My Moment of Mindfulness

My community college offers some excellent continuing ed classes, and every once in a while, I like to take part.  Cory, my current instructor, and I were chatting about his day job in high-end travel.  His company promotes a lot of fancy fly-fishing excursions.  I asked if they made him go fly-fishing.  He was taken aback for a moment, then answered, "No, they don't make me go.  They let me."  Oh.  Perspective.  Note to self:  Change mine.

You Are Cordially Not Invited

Once again, the North Allegheny School District has infuriated me.  For a district that touts its own excellence every chance it gets, yet has turned out hundreds of kids who cannot tell non-digital time, I am usually just not impressed.  Every so often, though, this district makes me irate.  This is one of those times.  

The following letter is addressed to the Superintendent, and I will cc: the school principals, as well as the school board.  Any corrections or tweaks would be appreciated before I send it.

Dear Dr. Gualtieri;

As a parent of an eighth-grade girl at Marshall Middle School, I have a concern I would like to discuss with you at your convenience.  As you know, the eighth grade is studying the Holocaust, its history and culture.  Part of this unit included a field trip to Pittsburgh’s Jewish Film Festival.  This field trip, however, was by the English teacher’s invitation only.  The criteria for this invitation were not shared with the students.  My daughter surmises that an A for the prior nine-week grading period was required (since last grading period she received the second B of a middle school career consisting of solid A’s).  During class, individual students were called into the hall by the English teacher, returning with sheets of paper detailing their upcoming excursion.    I assume that at least one adult at Marshall in charge of this activity could imagine how a student would feel as his/her friends are tapped for inclusion (shades of sorority rush) while not being chosen him/herself.   Further, I am guessing that at least one adult has read that earnest anti-bullying credo posted in the office, which ends with “We will make sure each student feels included.”  For the sheer hypocrisy, I do request that this sign is taken down.

Later that week, after a flurry of permissions slips back and forth, my daughter’s chorus class (and I do so wish it was a math class, so I could be even more furious) ground to a halt as, by her estimate, two-thirds of the eighth grade gathered in the auditorium for further discussion of their educational junket, which was followed by a speaker my daughter thinks might have been a Holocaust survivor (though she obviously isn’t sure).  Of course, this wasted class period does not compare to the wasted academic day, when most of her classmates were off-site.  Yesterday was the Great Film Festival Expedition for the Chosen Few.  All she really had to say about it was that she tried to be interested when her friends chattered about their day after they returned to school, but that it was hard to do so. 

I wanted to contact you weeks ago.  My daughter forbid me to, because, as she said, a) “I want my English teacher to like me” (surprisingly, I had the wisdom to not reply, “Too late for that”) and b) “I don’t want to be the kid who gets to go because her mother made a big fuss.”  I am contacting you now, mostly to ask if the adults in the North Allegheny School district simply suffer from a complete lack of judgment or if instead they sport a pretty wide mean streak that they use to work through their own issues from their student days. 

I’ll leave to you the irony of ghettoizing the Uninvited, while taking the Favored out on the town, in pursuit of Holocaust education.

Sincerely,

Ask Cathy!

Good Morning America recently completed their nationwide search for their new Advice Guru, an actual paying job on network TV.  To enter, viewers submitted  photos, answers to three knotty problems, and essays explaining why them - why they should be the next Advice Guru.   I thought my destiny was to schmooze with George Stephanopolous while solving the problems of your everyday Americans.  I even scheduled a hair appointment, so I'd have no grey roots the day they announced the winner.  I was camera-ready.

I am not the next Advice Guru. 

Here's my essay explaining "Why Me?"  And screw them anyway.

I don’t have all the answers (though until I was about thirty, I thought I did).  I do, however, have some amazing people in my life who’ve taught, and continue to teach, me so much about how to live in this world.  My friend Elizabeth reminds me that we never know what burdens people carry, so we need to give them the benefit of the doubt.  She also, handily enough, gives me free legal advice.  My friend Mary believes the only person who gets in the way of us achieving our dreams is ourselves.    If you need a kind but firm kick in the backside to get moving, she’s there to provide it.  Sharon has showed me that the key to popularity is to truly enjoy the people around you.  I’d always thought I had to show how terrific I was, instead of just appreciating how terrific they are.  Because of my sister, I know that it is never okay to eat your groceries in the car.  From my mom, easily the kindest person I know, I’ve learned the most.  She believes in family, forgiveness, and affection.  Her early life was so different from mine that she has a perspective I often lack.  But I know where to find it.  One of the most important things she’s always told me (paraphrasing the Buddha) is, “Always be kind to people.  Just remember, you’re a people too.”  That and, “Never underestimate the male ego.”

El Sancho: Why I am a Mexican Man

I was listening to an NPR discussion on life insurance in minority communities (because NPR can make even this subject interesting to me, which is why I should donate some cash).  The insurance expert explained that a major reason Mexican men won't buy life insurance is El Sancho.  El Sancho is the guy your wife takes up with after you're dead and who will spend all your life insurance money.  I've always been bothered by the possibility that a second wife could spend IRA money I accrued before I got married.  Now I have a name for it!

Halloween

Every Halloween, I think about this woman I never knew. I've linked to the piece she wrote on seeing her third-grade daughter off on Halloween night, the last Halloween of this mother's life.

I bought this book for my then eight-year old daughter so that, if anything happened to me, she would know. Marjorie Williams would tell her how being a mom feels.


The Woman at the Washington Zoo ... - Google Books

Smoke 'Em If You Got 'Em

I always keep a pack of matches in my jacket pocket.  Nothing else is permitted - no ponytail holders, no Kleenex, nothing that is used for the care and feeding of someone else.  I haven't smoked for years and have no desire to do so now.  The matches just remind me of me, when I didn't have to take care of anyone else* and I could smoke because I was never going to die.



*Standard disclaimer:  Of course taking care of my children is the most wonderful thing in the world to me, blah blah blah.

Tales of a Smarty Pants

I found an old journal of mine, one of many that have the first twelve pages filled followed by a hundred that are empty.  One of the few entries was from five years ago, and the memory made me laugh.  Also, I'm too lazy to think up anything new, so here it is:

I saw my eight-year old self at the playground last night.  As Belinda and Bill threw and swung at T-Ball practice, Julia and I hit the playground equipment.  There, I saw the kid I'd have been if I were a boy.  Just the tiniest bit chubby and with the short, puffy hair I know so well, he was playing Frisbee keepaway with three other boys (and I could tell they were only playing with him because it was his Frisbee).  He (who could have been me) fell and said, "I think I hurt my cranium."  One of the normal boys asked, "What's that?"  My silent answer was, "Head."  He (who could have been me) answered, "It's a part of the skull.  You know....cranium, maxilla, mandible..."  Later, sitting next to the normal boy on the playground mountain, he (who could have been me) asked, "Did you hurt your phalange?"  The other boy looked disgusted and said, "Why do you say that?  It sounds dumb."  It took me thirty years to learn that people don't particularly like it when you have all the answers.