Times have changed, and not for the better. I live with photographical evidence of that fact in my classroom everyday. At any given time, I can pick a year and step back in time. I can lose myself in the crinolines and taffeta of the pristine prom of the 1950's or the committed and passionate protests of the '60's and '70's. That's the wonder of being the yearbook adviser. It's like every year has been cryogenically frozen and preserved and when this world is unpleasant I can simply slip into another year and get lost, absorbed in innocence, freedom from technology and what was pictured as a society and culture that raised generation after generation of citizens who cared about their country, their school and themselves.
Today was one of those rare days where I didn't wander anywhere near the shelves holding those books, those portals that would sweep me into a "better" time. Today, in my little corner of the world, it was present perfect.
It was student involvement day and my classroom was buzzing with a variety of students, seniors through sophomores who were slowly preparing to sell an idea they had themselves bought into: school spirit. I'm talking about old school school spirit - the kind that makes you hum along to "Be True To Your School," makes you want to own a letterman's sweater, makes you want to be somebody's "best girl" or "guy." See, a group of students had decided that they wanted to leave their mark on the school in a way that didn't involve the negativity that is plunked all over the media, that is touted as the "apathy of the millenials." They decided they wanted to breathe life back into the ghost of School Pride.
Some of you may not understand why this is a big deal. Some of you won't care why this IS in fact a big deal. For those of you who haven't been in a modern high school, things have changed. Some might say they haven't changed for the better. Most would agree. I used to be one that would agree but Mexico High School has changed my mind.
In so many ways, it must be understood that a school is like a church. You can build a building and call it a church. You can build a building and call it a school. But neither of them are truly the essence of their own meaning until they are inhabited. And let me tell you something about Mexico High School: it is being inhabited.
We've seen glimpses in the past few years. Those students who grab hold of an idea and turn it into something living and breathing. We've seen the excitement for events and most importantly, the willingness to support those who are different. But this is something more, this is deeper, this is something that is going to resonate as you watch the sophomore student become enthusiastic about it because a senior student has invited them to become involved and passionate. This is... wait for it... epic.
There were just a few at first, at the end of last year, who came to me and expressed that they thought the Dawg Pound, the unofficial student pep club, needed to become official and organized. It seemed like a good idea at the time... which is also the unofficial story of my life, so I said I would sponsor them. Hundreds of spirit bracelets, posters, tweets and QR codes later, we offered our idea up to the student body today at student involvement day. The students, they came... but it didn't have anything to do with the bracelets or the tweeting. It started way before we did...
The feeling of our school has changed. Something about it has become more genuine, more caring, more student-friendly. You find it odd that a school wasn't student-friendly? If you want to know the main problem with education today, it is that most schools are not student-friendly. But what is happening at Mexico High School isn't just the students catching on to the school spirit idea.
The teachers are trying new things, getting brave, going out on a limb to engage students. The teachers are smiling at each other, fellowshipping with one another and creating an atmosphere that speaks to students of acceptance and respect. And those students will mirror what they will see. The administrators are supporting the teachers and the students. It didn't happen over night and in all truth it could end tomorrow. But I don't think it will...
Not when you have a football team that arranges a fundraiser for their opponent's coach's wife who has cancer; or when you have an organization that is forming with the purpose of making sure there is a network of support among community members, school officials and local businesses who can meet the need of a student or family with immediacy. It won't end, not when you have teachers working so hard to find ways to help make their students succeed not only now but in the future, and parents who are so supportive and involved that they can walk down the halls and speak to every kid they meet by name.
See, those are signs of a great school, the kind of idyllic school pictured in those old yearbooks with the perfectly coiffed young ladies and the handsome, smiling young men who look like they took the time to iron their clothes every single school day. We'll never be able to go back to that; we know way too much to go back to that. But what really mattered to me today as I cut out little strips of paper to staple to bracelets and stapled the football coach's face to a paint stick was that I really didn't want to be anywhere or any when but right then and right there. It seems that after so many years, we are finally reaching the edge of present perfect.
Friday, September 12, 2014
Friday, March 21, 2014
All Hail the Dead End
My classroom, at times, becomes more a crossroad than a classroom. Students wander in and out to work on various projects; teachers wander in and out to make copies when they don't want to make the Odyssey-esque journey to the teachers' work room. I love it because it affords the opportunity for teachers and students to interact in a very real way: conversation. The topics are wide and varied from the philosophical to the debatable to the good old-fashioned belly laugh that comes with being somewhere that you feel safe and accepted.
It was one of these conversations that lead me to an oddly dark place a couple of days ago. One of my students, very intelligent and well-spoken became absolutely appalled when I and another teacher expressed that, at some point in time you learn to cling to the following beliefs:
1) It is what it is.
2) Whatever happens, happens.
Her eyes flew open almost as quickly as her mouth in the shock that two people could allow themselves to become so desolate of hope. "That's terrible!" she cried as she made her case against the two mantras. "That's just giving up... it's so passive and so lacking of hope." She was sincerely shocked.
I didn't bring it up again, but her shock had shaken me a bit. Had I lost hope? At age 42 had I become so stained and tainted by the world and the people in it that I no longer felt the need to fight? Was I no longer raging against the dying of the light? Was I going gently? Had I become (gulp) a doubter?
I could turn only to one place... the past. And so I dug out my old journals and began to read the words of a former me, in many ways, a lesser me. My world was so small, I couldn't help thinking as I read and re-read poetry and the pining and whining of an unrequited lover, the girl who was left behind and the one that was never understood. All the way back to college when I first started writing "seriously" I traveled in those journals, all the while asking if I, bright-eyed/bushy-tailed optimist, first-to-arrive/last-to-leave party-goer and eternally-bubbly and good-natured good-time gal, had allowed life to turn me into (gulp, gulp) a doubter.
In the pages I found an odd destination to end my journey. I found the dead end. I didn't find it in my college journals or in the journals of my early 20's. I found it in the journals of my late 20's when my heart was absolutely and beyond mending broken. I mean broken in a way that could never be smiled away, that time would allow to scar but never heal. The kind of pain that scratches at your brain in your sleep and makes you feel as if you are being followed - that was the kind of pain that was my first dead end. Something was gone that was never coming back and there was absolutely nothing in the world, nothing at all within my powers that I could do to change it.
You either die at the dead end or climb over whatever wall is there and leave it behind... because it is what it is. The dead end is finite. The dead end is "no." And the dead end will never be revived, it will never come chasing after you, it will never whip you around and plant a passionate kiss on your mouth and whisper apologies in your ear. The dead end is just that: dead and it leaves a part of you dead as well.
And it occurred to me that, at the tender age of 18, she hadn't come to a dead end and I prayed a quick and quiet prayer that she never would. But that is not a reality. I was jealous of her for just a moment, the belief that you can change anything out of sheer will and determination. I believed that once too... until I dead ended. And then I had to adjust.
I have seen enough dead ends since my first to know that I am a climber. I may throw myself against the wall for a bit, kneel in a tearful prayer and ask that there be a secret passage through the dead end, but eventually I will accept the dead end for what it is... because, as much as I hate to say it again, it is what it is. And so I climb over it, sometimes in a few days, sometimes months, and there are still a few that I am struggling to get that last leg over... but once I am over them I then have the power to turn and look back at it, from wherever I am on my path at that time and move away from it with a bit more hope in my step because that dead end is a dead end - it is what it is. And whatever is waiting ahead for me is there. It may be a dead end, it may be an infinite loop that forces me to forge a path not yet created. But I am prepared for it because I know that whatever happens, happens.
So you see, young person, I am not a doubter nor am I a curmudgeon or a hopeless cynic. I'm a climber and I am stronger than I ever have been because I have left the dead ends behind knowing that I can deal with whatever the future brings. That is the great difference between me at 18, me at 25 and me right here and now. You fear that I am hopeless but in truth I have nothing but hope and for that I owe a debt of gratitude to the dead end that taught me you don't always defeat every foe but there is always a victory to be found if you are willing to claim it; I've claimed a million and I'm sure there are a million more coming.
There you go. That is why it is what it is. That is why whatever happens, happens. That is why you can truly only carpe so much of the diem and that is why YOLO is really stupid when you think about it: if you're doing it right, you live a million lives in your lifetime. THAT is what it is... truly.
It was one of these conversations that lead me to an oddly dark place a couple of days ago. One of my students, very intelligent and well-spoken became absolutely appalled when I and another teacher expressed that, at some point in time you learn to cling to the following beliefs:
1) It is what it is.
2) Whatever happens, happens.
Her eyes flew open almost as quickly as her mouth in the shock that two people could allow themselves to become so desolate of hope. "That's terrible!" she cried as she made her case against the two mantras. "That's just giving up... it's so passive and so lacking of hope." She was sincerely shocked.
I didn't bring it up again, but her shock had shaken me a bit. Had I lost hope? At age 42 had I become so stained and tainted by the world and the people in it that I no longer felt the need to fight? Was I no longer raging against the dying of the light? Was I going gently? Had I become (gulp) a doubter?
I could turn only to one place... the past. And so I dug out my old journals and began to read the words of a former me, in many ways, a lesser me. My world was so small, I couldn't help thinking as I read and re-read poetry and the pining and whining of an unrequited lover, the girl who was left behind and the one that was never understood. All the way back to college when I first started writing "seriously" I traveled in those journals, all the while asking if I, bright-eyed/bushy-tailed optimist, first-to-arrive/last-to-leave party-goer and eternally-bubbly and good-natured good-time gal, had allowed life to turn me into (gulp, gulp) a doubter.
In the pages I found an odd destination to end my journey. I found the dead end. I didn't find it in my college journals or in the journals of my early 20's. I found it in the journals of my late 20's when my heart was absolutely and beyond mending broken. I mean broken in a way that could never be smiled away, that time would allow to scar but never heal. The kind of pain that scratches at your brain in your sleep and makes you feel as if you are being followed - that was the kind of pain that was my first dead end. Something was gone that was never coming back and there was absolutely nothing in the world, nothing at all within my powers that I could do to change it.
You either die at the dead end or climb over whatever wall is there and leave it behind... because it is what it is. The dead end is finite. The dead end is "no." And the dead end will never be revived, it will never come chasing after you, it will never whip you around and plant a passionate kiss on your mouth and whisper apologies in your ear. The dead end is just that: dead and it leaves a part of you dead as well.
And it occurred to me that, at the tender age of 18, she hadn't come to a dead end and I prayed a quick and quiet prayer that she never would. But that is not a reality. I was jealous of her for just a moment, the belief that you can change anything out of sheer will and determination. I believed that once too... until I dead ended. And then I had to adjust.
I have seen enough dead ends since my first to know that I am a climber. I may throw myself against the wall for a bit, kneel in a tearful prayer and ask that there be a secret passage through the dead end, but eventually I will accept the dead end for what it is... because, as much as I hate to say it again, it is what it is. And so I climb over it, sometimes in a few days, sometimes months, and there are still a few that I am struggling to get that last leg over... but once I am over them I then have the power to turn and look back at it, from wherever I am on my path at that time and move away from it with a bit more hope in my step because that dead end is a dead end - it is what it is. And whatever is waiting ahead for me is there. It may be a dead end, it may be an infinite loop that forces me to forge a path not yet created. But I am prepared for it because I know that whatever happens, happens.
So you see, young person, I am not a doubter nor am I a curmudgeon or a hopeless cynic. I'm a climber and I am stronger than I ever have been because I have left the dead ends behind knowing that I can deal with whatever the future brings. That is the great difference between me at 18, me at 25 and me right here and now. You fear that I am hopeless but in truth I have nothing but hope and for that I owe a debt of gratitude to the dead end that taught me you don't always defeat every foe but there is always a victory to be found if you are willing to claim it; I've claimed a million and I'm sure there are a million more coming.
There you go. That is why it is what it is. That is why whatever happens, happens. That is why you can truly only carpe so much of the diem and that is why YOLO is really stupid when you think about it: if you're doing it right, you live a million lives in your lifetime. THAT is what it is... truly.
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