Ringing Like a Bell

In full disclosure, I have drafted this post multiple times. That should help explain why it's been so long since I've posted anything. Every time I post to this blog, I've tried to be really honest about the lessons I'm learning and the issues that exist in my life -- to be authentic. Lately that thing has been forgiveness. I've been hurt. Friends of mine have been hurt. There's been a huge, gaping need for forgiveness in my life. I watched a movie recently that had a great scene in it that I think demonstrates what it means to forgive. It is called In My Country and is a fictional story that includes historical elements from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in post-apartheid South Africa. A small boy sits, stone-faced in a plastic chair while two adult men recount the way they killed his parents in front of him. One of the perpetrators stands up, then kneels in front of the boy. He's a grown man sobbing, begging to be allowed to do something...

Since school has been out, I've been catching up on all the little things I've put off during the year. One of those things, besides resting and going to the dentist, is listening to all the podcasts I've missed in the last few months. One of my favorites is the Freakonomics podcast. The subtitle is "The Hidden Side of Everything." So if you like thinking about off-beat things in a weird way, let me recommend it. The Stevens (Levitt and Dubner) do a lot of talking about unintended consequences, and last week I listened to one called " The Cobra Effect ." Here's a quote: MEHROTRA : So the “cobra effect” refers to a scheme in colonial India where the British governor, or whoever, the person in charge in Delhi, wanted to rid Delhi of cobras. Apparently in his opinion there were too many cobras in Delhi. So he had the bounty placed on cobras. And he expected this would solve the problem. But the population in Delhi, at least some of it, responded by f...

I, like my favorite literary icon, 'dearly love to laugh.'  In fact there's only one thing I like better --  making other people laugh. Last week I co-hosted our school's annual Relay for Life talent show. In between acts, Mr. H and I regaled the audience with embarrassing stories about falling down in public or being caught in mid - "Baby Shark" dance. I shared some of my best stories about how I don't need the subtitles on the show Moonshiners , how I got in a fight with my sister-in-law over some cole slaw, and how my dad sometimes calls me just to say, "Roll Tide!" This past week I've really seen how much joy and laughter there is at my school. I'm thankful. Victor Borge was right: laughter is the shortest distance between two people. In fact, there have been times when humor has been my saving grace in the classroom. Often when tension or conflict arises, if I can say something funny about it or change the subject entirely, the m...

Of all the things I need to teach my students, one of the most difficult is clear pronoun-antecedent agreement. For those of you who don't speak 'grammarian', that's the connection between the thing you just talked about and the he, she, or it that replaces that thing later on. When my students write, they are forever rattling off a list of men like Bob, Charles, Tom, and Alex. Then they begin the next sentence with 'he.' I've lost count of the number of times I've written, "which guy?," in the margins of  student essays. A few days ago, one of my classes was discussing a writing assignment. The thread of conversation carried us around to the topic of homeless veterans, which might have seemed illogical, but you've got to remember that I'm teaching a herd of fifteen-year-olds. One girls said, "That's messed up. They shouldn't let that happen." Her friend chimed in, "Yeah, They need to do something about that....

It's a lot like playing Whack-a-mole. I wake up in the morning and think, "Okay, today I'm going to work on my pride." Off I go focusing on being humble, and the next thing you know I'm complaining. I focus on kindness and I start being lazy. I focus on having more faith and begin wasting money on stupid stuff. It drives me crazy because I'm a perfectionist. I want to get it all right all the time. The thing is that people have been trying to be perfect for a long time. Take Benjamin Franklin for example -- he developed this system for himself that, frankly, sounds exhausting. He called it " the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection ." He explains the whole thing in his autobiography.   He literally kept track of thirteen virtues every day. When he began keeping his charts as a young man, he figured out some hard truths. He says, "I was surprised to find myself so much fuller of faults than I had imagined." In th...

Last year I read Malcolm Gladwell's book, Outliers . In the book he uses historical anecdotes to illustrate his overarching claim: success doesn't happen the way you think. He brings out several interesting points about community, experience, and simply being at the right place at the right time. He also points out some interesting things about the link between perseverance and over all success. I won't tell you all about it because you might want to read the book. I'd recommend it; it passed my fifty page test. Linking self-control and perseverance to success isn't a new thing. In the late 1960's a psychologist named Walter Mischel performed The Marshmallow Test . His original intention was to simply study the mental processes behind delayed gratification. It wasn't until years later when the children used in the study grew up that he realized the experiment had uncovered much more. What is the experiment? Watch this: Isn't Theo adorable? Mischel...

This past week was Spirit Week at my school -- a big deal. It's fun, especially since I like to dress up. I've been Mrs. Claus, a Ninja Turtle, and Hermoine Granger all in the space of a few days. Our students really love it, too. I teach in a community with a strong sense of unity and tradition. Not everyone is dedicated to those things, but almost everyone is. In the past few years I've caught that spirit myself. It's irresistible, like a virus. When good things are happening, you just want to join in. At least that's how it is for me. I could tell you lots of things about this past week: face paint, pop songs, cheers, tractors, football, seeing former students, and jumping on trampolines. Instead I'd like to tell you about a few moments yesterday afternoon, moments that made me so proud to be a part of my community and to work at my school. Earlier this year,  a new teacher on our staff decided to sponsor a Project Unify group at our school. Th...

    A Christmas Story is one of those movies you just have to see. What's not to love? Turkey stealing dogs, a mouth washed out with soap, a bumbled trip to see Santa, 'You'll shoot your eye out!", a triple dog dare, a bunny suit, and a glorious Red Rider BB Gun. I was thinking about my favorite scene from the movie earlier -- the leg lamp. If' you've never seen it, Ralphie's dad wins a prize . The anticipation builds, and when the box is finally opened, inside is a horrendously ridiculous leg lamp. His dad proceeds to put the lamp on display in the family's front window much to his mother's shame. It's all very funny, but the part that cracks me up every time is what his dad says just before he opens the box, "Fra-GEE-Lay! It must be Italian!"  The word on the box is, of course, 'fragile,' a fact Ralphie's mother gently points out. I thought about A Christmas Story today because something else fragile came to m...