"What Teachers Make" by Taylor Mali

Sorry. This might not end for a while. :]]]]

Also known as If Things Don't Work Out, You Could Always Go to Law School

"He says the problem with teachers is, "What's a kid going to learn
from someone who decided his best option in life was to become a teacher?"
He reminds the other dinner guests that it's true what they say about
teachers:
Those who can, do; those who can't, teach.

I decide to bite my tongue instead of his
and resist the temptation to remind the other dinner guests
that it's also true what they say about lawyers.

Because we're eating, after all, and this is polite company.

"I mean, you¹re a teacher, Taylor," he says.
"Be honest. What do you make?"

And I wish he hadn't done that
(asked me to be honest)
because, you see, I have a policy
about honesty and ass-kicking:
if you ask for it, I have to let you have it.

You want to know what I make?

I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.
I can make a C+ feel like a Congressional medal of honor
and an A- feel like a slap in the face.
How dare you waste my time with anything less than your very best.

I make kids sit through 40 minutes of study hall
in absolute silence. No, you may not work in groups.
No, you may not ask a question.
Why won't I let you get a drink of water?
Because you're not thirsty, you're bored, that's why.

I make parents tremble in fear when I call home:
I hope I haven't called at a bad time,
I just wanted to talk to you about something Billy said today.
Billy said, "Leave the kid alone. I still cry sometimes, don't you?"
And it was the noblest act of courage I have ever seen.

I make parents see their children for who they are
and what they can be.

You want to know what I make?

I make kids wonder,
I make them question.
I make them criticize.
I make them apologize and mean it.
I make them write, write, write.
And then I make them read.
I make them spell definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful, definitely
beautiful
over and over and over again until they will never misspell
either one of those words again.
I make them show all their work in math.
And hide it on their final drafts in English.
I make them understand that if you got this (brains)
then you follow this (heart) and if someone ever tries to judge you
by what you make, you give them this (the finger).

Let me break it down for you, so you know what I say is true:
I make a goddamn difference! What about you?"


It is better viewed as a performance here.

"What You've Got" by Eddi Reader

I've long since forgotten the majesty of poetry.

Perhaps this will rekindle your love for it, as it has mine.


"You must know someone like him
He was tall and strong and lean
With a body like a greyhound
And a mind so sharp and keen
But his heart, just like laurel
grew twisted around itself
Till almost everything he did
brought pain to someone else

It's not just what you're born with
It's what you choose to bear
It's not how big your share is
It's how much you can share
It's not the fights you dreamed of
It's those you really fought
It's not what you've been given
It's what you do with what you've got

What's the use of two strong legs
if you only run away?
And what's the use of the finest voice
If you have nothing good to say
What's the use of strength and muscle
if you only push and shove
And what's the use of two good ears
if you can't hear those you love

Between those who use their neighbors
and those who use the cane
Between those in constant power
and those in constant pain
Between those who run to glory
and those who cannot run
Tell me which ones are the cripples
and which ones touch the sun
Which ones touch the sun
Which ones touch the sun"


You can watch a performance of it here.

Love Handles

I think I wrote this sometime this year. Or was it last year? Well basically, I have nothing else to publish. haha. Whatever.



noit a nigami.


Love Handles


The sand scratched our feet as we knelt down to sit in the sand and wrap a towel around us. It was the Structure towel that I had gotten for free back in middle school after signing up for the Structure Membership card. It seemed like ages ago when all I wore was clothes from Structure; and indeed it was, Structure had long since been renamed Express Men. Back then, I probably would have never seen myself here. Back then, all I wore were khakis and white shirts. Back then, I had always thought that I would marry a girl at least four years my senior, because “girls my age were too immature.” Back then, all she was, was another little middle school teeny-bopper who knew the favorite colors of all the Backstreet Boys, but not that girls were allowed to wear colors other than florescent pink.

But there I was. Sitting on that beach—the one they always show in movies. Only this beach was littered with crushed beer cans and the sand was not so much sand as it was crushed rocks. But we sat down anyway, the cracked seashells poking at the soles of our feet, legs, butt and all. Otherwise, it was that beach. The only other people we could see was a group of small boys down the shore kicking a soccer ball aimlessly, guarded on either side by empty lifeguard stands that stood watch over a barren sea. And here we were with a Structure towel big enough to cover everything but our feet—the sun sinking into the horizon with the night chill fast on its heels. She shivered. I wrapped my arms just a little tighter around her.

We stayed that way until I could no longer bear whatever it was that was poking me in the butt. The towel fell from around us, and the warmth that we had collected escaped into the twilight.

“Stop fidgeting, Fattie,” she smiles, brushing away the veil of hair that hides her from me, tucking it neatly behind her ear.
“Look who’s talking,” I tease, pinching her love handles. The ones she had so fervently tried to lose this past summer. The ones that obliged her drag me out of bed at 5 in the morning because she refused to run around the neighborhood alone. The ones that compelled her to do fifteen crunches every night before going to bed as if it was the most effectual of exercises, “slow and steady,” she insisted.

After a feeble attempt to squirm away, I catch her in my towel and wrap my arms around her once more. I smell the ocean in her hair, and as the sun finally melts into the ocean, I rest my lips on the nape of her neck, then whisper, “Don’t ever lose those love handles.”

Say Anything

...was a really bad movie. a mercurial plot that did not really flow logically... but it did have this one quote that I liked.

Basically the movie is about a "loser guy" liking the "pretty and smart girl." They begin to like each other, but girl has to leave for a prestigious fellowship in a few weeks. At the end of the movie, they are both on a plane headed to England to continue life together...

girl: "Nobody really thinks it is going to work do they..."
guy: "No. [but] You've just described every great success story."

Abigail Adams is my role model

I've posted this elsewhere, but I cannot help but share this quote with all the world. (By world I mean the people who check this incredibly stoic blog, and but do not check the Funky Garden Fresh one--however the world may be.)


In a letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams.

April 7. 1764 ..."Shall I come and see you before you do. No I wont, for I want not again, to experience what I this morning felt, when you left."


You can "awwwwwww....." now.


Hope everyone is well.

End of the Spear

To love a people you do not even know. To love a people would kill you. What love?

I think I've a new found respect for missionaries.


"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Luke 23:34

"And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge." Acts 7:60

Memory

'God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December.' Sir James Matthew Barrie (1860 - 1937)

Why are people with the name 'James' so cool? he he he

Heroes

Hiro makes me angry. What a freakin' frustrating character!!!!!