Middle School Itch

Middle School Itch

Middle school stinks.  Here I am, one great big hormonal zit, sitting in “junior” high, a person without status or stature. Not a kid, not a teen and certainly not an adult. Stuck in a place where they try to make me learn stuff for no apparent reason. None of this stuff relates to real life. You’re nothing here but a label: jock, brown-noser, slacker, techie, band geek, drama geek, geek-geek.  

Worst of all, they keep testing you!  And it’s not like you hear on TV: This is a test. This is only a test. No, all you hear is “This test is going to affect your grade, your promotion, the rest of your life!  If you don’t pass, you might as well buy a one-way ticket to loser-ville. And you had better do well, or you, the school, your parents, the country and the universe will suffer.” It is all on your shoulders. Me, the middle school brat, the nobody. 

Talk about stress. Not only do I have to do well in my studies, I have to be popular. Popular!  How do I do that? Do I go along with the crowd?  Do I hang out with the right people?  And most importantly, do I wear the right clothes?  Fashion “no-nos” can follow you for life – at least into high school. You will always be the kid who wore the Nikes the day after every else had shifted to ‘Asics or the kid who wore a b-ball cap the day everyone went topless (so to speak.)

And how about at home?  My parents expect me to act like an adult but treat me like a kid. My big sister despises me. My older brother throttles me. My little brothers won’t give me any privacy. Don’t they know I have important thoughts to think and for heavens sake, need my own room?   

Time management is a contradiction in terms for me. How can I possibly manage a schedule that includes chores and homework, band practice and soccer practice? My computer screams answer me! Texts and Tweets pile on top of each other. Video games demand new champions and surfing the net eats hours of my day. I’ve got to see the latest movies and watch the right shows so I can at least appear cool. 

Sleep? I come alive around eight every night and can’t drop off until after midnight. Then they drag me out of bed at six to catch the bus at seven so I can be sitting in class a half-hour later while still in a zomboid state to discuss Shakespeare or divide fractions by percentages. The teacher is collecting homework. Did I remember to bring (or even do) it?  Where’s my folder? Where’s my book bag? Where’s my brain? At home, asleep in my cozy bedroom that still has the Elmo curtains my mother made when I was in kindergarten.

I feel like I am in that rat race the teachers keep yammering on about. Running as fast as I can while stuck in one place. And then my mom yells at me because I’m not cheerful! Cheerful?  I can barely manage civil. Polite? Well that depends. Does she want Sunday School polite or locker room polite?  Can’t I just be me?

Middle school stinks.  

 But here I am, stuck for three years (at least) with a bunch of people who don’t understand me.  I learned in my psych class that the teen-age brain is not fully developed and will not be fully functioning until I am in my twenties. 

Why can’t they cut me a break? Let my brain develop guys! Don’t judge me by the size of my feet but by the size of my brain!  You say you can’t see my brain? Then listen to me. Watch me grow. For heaven’s sake, help me along! That’s what you keep telling me your job is. So act like it. We can all get through this together. 

It’s only three years and then I’ll be a teen. Imagine the fun we’ll have then!

The Aristoi

The Aristoi

Second in Series

During the 2012 presidential campaign, the term the “99 percent” was bandied about. The “99 percent” refers to the income and wealth inequalities perceived in the United States, that is, that the bulk of wealth in our nation is concentrated in only 1% of the population, and that the fate of the many is decided by the few. The term may date to the twenty-first century, but the concept is centuries old. 

Joseph Ellis, in his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Founding Brothers, refers to “eternal political verities.” One is that there has been and there always will be opposing parties. Another, in the words of Thomas Jefferson, is “that everyone takes his side in favor of the many, or the few, according to his constitution, and the circumstances in which he is placed.” In other words, we are always looking out for “Number One.” 

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were the best of friends and the worst of political enemies. As delegates to the Continental Congress, they had forged a friendship on the anvil of Independence. As presidential rivals and opposing political ideologues, they had slung accusations across party lines. After many years in retirement, the two were reunited in a correspondence in which they both renewed their friendship and attempted to, in Adams’s words, “explain ourselves to each other.” These letters were not only addressed to one another but to posterity. 

Adams and Jefferson addressed many political questions, including the use and origin of power. Adams had written three books arguing that political power was inevitably concentrated in the hands of a few prominent people and families. This system dated back from the feudal barons of Europe and Asia and the landed gentry of Elizabethan England to the plantation owners of the American south. Adams regretfully acknowledged that history proved that the “many always deferred to the few,” as was “established by God Almighty in the Constitution of Human Nature.” In other words, the one percent ruled in the past, the present, and the future, and the 99 percent will always be in their thrall.

Adams wrote that “as long as Property exists, it will accumulate in Individuals and Families…as a SNOW ball grows as it rolls.” Thereby, we have an inherited or wealth-based aristocracy which makes the decisions which rule the lives of the less-affluent. Adams defined the “Five Pillars” of this aristocracy as “Beauty, Wealth, Birth, Genius, and Virtues” with any of the first three overwhelming the other two at any time.

Jefferson contested Adams characterization of aristocracy. He believed that the artificial aristocracy that was “founded on wealth and birth” could be supplanted by a “natural aristocracy among men” based on “virtue and talent.” Wasn’t the American republic the result of the triumph of virtue and talent over wealth? Weren’t the founders fathers -- men who offered “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” for a political ideal -- the very emblem of an aristocracy based on virtue and talent? He conceded that the nations of Europe with their history of an inherited aristocracy limited the economic opportunities of the populous, but argued that in the United States labor and education could raise any one up to a position of prominence.

In separate correspondence, Adams noted the irony of this philosophical argument with Jefferson. Adams was the son of a New England farmer and shoemaker, while Jefferson owned about 200 slaves and 10,000 acres of land – much of it inherited from his father-in-law. Both were elected to the presidency on the basis of their revolutionary credentials – not on their accumulation of wealth and power.  

Jefferson and Adams stood in the one percent of talent and virtue. The nation was birthed and endured because of the character of its founders. If they had craved only wealth and power, the republic would have foundered. Can our nation stand on the character of our current one percent? Will the 99 percent always lose to the will of the aristocracy? Will the virtuous and talented ever supplant the wealthy? 

The answers depend on the character and labors of the 99 percent. The “founding brothers” defined the republic, but it is the American people, the 99 percent, who maintain the freedoms outlined in the Declaration of Independence. If we want “equality and justice for all” we must work for and be worthy of it.

(All quotations from Joseph Ellis’s Pulitzer Prize winning book Founding Brothers.)

The Odd Couple

They were America’s original odd couple -- a tall, reserved Southern gentleman and a short, feisty New England lawyer. Yet together, they were the “head and the heart of the American Revolution.” 

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams met in the Continental Congress. Together, they crafted one of America’s founding documents, served as delegates to France during the Revolution, and as ministers to the English court after Independence. They stood together as the King of England gave America the ultimate insult by turning his back on them. 

During these times, they were intimate friends. Yet not twenty years later, they were bitter enemies. What tore them apart? Party politics. 

In the first American election, political parties were superfluous. George Washington, the ultimate American, was undeniably the only choice for President. Washington stood above the political fray – at least this was the pose he assumed. Scrabbling around him, his advisors were busy forming alliances, taking sides, and promoting their own political philosophies. 

When Washington announced his retirement, these forces got busy. The Federalists, led by Alexander Hamilton, nominally supported John Adams, then Vice-President, for the top seat. The Republicans put forward Thomas Jefferson.

At this time, promoting oneself for office was considered unseemly, so Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, who was hungry for the office, and Adams, who felt that the honor was his due as the “Atlas of Independence,” retired to their respective homes and waited for the election results. Adams won this first round, becoming the nation’s second president, while Jefferson was appointed vice-president.

Four years later, the battle lines were again drawn. This time, Jefferson’s party, led by James Madison, was slinging mud. Jefferson paid a notorious scandalmonger, James Callender, to publish scurrilous articles about Adam’s unsuitability for the presidency, calling him a “hoary-headed incendiary” who was determined to go to war with France and declare himself “President for life” with his son John Quincy as his successor. Adams lost.

Callendar’s accusations were false, but what hurt Adams most was the loss of his friendship with Jefferson. When Adams held the presidency, he had wanted to create a “bipartisan administration” collaborating fully with Jefferson. Jefferson instead chose his party over his friendship. Abigail Adams wrote that Jefferson had “mortgaged his honor to win an election” and accused him of being a “man of party rather than principle.” 

This legacy continues today. Politicians, who should work together for the good of the country, square off in their respective corners and fight it out, slinging accusations and slugging it out in the public arena. No one wins. Today’s government is more divided along party lines than almost any other time in our history. The last time we were so divided, we had a civil war. 

Adams considered the word “party” to be an epithet, something you sling at an enemy. Jefferson, who denied his connection with Callendar (until Callendar produced letters from Jefferson authorizing the mudslinging), was stung himself by party politics. He later described party allegiance as “the last degradation of a free and moral agent” and claimed that “if I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all.”

Several years after both had retired from public life, John Adams was induced by a mutual friend to renew his friendship with Jefferson. He wrote “You and I ought not to die before we have explained ourselves to each other.” For the next twenty years, they corresponded to do just that, leaving us with a treasury of wisdom and history. 

This odd couple discussed their differences and came to the same conclusion: American politics must rise above party for the good of the Republic. So many years later, can we not agree with them? 

(All quotations from Joseph Ellis’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book Founding Brothers.)

Dad's Umbrella

Dad’s Umbrella

One rainy summer day, I grabbed an umbrella from the coat rack and strolled out to get the mail. My mailbox sits at the end of a long driveway, so I had time to enjoy the beautiful umbrella protecting me. It was my father’s umbrella decorated with a depiction of the angels in Raphael’s Sistine Madonna. 

You’ve seen these cherubs. They gaze upward on many posters, mugs, and t-shirts, their golden ringlets and colorful wings framing their wistful faces. It’s a beautiful painting. As I walked, I thought about how my father gave me two wonderful gifts – his love of beauty and his protection.

Dad loved beautiful things. He traveled the world for his job and in every place, he sought out something beautiful to bring home. Asian carpets, French paintings, a bit of Italian sculpture, a gossamer scarf, a delicate necklace, or a piece of poetry, anything which captured his eye or his heart, he packed up or shipped home. Nothing expensive – just beautiful. 

Of course, if you asked him what he considered most beautiful, he would not hesitate to answer – Marie, his wife and the mother of his six children who were next in line on his scale of beauty. An amateur photographer, he took every chance to immortalize us in pictures. He photographed our eyes, our smiles, our tears, and our triumphs. His photos evoke memories, laughter, and tears as we remember the beautiful moments we shared.

Dad loved all things beautiful. His rose garden boasted 50 bushes with some varieties of his own cultivation. He named these after his beloved wife or rambunctious children. His record collection included opera, Broadway shows, and Shakespeare. We listened. We sang. We absorbed their beauty into our souls. 

Dad loved poetry and prose. He recited epic poems for us and Shakespeare soliloquies. He introduced us to classic literature – beautiful words which enlightened and delighted us. He shared his love of comedy and drama, giving us laughter and tears. He took us to church where we learned the great mysteries and assurances of faith. 

He wanted us to find beauty in the world, so he protected us from things which were ugly. He steered us away from prejudice, anger, fear, and hatred. He guided us toward acceptance, joy, security, and love. He showed us beauty in his actions and his words. He covered us like an umbrella, sheltering us with his love. 

My father left this world in 2014 but his gifts remain with me still. I see him in the roses in my garden, in rainbows after a storm, in the smiles of my children and grandchildren, in the heart of my husband, and in the love of my siblings. He shaped our hearts.

Dad is still teaching us about beauty. He is protecting us still. Like his umbrella, he left us behind. But when we gaze upward, with wistful glances, we see beauty and feel his love shielding us still. 

Delicacy

Delicacy

Quick! Think of a word to describe American politicians today? What comes to mind? Argumentative? Brazen? Crass? You could probably continue on to the end of the alphabet with nary a complimentary adjective. How about delicate? Not a word that springs to mind.

Dr. Frank Crane, a Presbyterian minister and inspirational writer from the early 20^th century wrote a series of Four-Minute Essays which focused on positive thinking. His writing encompassed almost every topic of the day. These essays, which I found in a tiny little book at a library sale, have a lot to say about today too.

Dr. Frank considered delicacy to be the “flavor of all the virtues.”  By delicacy, he meant not fragility but gracefulness. “It is not goodness; it is goodness filtered through modesty. It is the gentle hand of the courageous heart.” Crane felt that this quality of delicacy was required for any man to be a gentleman and any woman to be a lady. He warned that a “lack of delicacy has spoiled many a man’s career.”

A delicate person thinks first. She weighs her words carefully. She considers the feelings and opinions of others. She holds others’ points of view as no less valid than her own. She may argue, but she doesn’t berate, accuse, or demean.

Abraham Lincoln would never have been described as delicate in body. Standing well over six feet tall, he seemed to have little control over his gangly legs and enormous feet. In fact, when he first met his wife-to-be, Mary Todd, he told her, “I want to dance with you in the worst way.” For years after, Mary reported to friends and family, that that is just what he did!

But Mr. Lincoln was the model of delicacy in his life and with his words. He wrote some of the greatest speeches of any time, asking Americans to be guided by “the better nature of our angels” to forgive our former enemies, to not avenge but to aid. He realized the true intention of our nation’s Constitution, that America was “conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men were created equal.” He knew that no person could be free unless all were free. He went against popular opinion to do what was right.

Dr. Crane lists some qualities which are “fatal to delicacy.” His list includes egotism, smugness, vanity, selfishness, lack of respect for others, insolence, and most telling, insincerity, and satisfaction. Which of these might we apply to our politicians? Which of these might we ascribe to ourselves? 

Insincerity plagues our political system today. Don’t take a stand; take a poll!  See where others sit on that fence before choosing a side to land on. And what is satisfaction? Satisfaction means letting the status quo of your own personal life dictate the lives of others.  I’m OK. Why should I worry about anyone else? 

Lincoln was OK.  He had a thriving law career and a growing family. But he gave it all up for a bigger cause -- to assure that all people could be OK too. He suffered. His family suffered. The nation suffered. But America grew stronger and more delicate too. He taught us to think about the OK-ness of all in our nation and eventually, the entire world.  

“[Delicacy] cannot be explained to you; you must absorb it. It cannot be learned; it must be assimilated.” It must become part of the fabric of our lives if we are to “make virtue victorious.” Dr. Frank admonishes us to practice delicacy so that “the strong [will be] tempered with kindliness, wisdom [will be] suffused with modesty, conviction [will be] balanced with toleration.”  

If, like Lincoln, we want “the gentle hand of a courageous heart” to govern our nation, we need to assimilate delicacy and practice it daily. Let us hope our politicians embrace it too so that when we get to the letter “D” in our list of virtues, we know what quality will define our leaders, that virtue that flavors all others -- delicacy.

(Quotations from Four Minute Essays; Vol. IX  by Dr. Frank Crane, 1919.)

Distractions

Distractions

Once upon a time, I had a student named Charles. One day, as Charles worked at his desk, the principal announced an emergency dismissal over the loudspeaker. All of my students leaped up to grab their school bags, shrieking and rushing about bumping into each other as I tried to restore order. Charles sat placidly at his desk working away.  

About five minutes into this scene, Charles looked up. I caught his attention and told him that he had better pack up. “Oh,” he said and gathered his belongings obediently.

Charles is memorable because he was an unusual student. He was an average student with average abilities and average looks but in one thing he was very strange: nothing distracted him.  

What distracts students? 

Everything. 

You name it; they’ll be distracted by it. I have seen girls spend days gazing at the fingernails they glued on for a flower girl stint, picking them off one by one, arranging them in patterns, holding them up to catch the light, coloring them with markers and pasting them on pencils.  

A ruler is a magical toy. Not only can you measure things with it, but it also serves as a propeller, a drumstick or a weapon to bop your neighbor on the noggin.  

Any and every item in a desk can draw attention for some kids. One of my guys loved to arrange his pencils, crayons and erasers in battle formation. Another pulled apart each page of her notebook to make feathers of paper. These she rolled and stored in her pencil box for future experiments. A laugh in the hall, a bird swooping by the window, a sniffle, a burp, a gust of wind, all pull eyes and minds away from a lesson. Don’t even mention what happens when the first flakes of snow flutter down.

Teachers work hard to keep attention. We plan dazzling lessons filled with wonderful learning tools. Unit blocks are great for teaching place value. Unfortunately, they also encourage tower building. Plastic clocks help students learn to tell time; but isn’t it fascinating how the hands go round and round? Highlighters boldly mark important facts and also connect to make really long and colorful pointers. Glue works great on paper and fingers. What fun to peel it off!  

Kids see the world in a wholly different way. Where adults see a tool, kids find a toy. Scotch tape offers endless possibilities. Wrap it around a pencil for a unique grip. Tape six crayons together and draw a rainbow. Pull it over your lips and make your friends giggle. Stickers can decorate a nose or an ear or become a finger-tip puppet. 

It’s a magical and distracting world. I found myself banning bracelets, hair ribbons, watches, pencil-sharpeners and key rings. Keep them home I cautioned. Put them in your school bag. Look at the board. Focus on your book. Listen. Watch. Pay attention.  

But it is a losing battle. Kids will be distracted. I find it amazing that they learn as much as they do. With all the wonderful diversions the world offers, a student somehow still learns to read, to figure, to write and to wonder. What a wonderful brain a child has! 

A friend of mine taught in a rural school in Africa. Whenever a truck or tractor rumbled by, her students rushed over to the windows to watch. Motor vehicles are rare in that community without roads and her students would debate make and model and discuss possible destinations. It always took awhile to refocus attention on her lesson.

One day, a donkey cart rambled by. The students rushed to the windows. 

“Wait a minute,” said my friend.  “Surely you’ve seen donkey carts before.”

  

“Yes,” her students agreed.  “But we have never seen that one.”

Hats On

Hats On!

Hats On!

    I do not like to wear hats -- but I wear one every day. Let me explain.

When I was young, hats were de rigueur – required in polite society. We wore bonnets to church, beanies (yes, beanies) to school, caps for sports, hats for clubs, wool hats in winter wand sunhats in summer. Hats were fashionable. We removed our hats to show respect and put them on to show allegiance. Hats were in.

But I hated to wear hats! I rebelled vociferously! Hats gave me a headache. Hats gave me hat-head. Hats limited my view. I looked terrible in hats. I didn’t care how stylish my hats were – I didn’t want anything to do with them. Most of the time, I put them on to please my hat-knitting grandmothers, to stay out of trouble at school, and to remain a member of the team, but I grumbled.

My mother, however, loved hats (read that LOVED hats). She had a hat for every occasion, and, if there wasn’t an occasion, she made one up to fit the hat! She had birthday hats, Santa hats, Halloween hats, Easter bonnets, and leprechaun bowlers, stove-pipe hats for patriotic holidays, and hats related to family events. She had hats from every corner of the globe. She had hats that sang and hats that danced. She wore them even while her six children ducked their heads and grimaced behind her. 

Today, she has a huge collection of hats. She carefully chooses one to wear each day. They make her happy. They make others happy too. People grin when they see her coming. Her Christmas tree hat with the blinking lights make children’s eyes light up. Her leprechaun hat brings smiles to more than Irish eyes. You can be sure that if it is your birthday --even if you are on the other side of the world -- Mom will have a hat on her head in your honor – complete with “flaming” candles. 

The smiles her hats inspire are mirrored by the smile on Mom’s face. She likes making people smile. She radiates joy. Even though her world has gotten smaller in the last few years, the happiness she shares with her smiles and her hats continues to spread.

So why do I wear a hat every day? Well, for practical reasons, of course. Hats keep the sun out of my eyes and off of my face. But more importantly, when I put a hat on my head, I think of my mother and smile. 

I remember how she smiled as she cared for her children, her husband, her mother, and her father-in-law – all ten of us who shared our family home. I remember how she welcomed every new neighbor as if they were family. I remember how she made friends with everyone she met. I remember that she continues to share this joy every day and in every place. How can I not smile with a mother like that?

So every day, when I put on my hat, I think of Mom and smile. I actually hope to get hat-head because if wearing hats make you as happy as Mom, I’m going to put one on. And, when I see you coming, I’m going to smile. I hope you smile too.