back in september before the controversy got out of hand. with more and more protests and riots breaking out all over the world, the american public is going to put pressure on the media because we want to SEE what all the controversy is about, and someone will make the decision to give in. i am hoping that smarter heads will prevail, and we will not be exercising our man made right to know and see everything. a little discretion would be a very good thing right now. at least if we want to stay out of the line of terrorist fire.

chicago hot dogs and tangelos...all in one day!!!

one of my students, nick c., is from chicago. his mother has been going back and forth to visit her mother (i think she is ill) and nick asked his mom to bring me back some chicago hot dogs! and she did...nick showed up after school on tuesday with a package of vienna beef hot dogs and the poppy seed rolls they go on! i immediately canceled the date i had with the exercise machines at american family fitness and went instead to the grocery store to buy the things needed to make a real chicago dog.

so what makes a chicago hot dog different from any other? start with a vienna beef hot dog, which is only native to chicago. add yellow mustard, bright green relish, 2 slices of tomato, a kosher pickle slice, onions, a dash of celery salt, and 2 sport peppers! sounds awful, but it sure does turn out to be fun! they say that when you bite in to all of the ingredients at once, you are supposed to experience a "snap" and you do!

i didn't fix all of them, just half, and saved the rest for a rainy day. but it just wasn't the hot dogs that day...i also got my shipment of honeybells and mini-bell tangelos! deeeeelish!