There’s nothing like having children to knock most of our lofty expectations and plans into a cocked hat.  Other people’s children are one thing; who among us has not watched disdainfully as someone’s child melted down in public or ran wild in a grocery store or openly defied a red-faced, humiliated parent in front of “people.”

Our own kids are quite another thing.  “MY kids will never behave like that!” said we all to ourselves whilst still there and to each other when we got home again.  “Bad parenting!  We won’t have problems like that when WE have kids.”  Such statements are, naturally, curses that work well, only in reverse.

I now live such things entirely in retrospect, which, bless it, removes most of the traumatic memories and fills our heads with the good stuff.  Looking back, it’s the good memories that make me cry real tears into the photo albums of tiny little girls in fluffy dresses and hairbows, and smiling little boys in overalls and miniature red baseball caps.

The picture of my three-year-old son in a little brown suit complete with vest and tie makes me smile now, because when I focus on his bare feet, toes curling, the memory of how he had hidden his shoes “because I don’t LIKE them” right before our studio appointment has had all the “upset” removed and replaced with laughter.

The picture of my five-year-old daughter with her hair chopped off from the middle of her head to her forehead makes me smile now, too; I remember that little voice telling me with great pride that “I cut my own bangs myself so I’ll be extra pretty for kindergarten” and instead of blushing red when I look at her yearbook I now laugh out loud with delight at that perky scalped little girl  beaming with pride.

Dear Parents:  Don’t waste your energy getting upset over trifles.  A few years down the road and you’ll be laughing your asses heads off over the innocent silliness of your infinitely precious little people.

To be perfectly honest with y’all, I lose my shoes all the time, because I only wear them when I absolutely have to.  I never hid my shoes, but only because it never occurred to me.  My little son’s picture with his tiny bare feet and curled toes is far more true to form than a fully dressed and posed studio portrait would have been.

As for hair, my skills in hairdressing were and still are so non-existent that even a semi-scalping didn’t make my princess look all that different from what she would have looked like with a Mommy-made hairdo.  I did well to manage a curly ponytail cascading down her back.  Two ponytails?  The part down the back of her head was always more crooked than a dog’s hind leg.  The harder I tried, the worse it looked.

I know there were many traumatic things when my children were small, but nothing comes to mind right now.  I just remember those little people nestling and snuggling all over me, and trusting me to keep them alive, fed, clean, and happy.  I did the best I could.

They’re still alive;  they seem pretty healthy;  they’re usually clean, and I hope and pray that they’re happy.  They’re also still speaking to me, and I count that as a good sign.

Now, where did I put my shoes?

And, of course, other people’s words are far more powerful than mine. Funnier, too.

“There never was a rule that didn’t have to be broken at some time, and the man who doesn’t know when to break a rule is a fearful pain in the neck.” –William Feather

“The price one pays for pursuing any profession or call, is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side.” –James Baldwin

“Not to know is bad; not to wish to know is worse.” –West African Proverb

“Children, I grant, should be innocent; but when the epithet is applied to men or women, it is but a civil term for weakness.” –Mary Wollstonecraft*

“So live that you wouldn’t be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip.” –Will Rogers

“. . . he who does not increase his knowledge diminishes it; he who refuses to learn, merits extinction.” –Talmud

“A mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it.” –Tagore

“I guess the definition of a lunatic is a man surrounded by them.” –Ezra Pound

“I hasten to laugh at everything for fear of being obliged to weep at it.” –Pierre De Beaumarchair

“You don’t look in the mirror to see life; you gotta look out of the window.” –Drew Brown

“We do not really know anything at all until a long time after we have learned it.” –Joseph Joubert

“Happiness is not the absence of conflict, but the ability to cope with it.” –Anonymous

“Do not assume that the other fellow has intelligence to match yours. He may have more.” –Terry-Thomas

“He who is firmly seated in authority soon learns to think security, and not progress, the highest lesson of statecraft.” –J.R. Lowell

“Do not fear when your enemies criticize you. Beware when they applaud.” –Vo Dong Giang

“Earnest people are often people who habitually look on the serious side of things that have no serious side.” –Van Wyck Brooks

“It’s the most unhappy people who most fear change.” –Mignon McLaughlin

“Eccentricity is like having an accent. It’s what “other” people have.” –Oliver Sacks

“Some people crave baseball. I find this unfathomable; however, I do understand how someone could get excited about playing a bassoon.” –Frank Zappa

“Sometimes I think war is God’s way of teaching us geography.” — Paul Rodriguez

“A headline is not an act of journalism; it is an act of marketing.” –Harold Evans

“Take a rest; a field that has rested gives a beautiful crop.” –Ovid

“If a man does not work passionately – even furiously – at being the best in the world at what he does, he fails his talent, his destiny, and his God.” –George Lois

“All of us are mad. If it weren’t for the fact that every one of us is slightly abnormal, there wouldn’t be any point in giving each person a separate name.” –Ugo Bette

A good quotation is an education, isn’t it. Sometimes, a really good one can make my skin tingle and my brain light up in one of those big areas we never use. Maybe a really good combination of words is the spark we need to heat up those empty lobes and see what’s going on in there.

*Bonus points if you know what she wrote!

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly

Remember, if you don’t take the trouble to find out what’s going on and what people are saying about it, you won’t KNOW what’s going on.  Not to keep updated is to choose ignorance.  Choosing ignorance is one of the most horrible things a person can do, no matter what the topic.  Education is what separates the sheep from the goats, because not to understand that everything is connected to everything else, and that nothing exists in isolation, and how to connect these dots to form ideas and understanding, is to actively choose ignorance.  We can’t help being ignorant about things we’ve never been exposed to, but to choose non-exposure is to choose ignorance.  Oh, and those people who take great pride in refusing to learn?  They are ignorance, personified.  Harsh?  I don’t really think so.  In fact, I have not even begun to express my disgust for people who are able, yet actively choose to be ignorant.  We are all ignorant of many things, but if we continue to learn, to be less ignorant daily, we’re on our way.

Oh, and please don’t forget that ignorance and stupidity are not the same thing.  Not the same thing at all, at all.

Parents, professional educators, and all inhabitants of the planet, simply must keep learning.  If we stop learning, “they” might as well bury us, because such people are as good as dead. Worse, even, because dead people don’t bring others down.  Ignorant people do.

CONSTANT VIGILANCE, as Alastair Moody would say.  To choose ignorance is to choose a kind of death.

P.S.  When I took my beautiful daughter to her college dorm and went back home without her, itself a traumatic thing, “Less ignorant every day” became our rallying cry for her college education.  We still quote it, laughing, when we learn new things and share them.  Why don’t y’all use it, too?

Less ignorant daily.  Bring it on, universe.

I never liked group work as a child.  The same few people always did all the work, and the same few people always sat around, goofed off, “forgot,” turned in nothing, and got the same grade as the rest of us.  Everyone in the group got the same grade, regardless of contribution.  Whenever the teacher started to divide us into groups, half the class would groan and the other half would grin.

It was unfair then and it’s unfair now.  I can still remember the feeling of outrage when this would happen.  I still feel outraged.

Why should good, hardworking students have to support lazy, non-contributing students?  Why should lazy, non-contributing students get the same grade as the students who actually did the work?

One group grade indeed.  Hong Kong Phooey.*

Unfair.  Unfair to the max.

And I may have just described our economic system.  Sigh.

Oh, and as far as the grasshopper and the ant are concerned:  why in the world should we pity the grasshopper?  He chose his way of life.  Let him reap the consequences.

*Bonus points if you know what that means.

P.S.  I wanted to insert a cool picture of Hamlet telling the skull he knew it well, but my blog will not let me upload pictures any more.  Are you an expert?  I need help here.

P.P.S.  My blog won’t show tags now, either.  Is it haunted?

I love airports, and I love riding on airplanes.  Or, would that be riding IN airplanes?  See, students, prepositions are quite important.  If I were to ride on an airplane, I’d be in all the papers under the headline “Nutter Straddles Boeing 747″ or some such.  Or, would that be, I’d be WITH the headline, or ACCOMPANIED BY the headline. . . .   PREPOSITIONS, people!

I love meeting people.  I’ve met the nicest people on planes, in fact.  I love it when they turn to me and strike up a conversation, or just smile and mind their own business.  I firmly believe that most people are good people: kind, fair, considerate, and eager to help others.  I also firmly believe that all people have a right to what they pay for, and NO right to what someone else has paid for, without prior permission from the person who paid.

The thing is, when I saw this woman shuffling down the aisle – or perhaps UP the aisle, or through the aisle (take your pick) I knew exactly where she was going to sit.  Right.  By.  Me.

Beside me. Near me.  Attached to me.  Glued to me.  Pressed against me.  Melting against me like a caramel in the sun.  A really, really big, sweaty caramel.

I have never cared for political correctness.  I think it cheapens and weakens the language, and turns situations that fully earn the attention deserved by idiocy and selfishness  into something that believes it merits sympathy, and catering to, rather than derision, or possibly (shudder, and what were you THINKING!) common sense.

So here it is, and bring it on.  This is not a new issue; people have been debating it for a long time.  Where do I stand?  Right here.

Perhaps it is time for airlines to sell their space according to the amount of space each passenger will need.  Not weight, although I know they used to in the beginning, and maybe it was wiser than the “equality” of now, with all seats the same size and price; I think airlines should sell the space by measurement.

Perhaps there should be a row of different-sized seats at the ticket booth, and a description of such including measurements, on the internet, and people could “try on” the seats, and the passenger will pay for whichever size suits his/her, well, ass.  Or needs.  Small ass, small price.  Huge ass, huge price.

Parents with small children could purchase an extra-large space to accommodate their children and “things.”  People who want to work while flying could purchase an extra- large space.  People who just plain don’t want other people’s elbows touching theirs could purchase a large space.  And – here it is – large people could purchase an extra-large space so they don’t trespass on someone else’s paid-for space.

Small people with no accouterments could purchase a small space.

Average people could purchase an average-sized space.

All passengers would be required to stow only ONE piece of whatever above his/her own rented space.  In other words, the space over one’s seat belongs only to the person in that seat. Nobody has a right to space above anybody else’s seat. (I hate it when I try to stow my one bag above my seat and discover that someone from the back of the plane took my space.  USE YOUR OWN SPACE. )

And if you weigh 395 pounds and your right buttock and side-boob cover more than half of the body next to you, you should be required to pay for the space you are covering, and the crushed person should get a discount.  So much money per square inch of ass, for example.   If you are over or under-sized, why can’t you inform the airline of this fact BEFORE entering a plane that’s at capacity?  And why should anybody have to share paid-for space with someone else who didn’t pay for that space?  Kevin Smith, indeed.  And he wasn’t as large as my seatmate’s right arm alone.

This woman, today, reached over and pushed up the armrests, and somehow sidled herself into the middle seat.  When she sat, only her buttcrack well, what else could one call it? was in her own paid-for space; one buttock was in my lap and the other was in the lap of the man on her left.  Her body pushed me against the wall and window so hard, my cheek was smashed against the glass.  Her side-boob and upper arm covered over half my body, and on her other side, the body of the man by the aisle.  The two of us were unrecognizable; I was mashed against the wall and window, and the man was mashed and pushed almost into the aisle.  My left arm was underneath her and I had to leave it there because the only other place for it was on top of her boobs.

Milk of human kindness, etc. etc. blah blah blah.  She was trespassing into spaces that weren’t hers.  She should have been required to buy three tickets.

Am I being unreasonable?  I don’t think I am.  However, I think she was.

Please don’t beseige me with “wah wah wah” because I don’t care to hear it unless you’ve got a better argument than “self esteem. “  People should be required to pay for the space they take over, on an airplane.  Period.  Whether the passenger requires more space for children, workspace, breathing room, or ass – those people should be required to pay for that space.  If it turns out that the flight has space to spare,  these people could be given a refund for all but one purchased seat.  Otherwise, in a packed plane, let people pay for whatever space they cover, and people who cover less space should pay less than people who cover two or even three spaces.

“I have a right to fly, boo hoo, just like everyone else, wah wah.”  Sure you do.  But if you take up more than one seat, you should have to buy more than one seat.

Honest to boo; I didn’t even have a place for my feet.  I rode the entire way with one foot resting on top of the other.

And now, let it begin.  More people will side with this woman than with her victims.  Why is that?  I’ve been wondering that for a long time now.

I’m not a mean person; really, I’m not.  Well, not usually.  But I do believe, and quite firmly, that on a plane, nobody has a right to an inch that someone else paid for.  You want it, or need it?  Buy it.

School will be starting soon – or maybe it already has – for most kids, and each year at about this time I like to re-run this post about an issue that really, really makes me want to kill somebody and put his/her head on a post in the WalMart parking lot bothers me a lot: community supplies in the classroom.

When I was a little kid, one of my favorite days of the year (besides Christmas Day) was the day the newspaper posted the list of required school supplies, and Mom took us to Crowder’s Drug Store to buy them.

I loved looking at that list, and Mom always let me be the one who got to put the little checkmark beside the items as we put them in our basket.

Prang paints. Check. Paint pan. Check. Rectangular eraser. Check. Blunt-tipped scissors. Check. Etc. Check.

On the first day of school, I loved bringing my beautiful shiny school supplies into my new classroom, and I loved arranging them all inside my desk. I loved to look inside my desk and just savor the sight: all those cool things I could draw with and paint with and write with. . . and they were mine, all mine, and nobody else could touch my things unless I gave them permission. Me. I was the boss of my desk things. I took such pride in my school supplies, and mine were usually still looking pretty good even at the end of the year. They were mine, you see, and I had a vested interest in them; therefore, I took pains to take care of them. Back then, down in lower elementary, the school supplied only the special fat pencils and the weird orange pens.

When my own children were little,  I looked forward to Buying School Supplies Day with just as much delight as I did when I was a little kid. New binders. New pencils. And the most fun of all, choosing the new lunchbox. My own children loved the new school supplies, too. I think it is of vital importance that all children have their own school supplies; it is the beginning of them learning the pride of possession and the importance of caring for one’s own things in order to keep them for any length of time.

It’s not like that in many schools nowadays. I learned, to my horror and dismay, that many teachers do not allow their students to have their own supplies now; the little sack of a child’s very own things is taken from the child on that first day, and dumped into the community pot for all the kids to dip into and out of. There are no “my scissors,” there is only a rack or box of scissors for everyone. “Look, there are the scissors I picked out at Walmart; my name is engraved on them; I wish I could use them but they’re so cool, other kids grab them first every time. . . .”  There are no more personalized pencils or a child’s favorite cartoon character pencils to use and handle carefully; there is only a big on chewed-on germ-covered pencils grabbed at and used by everybody in the room.

And since nothing belongs to anybody, who cares about taking good care of them?

I fully understand that the community pot of supplies is much easier for a teacher to control. I wasn’t, however, aware of the fact that teacher convenience was any kind of issue here. I taught in the public schools for 26 years and I never expected things to happen for the convenience of me; that wasn’t why I was there.

I fully understand, too, that some children’s little sack of supplies won’t be as individualized or cool as another child’s sack of supplies.  I know for a sad fact that some children will never have their own little sack of supplies, at least, not one brought from home.  That’s life; that should not even be an issue. Some children’s shoes aren’t as cool, either; do we throw shoes in a box and let the kids take pot luck with those, too? I understand that in some classrooms, a child’s packed lunch is sometimes taken apart and certain things confiscated or distributed, lest some child have a treat that another child doesn’t have.   When my kids were in grade school, my mother would occasionally stop by at lunch time with a Happy Meal for them – and for me! – and I was told this had to stop because other children didn’t have that option.  Well, you know what, my children were often envious of another child’s dress or shoes or lunch or cool pen, but I would never have tried to ensure that other children would never be able to have anything my own kids couldn’t have.  Good grief.  Such insanity!

Teachers should keep an eye out for those kids who don’t have supplies, and the school should supply them, but after that point, they become the child’s own and he/she should be required to take good care of them, just as any and every kid should be required to take care of his/her things. Children who take good care of their things should not be required to supply children who had their own things but didn’t take care of them properly. As a little child, I was horrified at the thought, and as a parent, I’m even more horrified.  It was like a reward for being negligent! Every year, I donate tons of school supplies to my neighbor’s children’s school; I’m delighted to do this,  and I recommend this to all of you.  Perhaps, if schools have enough donated supplies, our little children will be allowed to keep their very own supplies once again.

When I was a child, I had very little that was my very own. Everything that was supposedly mine was expected to be shared with anybody else in the house that wanted it at any given moment. But at school? In my desk, in my very own desk, were things that were inviolably mine, and I can not even describe for you the sensations that went through me when I looked at those things that my teacher had ruled were mine and only mine. Kids who violated another kid’s desk were quite properly labeled ‘thieves,’ and they soon learned what happens when a person put his hands on property that was not rightfully theirs.

Things are very different now. I hate it. The rare teacher who takes the time and trouble to allow his/her students to have their own things is often castigated by the other teachers who are taking the easy ‘community property’ route. Kids are sharing more than gluesticks and pencils, too; I don’t even want to THINK about the incredible pot-o-germs they’re dipping into daily. Gross. My child using a pencil some other child gnawed? I guess so, because teachers who don’t want to bother with a child’s private property are forcing the kids to dump it all in the pot for everybody to use. “Don’t be selfish.” “Share.” Well, you know what? I don’t like that kind of forced sharing. I had to share everything, EVERYTHING, and that little pile of school supplies was my only private stash of anything. I do not feel it was selfish, or is selfish, to want to keep school supplies that were carefully chosen, to oneself.  Children who have their own things learn to respect the property of other children.  Children with no concept of personal property tend to view the world as a buffet of delights awaiting their grasping, grabbing hands.  Both tend to grow into adults with the same concepts learned as children.

This business of everything being community property in the classroom causes problems in the upper levels, too. Junior high, high school, even college students, are expecting things to be available for them without any effort on their part. Upper level students come to class without pencils, erasers, paper, etc, because they’re used to having those things always available in some community bin somewhere in the room. They have never been required, or allowed, to maintain their own things, and now they don’t know how to. The stuff was always just THERE, for a student to help himself to. And now that they are supposed to maintain their own, they really don’t know how. Plus, why should they? HEY, I need a pencil, Teach, gimme one. No, not that one, that other one there.       Indeed,

Well, it worked down in the lower grades, with community property. You just get up and help yourself; everything in this room is for me, ain’t it? Gimme that pretty one, I want it.

But guess what, kids, it’s evil enough down in the lower grades, but it doesn’t, or shouldn’t, work at all when you hit the upper grades. I’d like to have a penny for every hand that tried to help itself to things on my desk, because, well, they were there. I’ve even had students who opened my desk drawers, looking for supplies. Not poor kids who didn’t have any; just a kid who didn’t bring any and expected everything to be supplied because, well, down in the elementary, everything WAS.

Oh good grief, teachers, let the little kids keep their own things, put their names on them, and learn how to be responsible for them. Secondary teachers and future employers will greatly appreciate it.

I know that in some cases, it’s not the individual teacher’s decision – it’s a corporate mandate.  This is even more evil.  It’s like a national plot to make future generations needy and dependent and reliant on others to fulfill all their needs. And don’t we already have more than enough of THOSE people?

Let me sum up, as Inigo Montoya would say:  Community school supplies are wrong on every possible level.  Period.

Parents, if I were you – and I am one of you – I’d buy the community bin stuff at the Dollar Tree instead of the overpriced educational supplies store in the strip mall that the school supplies newsletter instructs you to patronize.  Send them to school and let them be dumped into the bins for mass consumption and germ sharing.  Then you and your children go shopping and pick out the good stuff.  If your school informs you that it’s against their policy for any of the children to have their own supplies, you inform the school that you don’t give a rat’s ass about such a policy; you did your chipping in and now you’re seeing to it that your children have their very own stuff and that you expect your children’s very own stuff to harbor no germs except your own children’s germs, which will be considerable, but that’s another topic.  What’s more, if your children come home and tell you that their very own supplies are not being respected and are in fact being accessed by others without permission of their rightful owners, you should high-tail it to that classroom and raise bloody hell.

I am happy to see to it that all of the children in the room have adequate supplies, but I can’t stress strongly enough that each child needs and deserves to have his/her very own personal private stash of supplies that nobody else can ever touch.

Do I seem overly obsessed about this topic?  Darn right.  The very concept of community school supplies makes me so furious I become incoherent.  Which is apparently happening right now so. . . .

There is such potential in every classroom, such stories to be told, such wondrous talent and creativity and sensitivity and music concealed behind the t-shirts and the grubby jeans and exposed underwear and defiant raising of the eyebrows and the punky hair and the chips-on-the-shoulders and the trendy slang and the stubborn glares. . . . there is poetry behind the obscenities, and magnificent scientific discoveries behind the unwillingness to conform.

It’s too bad teachers are no longer allowed to cultivate it.

Why can’t we be allowed to step back and bask in the glow of unbridled enthusiasm, and throw ourselves into helping students learn and discover and grow, grow, grow, both physically and mentally and socially and culturally and scientifically. . . . .

Mamacita says:  Back in the day, all middle school/junior high students had to take shop and home ec. They entered high school, and life, knowing how to use a hammer and nails, how to put together a simple meal, how to sew a straight seam, how to take a few simple tools and create something new or improved with them. These are life skills, not frills.

There are all kinds of creation, and an essay or mathematical equation or scientific proof are only some of them, and not necessarily the most important ones, either.

Back in the day, all elementary students were taught about basic musical and artistic base-line skills. Students were taught to read music, and to mix colors together to make new colors. Students were taught the lyrics to hundreds of songs, and how to sing harmony, and they were also taught how to recognize different artists by their personal styles and quirky signatures.

Schools used to require the students to memorize poems, and stories, and to write original ones, too.

Students entered high school knowing the rules for games, and about sportsmanship.

Cheaters were the lowest of the low, the scum of the earth.

They still are, but public opinion has changed quite a lot, and sometimes cheaters are exalted. This must cease. (insert smirk here, for who is going to stop it? Those with the power to do so are the same ones who often exalt it. Those with the power are sometimes the cheaters.) (Principal who insisted that plagiarists retain valedictory position, for example.) (Superintendents with no internet knowledge who make judgment calls based on. . . well, nothing.)

Cheaters are the lowest of the low, the scum of the earth. They may have achieved a victory now, but the wheel of life keeps turning, and the fly on the top will be the fly on the bottom eventually. And vice versa.

Ahem.

Doing away with woodshop and home ec and music and art, to make room for more and more practice sessions of ISTEP and review sessions for those subject areas that are covered in the mandated standardized tests, has done nothing but remove a few areas wherein some students found success, and replaced them with more areas wherein these students will certainly fail.

Not everybody is a rocket scientist or a writer or a mathematician. Some people are musicians and artists and craftsmen and carpenters and chefs.

And what is a rocket scientist’s or a writer’s or a mathematician’s life without music and art and furniture and food?

I firmly believe that every student should be exposed to as much and as many diverse areas of curriculum as is humanly possible according to the limiting laws of physics. Every person should know how to cook, and sew, and use simple tools, and recognize good music from bad, and look at a piece of art and see beyond the lines and borders.

Why are our schools casting the artistic and hands-on students aside in full favor of the academic students? Yes, schools ARE academic, but schools are also the institution that is supposed to prepare our students for the future, and the future depends on people who can read, write, do the math, understand basic scientific functions. . . . and feed themselves and others, and create beautiful objects for practical and impractical use, and nourish the soul and heart as well as the brain.

Only the finite can be ‘tested;’ therefore, only the finite is stressed and even allowed in our schools, these sad, sad days.

Maybe this is why so many of our young people drop out; the schools are offering nothing for them, only for those whose talents lie within the very limited boundaries of the ISTEP test.

Maybe this is why so many of our young people vandalize; they were taught nothing about what real art is, or even respect for it.

Maybe this is why so many of our young people listen to music that isn’t really music; they’ve never heard real music. It’s a fact that when the schools dropped music as a required subject, the recording industry took up the slack, and which of these has our kids’ loyalty now, hmmm?

Maybe this is why so many of our young people associate a song with a video; they’ve never experienced the joy and wonder of learning a song within a group and having it branded on the memory like a wonderful dream, and associating it with an experience rather than a television program..

Maybe this is why so many of our young people disrespect those who make their living with their hands; the school wherein they sat for years and years never emphasized it or showed them the importance of it. On Honor Day, the prizes for those who did well in ‘those’ kinds of classes were smaller and less shiny than the big trophies for “Most Improved Math Student,” or the many “Way To Show Up, Kid” self-esteem awards.

Maybe this is why so many of our young people are anorexic and bulemic and obese and existing on lard and salt and cholesterol; they were never taught the essentials of human nutrition and how to create it themselves.

Maybe I’m being too judgmental; it wouldn’t be the first time. Maybe I’m being too simplistic; well, of course I am. But even in a judgmental and overly simplistic mindset, I still think maybe I’m on to something here.

My dulcimer was created for me by a student named Rusty, who was pretty much nothing but a big illiterate hood, by academic and behavioral standards. He failed everything but woodshop, but in the woodshop he shone like a star. Put a pencil in his hand and he could do nothing but break it in two and throw the pieces at someone. Put a piece of paper in front of him and he would probably wad it up and spit it across the room. Ask him to spell a word and he would stare helplessly. But put him in a room full of hammers and nails and glue and pliers and saws and complicated directions, and he became a genius, a maestro wielding a screwdriver, and making beauty out of a piece of raw wood.

Our shop kids used to make dulcimers; it was their big project. Beautiful musical instruments, fashioned by the hoody crud of the student body. The kids were then taught to play them, and taken around to nursing homes and business clubs to perform.

No more, of course. The woodshop has been closed and locked for many years now. There just isn’t time for it any more, what with computer tech and ISTEP prep. Besides, all field trips have been done away with. (Except for athletics, of course. You really don’t want to get me started on THAT one. . . .)

Students like Rusty, who shone at nothing but hands-on, now shine at nothing. This isn’t right.

In our schools, we have fantastic musicians and artists. Back in the day, we cherished and nurtured these incredible talents. Now, we brush them aside and pull these kids from the studios and make them study only academics, because the arts aren’t tested. And if a subject isn’t on the test, it won’t be offered; at the very least, it won’t be taken seriously.

There are six or seven periods in the school day. Three or four subjects are ‘tested.’ The State has mandated “Advisor/Advisee” time, daily; that means our kids will get some serious counseling by some seriously untrained non-counselors. Some students will have as many as three study halls every day. This is inexcusable.

Of course, to do it all up properly would require the hiring of a few more teachers. We can’t DO that; those athletic buses and the athletic director’s five full-time assistants and the superintendent’s company car and $100,000+ salary take a lot of money.

And in many schools, the ’special’ teachers (art, music, etc) are shared by several buildings. Ask my Tumorless Sister about her schedule back when she taught at the elementary level, why don’tcha. It’s a moral disgrace. As parents, and as citizens, we should make our outrage at this misuse of talent known, with our voices and our votes.

Our children are more than a piece of paper with a few numbers on it.

Factor in individuality, talent, brains, work habits, etc, and you can’t help but have a set of expectations, and expectations should be met.

I know that there are exceptions to this and most other things, but I honestly believe that every kid should do his/her best, because NOT to do so just isn’t good enough, no-allowance-today-boy.

Of course, I also believe that a good parent knows what’s going on in his/her kids’ classrooms, too. That is, we should be aware that our kids, this grading period, are studying about the Revolutionary War, reading “The Giver,” writing little newspapers about things that happened in 1774, making recipe books with directions for preparing foods that the Founding Fathers (and Mothers) might have eaten, researching which Nation was already here and where they were forced to relocate and how do you feel about that, studying 50 words and their unique rules and exceptions to those rules, learning all about Peer Gynt and how to at least hum a few of the more popular melodies, and how to deal with fractions in everyday life (see recipe book assignment, above.)

And now I wish I were back in the fourth grade, doing just such things. Sigh.

Of course, nowadays there isn’t much time for creative assignments because the teachers are forced to use the time they might have utilized for such, to review and prepare for the almighty standardized test.

Personally? I believe that tests are sometimes necessary and occasionally important, but I also believe that the questions should pertain to “things every fourth-grader should know based on the available books and the creativity of the teachers,” not “things that are being pounded into every fourth-grader’s head starting three weeks before the Test because some old guys in the State Department who were influenced by a book salesman said so.” In other words, give each child a test based on standard fourth-grade curriculum. It would better benefit the child, and it would also better tell which children were at grade level, not that grade level is even the real goal.

As a child, I was always six or seven grade levels above the rest in anything regarding reading, writing, spelling, grammar, history, etc, but down in the depths of second grade remediation in math.

Guess what. I didn’t care then and I don’t care now.

In ten years, whatever your child scores on that test won’t mean anything, either.

What are those tests, anyway? They are tests put together by people who haven’t been in a classroom for years, if ever. It’s a test that is embraced by textbook publishers and salesmen, in hopes that the inevitable low scores will inspire schools to purchase THEIR books, because the new books all have individual State Standards written right in them and golly gee whiz, if the school buys OUR books, the students will do much better on those tests.

Eh, I’m rambling again. I really despise a school system that puts such emphasis on one test score that it ignores or neglects the really important part of a child’s education, to wit, the learning of things that will enable the child to better take care of himself/herself and others as an adult, to appreciate and love the writings and pictures and history of those who came before, to understand and appreciate music and art, and to be a part of a little community in which every child has an important role. Our students these days don’t understand how one vote can make or break an entire government. Some students don’t even know anyone who votes.

For some of our students, the teachers are the only adults they know who work for a living.

Many homeschoolers are turning out children with superior educations and abilities, and many are simply teaching their children that isolation from ‘other’ people is better and that it’s nobody’s business if you are fifteen and still don’t want to try to learn to read yet but be careful because if you raise the curtains, big government will SEE what we’re doing, or not doing, and try to interfere and make you LEARN to read so you can be JUST LIKE ALL THE OTHER CLONES.

Sometimes it seems like a losing battle, and yet, these are our children, the hope of our nation, and we have to keep trying.

After a certain age, I do not believe that blaming one’s shortcomings on one’s background or family is a viable argument. Ultimately, each person must stand on his/her own feet and walk out into the sunshine and shadow of life and do it all alone. We must not send our children out there unprepared, and yet, what do we do when the families support their children in their desire to NOT work at it?

I keep saying this but here it is again: There are certain skills that intelligent persons simply must have, at certain ages. When one becomes a self-sustaining adult, (which status of course many ‘adults’ never attain because their families and they themselves allowed them to go through school without doing or learning anything!!!) (My SELF ESTEEM!!!!!!) a decent person will be armed with skills, marketable skills, with which to earn one’s own living.

To allow any person to leave any kind of school without these skills is a crime. And a high school diploma given to any person without these skills is a joke.

If your child is 27 and still isn’t interested in learning to read and is still playing video games all day and still hasn’t learned to write and doesn’t know how to spell or reason. . . . well, I guess you all know my opinion of your child. And of you. And yes, it does become my business after a certain point because my tax dollars will be supporting your bum kid.

I worry about us as a society, I really do.

Here’s your task:  Read the first and last lines of each tale and see if you know the title.  You might surprise yourself in more ways than one!  (The first line will be first and the last line will be, duh, last.)  Well, you know, some people require explicit instructions.  Sigh.

1. There was once a young fellow who enlisted as a soldier, conducted himself bravely, and was always the foremost when it rained bullets.

In the evening, some one knocked at the door, and when the bridegroom opened it, it was the Devil in his green coat, who said, “Seest thou, I have now got two souls in the place of thy one!”

2. A soldier came marching along the high road: “Left, right—left, right.”

The wedding festivities lasted a whole week, and the dogs sat at the table, and stared with all their eyes.

3. One summer’s morning a little tailor was sitting on his table by the window; he was in good spirits, and sewed with all his might.

So the little tailor was a king and remained one, to the end of his life.

4. There was was once a woman who wished very much to have a little child, but she could not obtain her wish.

The swallow sang, “Tweet, tweet,” and from his song came the whole story.

5. A certain man had a donkey, which had carried the corn-sacks to the mill indefatigably for many a long year; but his strength was going, and he was growing more and more unfit for work.

And the mouth of him who last told this story is still warm.

6. Once upon a time there was a prince who wanted to marry a princess; but she would have to be a real princess.

There, that is a true story.

7. The wife of a rich man fell sick, and as she felt that her end was drawing near, she called her only daughter to her bedside and said, “Dear child, be good and pious, and then the good God will always protect thee, and I will look down on thee from heaven and be near thee.”

And thus, for their wickedness and falsehood, they were punished with blindness as long as they lived.

8. Far out in the ocean, where the water is as blue as the prettiest cornflower, and as clear as crystal, it is very, very deep; so deep, indeed, that no cable could fathom it: many church steeples, piled one upon another, would not reach from the ground beneath to the surface of the water above.

But when we see a naughty or a wicked child, we shed tears of sorrow, and for every tear a day is added to our time of trial!

9. There was once on a time a Fisherman who lived with his wife in a miserable hovel close by the sea, and every day he went out fishing.

And there they are living still at this very time.

10. Many, many years ago lived an emperor, who thought so much of new clothes that he spent all his money in order to obtain them; his only ambition was to be always well dressed.

And the chamberlains walked with still greater dignity, as if they carried the train which did not exist.

11. There were once five-and-twenty tin soldiers, who were all brothers, for they had been made out of the same old tin spoon.

But of the little dancer nothing remained but the tinsel rose, which was burnt black as a cinder.

12. There was a man who had three sons, the youngest of whom was called Dummling, and was despised, mocked, and put down on every occasion.

After the King’s death, Dummling inherited the kingdom and lived a long time contentedly with his wife.

13. It was lovely summer weather in the country, and the golden corn, the green oats, and the haystacks piled up in the meadows looked beautiful.

Then he rustled his feathers, curved his slender neck, and cried joyfully, from the depths of his heart, “I never dreamed of such happiness as this, while I was an _____ ________.” (dead giveaway, sorry)

14. There was a certain merchant who had two children, a boy and a girl; they were both young, and could not walk.

On this they tried to seize him and pressed upon him, but he drew his sword and said, “All heads off but mine,” and all the heads rolled on the ground, and he alone was master, and once more King of the Golden Mountain.

15. Far down in the forest, where the warm sun and the fresh air made a sweet resting-place, grew a pretty little fir-tree; and yet it was not happy, it wished so much to be tall like its companions— the pines and firs which grew around it.

Now all was past; the tree’s life was past, and the story also,—for all stories must come to an end at last.

16. A long time ago there were a King and Queen who said every day, “Ah, if only we had a child!” but they never had one.

And then the marriage of the King’s son with Briar-rose was celebrated with all splendour, and they lived contented to the end of their days.

17. You must attend to the commencement of this story, for when we get to the end we shall know more than we do now about a very wicked hobgoblin; he was one of the very worst, for he was a real demon.

And they both sat there, grown up, yet children at heart; and it was summer,—warm, beautiful summer.

18. Once upon a time in the middle of winter, when the flakes of snow were falling like feathers from the sky, a queen sat at a window sewing, and the frame of the window was made of black ebony.

Then she was forced to put on the red-hot shoes, and dance until she dropped down dead.

19. It was terribly cold and nearly dark on the last evening of the old year, and the snow was falling fast.

No one imagined what beautiful things she had seen, nor into what glory she had entered with her grandmother, on New-year’s day.

20. There was once a widow who had two daughters — one of whom was pretty and industrious, whilst the other was ugly and idle.

But the pitch stuck fast to her, and could not be got off as long as she lived.

21. There was once a merchant that had three daughters, and he loved them better than himself.

And that’s why, to this day, the castle is known as the Castle of the Rose.

22. There were once a man and a woman who had long, in vain, wished for a child.

Two of her tears wetted his eyes and they grew clear again, and he could see with them as before, and he led her to his kingdom where he was joyfully received, and they lived for a long time afterwards, happy and contented.

23. There was a king who had twelve beautiful daughters.

So the king asked the soldier which of the princesses he would choose for his wife; and he answered, ‘I am not very young, so I will have the eldest.’ — and they were married that very day, and the soldier was chosen to be the king’s heir.

24. There was once upon a time a poor miller who had a very beautiful daughter.

“Some demon has told you that! Some demon has told you that!” screamed the little man, and in his rage drove his right foot so far into the ground that it sank in up to his waist; then in a passion he seized the left foot with both hands and tore himself in two.

25. One fine evening a young princess put on her bonnet and clogs, and went out to take a walk by herself in a wood; and when she came to a cool spring of water with a rose in the middle of it, she sat herself down to rest a while.

They then took leave of the king, and got into the coach with eight horses, and all set out, full of joy and merriment, for the prince’s kingdom, which they reached safely; and there they lived happily a great many years.

26. There was once a poor widow who lived in a lonely cottage. In front of the cottage was a garden wherein stood two rose-trees, one of which bore white and the other red roses.

She took the two rose-trees with her, and they stood before her window, and every year bore the most beautiful roses, white and red.

27. In China, you know, the emperor is a Chinese, and all those about him are Chinamen also.

The servants now came in to look after the dead emperor; when, lo! there he stood, and, to their astonishment, said, “Good morning.”

28. Every afternoon, as they were coming from school, the children used to go and play in the Giant’s garden.

And when the children ran in that afternoon, they found the Giant lying dead under the tree, all covered with white blossoms.

29. Once upon a time there lived in a certain village a little country girl, the prettiest creature who was ever seen.

And unfortunately, it is these gentle wolves who are the most dangerous ones of all.

30. Once upon a time there was a poor peasant who had so many children that he did not have enough of either food or clothing to give them.

As for the prince and princess, they set free all the poor Christians who had been captured and shut up there; and they took with them all the silver and gold, and flew away as far as they could from the castle that lay east of the sun and west of the moon.

I’ll post the answers in a few days, if you ask me nicely.

Highly recommended:  go to the library this summer and check out a big thick book of UNABRIDGED fairy tales;  the politically incorrect blood, gore, daughter-selling, youngest-son-mocking, parent-fooling, and poop-in-the-suit will entertain you for days.  Don’t waste your time on abridgments; they’re watered down and a major disappointment, and that’s true for ALL abridgments. I loathe and despise the abridged version of anything.

Real fairy tales, though, are bloody awesome, and I do mean bloody.  Of course, a lot of the action is perfectly understandable; I mean, who among us HASN’T, on occasion, accidentally cooked and eaten one of our children?

Come on, take the quiz.  Who knows the real stories and who thinks Disney’s are the real stories?   I’m always more than just a little bit horrified surprised at the people who really thought Disney’s versions were the real ones.

Blood bath!  Cannibals!  Dismemberment!  Poop in your suit!  Never bathe!  Sell your babies!  Hell, DEVOUR your babies!

I do love me some unabridged fairy tales.

“Good, by my troth, daughter broth!”