parent-teacher

yesterday and today we had parent-teacher conferences. for those of you who have managed to get through an entire life without having participated in these spectacles, i will fill you in a bit first. twice a year (at least here in nyc) public schools set aside time for teachers to meet with parents and visit about how students are doing. my own school sets aside thursday from 6-8:30pm and friday 12:20-2:20. on thursday we have school until 3:10 and because it takes me (and many other teachers) an hour or so to get home and then a whole new hour to get back, i just stick around, go out for dinner, fix up my classroom.

this year i had help. one of my ninth grade boys decided to hang around at school instead of going home and when i realized he was driving folks crazy with his nonstop chatter, i invited him to help me set up my class. he started talking immediately. during class i have to ask him to stop talking about five million times, but outside of class, i like to just let him go. he's reading a book. a great book. early in the year he read a novel about the knights templar and wouldn't shut up until i read it. he was right. it's the kind of book you don't shut up about. but now he's got this new book and i'm beginning to see he likes knights and fantasy and all that, but he has this little kid streak in him, too. and so he walked around the room, taking chairs off tables and setting them upright on the ground, never once pausing in his assessment of this new book. he talked for fifteen minutes about a book. and his face was completely involved in what he was saying. and when his mom came to visit we talked about how he never shuts up in class but then i told him (and his mom) that when i was little i never shut up. and i never slept. his mom asked what my parents did and i said they did everything. they kept up with me. she slumped back in her chair and looked very tired but the kid's eyes got really wide. "you were like me?" he yelled. i nodded. "cool!"

parents arrive between 5:30 and six. they sign in and wait in chairs outside the classrooms and are called in, like at a doctor's office, a family at a time. some folks sign in and then walk off. when they return they are incensed that someone went in before them. things often get heated. grown folks yell at each other about who will get to visit with me first. i pretend this is flattering but really it's mostly ugly and i feel embarrassed for the children they belong to. voices get shrill. parents come in grumbling about having worked all day, somehow forgetting that i've been in this very room since 7:30 am and will leave well after they do. after 8:30, because even though my principal will announce at 8:30 that the building is closing and will be locked in five minutes (information that makes my breathing get short and makes my skin prickle) three sets of parents will be standing at my door and will refuse to leave, saying they've been waiting and i have to talk to them. all three will be parents of children whose names i barely recognize. children who show up to my class once a week and do nothing on those days. the parents will demand to know why their children are failing and will ask what i am doing to help their children. and i will resist the urge to get all snooty and say, "plenty. and what are you doing?"

and there are plenty of parents like that. people who don't really have any interest in the miserable fourteen year old living under their roof, but who come in to try to get me to admit it's my fault this child can't read. i don't. they leave disappointed. i no longer get parents staggerng in drunk or high like i did when i had younger students, but there are always a few wild ones.

one child came storming in with his mother, yelling at me as he walked across the room to the table. his mother sat down and let this continue until i told him he needed to stop yelling at me and sit down. he sat and began again with the yelling. i turned to his mother and asked if he treated her the way he was treating me. she said yes. now, here's a hint. don't admit to things that will make you look like an idiot. don't admit to things that will make you look pathetic. but she did and i figured she was asking for it so i told her the reason he treats me, and in fact all women, as far as i can tell, like dirt is because she allows him to treat her that way. i suggested she get her child under control if she plans on having anyone try to teach him anything because right now he isn't learning anything from me. the child continued to be rude and i continued to point it out each time. we ended the meeting with a handshake and a suggestion that his mom get a spine.

one child came in with a grandmother and mom. it was clear pretty quickly who was in charge. after i explained that the child was working pretty hard and was struggling with comprehending what she read, the grandmother asked what the family could do to help. they want her to improve comprehension and vocabulary. good, i thought. this is nice. they want to be involved. so i said what i know- the only thing that helps kids improve those things. read. read all the time. read and talk about what you read. read good books. read easy books and hard books and books about science. read everything. ask questions about what you read. tell people what you're reading, what you love about it, what you hate. and the grandmother smiled at me the way you smile at a small child who can't understand something you find simple. she leaned in and said, "yes, of course. but what can we do? isn't there some sort of program? some technique?" and there are countless programs designed to improve a person's reading skills and countless more designed to improve vocabulary, but a fourteen year old girl who had a hard time reading because she doesn't read much needs practice more than anything else. so i asked her. what are you reading? and her whole face lit up and she started spilling out this story of a family swirling around in a drama of cancer and poverty and struggle of various sorts. she was gesturing with her hands while she talked. i asked how far she'd read. ten pages. only ten pages and she was already hooked. so i smiled and said, "that's what you do. that. you talk to her about books. read with her. read to her. read the same book and talk about it. read." and and the kid got the point right then but grandma just didn't want to hear it. "don't you think there must be some program, something online she could do?" and i smiled at her and i smiled at the child who was still thinking about this family swirling in drama and i said, "no. i really don't."

a set of parents came in without their son. i prefer having children present so nobody twists anything anyone else says at these things (it is usually parents who are guilty of this, by the way). they lamented their son's grades and were surprised and concerned to find out that he shows up in my last period class about once ever two weeks. i did not intend to tell them that i think their son is a drug dealer. i've learned that parents don't want to hear that, even when it's true. they sort of have to come to the realization on their own. but they began to tell me a saga of endless brief cell phone conversations and mysterious treks outdoors late at night to get "index cards". my brain was itching at that point, positively squirming to tell them and i'm pretty sure my outsides were fidgeting, trying to keep my brain shut up. but then the mom mentioned they thought he might be smoking weed. my mouth slowly opened. the sentence was crawling toward the front of my face when the dad said they'd had the kid tested recently and he'd come up positive. i closed my mouth. breathed in. he tested positive and all she can say is she thinks he might be smoking? dear parents: this is why your kids think you are stupid. it's not your lame taste in music or clothing. it's not that you don't know how to text fast enough. the kid has been slapping signs up all around the house and they couldn't read them, couldn't put them in a stack and add them up. and so i said, slowly, "well, i have to tell you, when you put all that together, the drug use, the short phone calls at odd hours after which he's gone for a while, the cutting class, the sleeping in class, the plummeting grades, the fact that he has some pretty nice stuff for a kid with no cash, you might want to consider that he's selling and not just using". lights going on all over the place. "ohhhh," whispered mom, not as surprised as you'd think. same with the dad. they'd had these thoughts and put them away. hoping. and i'm not telling them this just to shove the kid further into trouble. the problem is he's not such a clever kid and if he's selling, he's selling for someone. and that someone is a real drug dealer. those folks don't so much fool around. this is the sort of kid who will smoke some of what he ought to be selling and will try to short the guy he works for. and if confronted, he'll act with a drug dealer the way he acts when i ask where his homework is. but drug dealers, the real kind, do not just put zeros in grade books. they are in business and quite a few of them carry weapons to help drive home a point with problematic clientele or employees. the parents tell me they are planning to test the child again over the weekend. i wish them luck. i wish the child luck.

but not everything is me feeling like my frustration with a child has just been shifted over to the child's parents. not everything is the big light going on over my head when i meet a parent and see why a kid doesn't think being able to read is a real issue. or why a kid is so obnoxious. one mom came in with her son, a child who is quiet and who seems to think i am smart and funny. do not hold this against him. his peers like the jonas brothers. he smiles as he slides his report card across the table to me. excellent grades. he is a good kid. and i tell her. i say a pile of nice things because i think a good kid who is working really hard ought to hear someone go wild with praise at least once or twice a year. at some point i stop. "but you know all this already," i say. she looks at her son and smiles. "of course i do," she laughs. "but i really like hearing you say it, too."

one of my last visits is from a mom all by herself. her child failed my class because it is hard for him to do most of the things school asks him to do. he is shy and gentle and when i think of him i think baby giraffe. he is the sort of child you instinctively protect. he doesn't ask you to. it's just what happens. he is very much a little boy and is quite shy but recently he's decided to grow up a bit. his spin on this involves grumpiness, which is very grown up. i tell her about his recent attempts at grumpiness, huffing around when i tell the class to get out a sheet of paper, grumbling when i ask them to open their books. somehow, things i would snarl about with other children end up seeming, well, adorable when this child does them. this is because, although you may not recognize it, these behavior changes are signals of progress for this particular child. these things are an indicator that he is struggling right now to gain control of a life he will always have to work to keep together. but his mom knows this and she giggles with her whole body as i tell her and says with a look of absolute passion, "i do just love him so much!"

wednesday's child

monday's child is fair of face,
tuesday's child is full of grace,
wednesday's child is full of woe,
thursday's child has far to go.
friday's child is loving and giving,
saturday's child works hard for a living,
but the child born on the sabbath day,
is bonny and blithe and good and gay.

channel 4 has this feature on the wednesday news called, cleverly, "wednesday's child". you know, the child full of woe. it's the strangest thing i've ever seen. every week the news crew goes out and spends a few minutes with a child who is familyless. a child "in the system". a child waiting to be taken to a real home. now, the way childless families and familyless children get together has changed all sorts of ways over time, but few things are as heartwrenching as seeing a seven year old boy painting while the adults around him are asking him questions on camera, trying to make him seem appealing enough to take home. like a new puppy from the pound. look at those dimples, they squeal.

in my mind i see people fighting each other, shoving and knocking people down, just trying to get at the child i saw today. he is smart and funny. he is incredibly verbal. he wants to be a cop so he can help people. who wouldn't want him? but when you look at the website you see all these other children who are wednesday's children. full of woe. descriptive terms include "lovely" and "articulate" and "well-behaved". more than half the children listed in the nyc area mention wanting to be a chef when they grow up. i have no idea why that figures so prominently but it does. the children listed include a set of three siblings- twin fifteen year old boys and their thirteen year old sister. a ten year old boy who is "mentally retarded". a fifteen year old boy whose past is described as "chaotic". there are seventeen year old children looking for families. nineteen year olds. twenty one year old children. many sets of siblings. an incredible amount of pairs of brothers in their late teens. most are over the age of ten. most are children with brown skin.

so what happens when they are featured on this show? when the seventeen year old girl is featured? or the twenty year old boy who is still in high school? what happens when the set of four siblings, aged 11 to 15 are on the show? the cynic in my brain says nothing happens. nobody calls and nobody visits the website to print out a form and get themselves one (or a few) of those children. these are stale children already screwed up by someone else. why would they be free if they weren't a disaster?

and the truth is the older children are harder to place. even for free (yes, i know. they're not really free). but this is how we got max. guthrie is store-bought but we got max because we saw a picture of him on a website for stale dogs. old dogs. dogs with problems. and although- or maybe because- he was old and fat and full of pancakes we fell for him. because that, really, is how we see our best selves. isn't it? a need presents itself and we don't know who we are until we fill that need. until we exist for someone else. and max looked exactly like these children. he'd been sent back once for biting a baby and once for crying all night. he'd been returned like a broken toy or a shirt that didn't fit. but we figured no amount of someone else's stupidity could match our own wonderfulness.

and we were right. max has given us a chance to be people we didn't even know we were. so i guess that's why they put these phenomenal children on tv like this. like commercials complete with the occasional "buy one get one free" offer. with "fixer-upper" stamped across a few. people who want new babies aren't going to get a child off the tv news. but nobody really knows who they might get to be until they see some wacky kid sitting down in front of a camera on the evening news, fat and old and full of pancakes, without a clue how to make himself appealing to parents he has no idea how to get. that's how strange things happen. someone sits in front of the tv eating chips and sees that kid being familyless and says that one without even realizing it until the words are out there.

pigeon

there are plenty of ways to get on a northbound f train in brooklyn. you can walk out of the ocean at coney island and right there is the f train, waiting for you. you can roll your wheelchair onto an elevator at church avenue, one of the few accessible stops on the entire line. you can leave the wilds of prospect park and enter the tunnels at the 15th street entrance. but if you're walking from bensonhurst, you can climb the dusty wooden stairs at bay parkway. two flights of slats you can see between, allowing you to view small strips of the world below you. mostly cars and cemetery.

as you walk up to the first landing you try to figure out what made folks build this thing two stories high. think about the fact that further in toward manhattan on this very line is the highest point on the entire system. be glad you aren't climbing to that platform. you make it to the second landing and you see an egg there, looking like last halloween, flat, splattered. it isn't right, though, because it's too small. half the soft white shell is lying between two of the floorboards and you realize it's a pigeon egg fallen from somewhere. you look up and there on the rafter directly above you, directly above the egg, sit two pigeons staring at the mess and at you. sticks and torn bits of plastic decorate the beam under their claws.

you want to take a picture of the shattered egg. the yolk is stiff and dry, little peaks standing up where people have stepped in it and walked away. you think about the camera in your bag and look up again at the two pigeons, solemn, like ugly guardians of the egg. what you know of birds tells you this is no real loss to them because they are birds and have brains the size of peas, made for building nests and finding food and for figuring out the mechanics and logistics of flying. birds do not feel sad. then there's the fact that you do not like pigeons. they are dirty and the city ones especially are always broken- dragging along gnarled claws or bent wings. half the city's birds seem to be without two feet. you recall that your hatred of pigeons did not stop you from thawing out a pigeon stupid enough to get itself frozen to a ledge once. and that part of you, not the part that knows facts but the part that feels sad for stupid things when- or maybe because- they are stupid, looks down at the crushed egg, which might have been a dirty pigeon someday but for the horrible wind. then that same part of you looks back up at the stupid pigeons, blank circles for eyes, staring right back at you. and you don't take the photo. you just get on the train.

turkey dinner

some time around seven the sweetie asked me if i was hungry. i was and i said so, thinking he'd head into the kitchen and start something on the stove, maybe burritos. instead he put on his shoes and headed to the car. now, i am like most dogs. i love a car ride. the perfect combination of soothing and adventurous. so we hopped in the car and turned toward roxbury and food. we passed a tall farmer walking across a stubble field, barn behind him, slow beagle loping alongside him. on past them a deer stood absolutely still on a hillside, feet from wooded land, ear flicking. we followed the river between mountains catching the last bits of orange from the sky.

and there, slapped right up along the side of a whole field on the side of a hill, were 41 sleek, shiny blue turkeys. if you've been here before, you know how i feel about the turkeys on the loose. if not, i know what you're thinking. you're ignoring what i'm saying and thinking up 41 fat, brown ugly birds too stupid to do anything but stand around. listen, erase all those memories you have of tracing your hand and adding a beak. forget the centerpieces and orange and brown candles. get rid of all the pipe cleaner turkeys and the cutout images in every fall classroom you've ever walked into. i mean it. quit thinking brown.

now, think of looking into a deep well. that's the color of these turkeys. think about the color of the sky when the stars first get themselves all sparkling. think lean. think elegant. think peacock. that's right. peacock. that's what these turkeys look like. and while we were rolling by, looking for food, hoping for a little something good, one of those deep well, peacock-proud turkeys stood his body up straight and fanned his feathers out behind him like he was getting ready to say something. and although i've seen nothing but this pose in all those stupid fatbrown turkey pictures, i almost didn't recognize it. because i have never, not even once, seen a real live free turkey do that. and it was so pretty i think i might have forgotten to breathe a few seconds.

bulletin bored

"there is some shit i will not eat..." e.e. cummings

you ever have one of those days where your brain whispers to you, quietly, after one stupid thing then a second, third and increasingly more stupid things, "stop"? just that. "stop". and you know how you're always surprised, if you're the sort whose brain does this sort of thing, you're surprised by how light the load of that last thing is. by itself you could carry it without even noticing. someone could slip it into your backpack or bag and you'd never know. but teetering on top of a wavering stack of ridiculousness, it finally makes the weight of the whole pile clear.

today, for me, it was.... bulletin boards. that's right. we've been down this road before. i hate them. my school, my district, the city of new york- all place an incredible amount of value on them. not the ones in my classroom. the ones in the hall. in this case, one in a hall two floors away from my own classroom. so today when one of my administrators called me during my class and proceeded to ask me when i thought i might put together my next bulletin board, i said, "i'm not doing it." that simple. this was today sometime between 8 and 9 am. i went on teaching the next three hours then visited a bit with other teachers who thought it was funny our school (and all schools in nyc) spend so much time and energy on something as stupid as bulletin boards while ignoring glaring problems like children with knives.

i went down to the office and was handed the most spectacular letter. it read:

re: counseling memo

i am writing this counseling memo to request your presence at a meeting on tuesday, march 17, 2009 at 1:00 m in room 107 (main office).

when we spoke on march 16, 2009, about the fact that your bulletin board was not yet complete, your final response was "i will not be doing it".

the purpose of this meeting is to discuss the practice, procedure and expectations of teachers in regard to the display of student work and your expression of dissatisfaction with your assignment.

there's a little note at the bottom promising me this is not a disciplinary action. i suppose if i continue to express my dissatisfaction, it will become one.

now, here's the thing. when a student in my class threatened to shoot all of us and said he had a gun with him, this same administration offered me nothing in the way of a counseling memo. it's not that kind of counseling. and although this same child has threatened several other people and has been in countless fights in class, my administration weighed my own life against his mother's obliviousness and my own life, the lives of my students, weren't worth protecting. i'd like to say that again in context. my administration wrote me a letter and would like to discuss my refusal to put up a bulletin board, but when a child in my class said he wanted to kill us, they did not want to meet with me. they said, through action after action, that our lives weren't worth protecting.

then there's this other thing. i have yet to teach through a single hour without being interrupted by phone calls and poorly worded intercom announcements, mostly courtesy of my administration. the same administration who insists we teach bell to bell. it is difficult for me to do this when i get a call from one administrator asking me if i've seen one student. another administrator asking me what work a student is missing so she can help him make it all up today (because grades are due and although he hasn't been in class once this marking period, she really, really wants him to pass). a call from the dean's office explaining that a student i've seen twice all semester has been suspended and could i stop what i'm doing (which is attempting to teach children to read) and make up a set of three lessons for the days he'll be out and send them down via one of the students i'm trying to teach to read because clearly that student's time is as worthless as mine. but wait, then there's someone asking me if a student can leave my class and go to some other class that is not at all my class and make up a test he or she should be making up after school instead of during my class. then there's an administrative type who calls reguarly to sort of visit about the students she's repsonsible for.

the announcements are quite a bit like these phone calls but they are loud, garbled and available to everyone. they generally begin with, "please excuse this interruption..." no. no no no no no. when i am trying to talk to my class about setting in the novel we're reading there is an announcement reminding us all that wednesday is the day we can buy dollar donuts in the cafeteria from dunkin donuts. when my students are sharing their creative writing assignments, someone with serious breathing issues hisses that big brothers/sisters will be meeting in the library at noon. and then about ten minutes later, while this same class is finishing up their stories the big brothers/sisters announcer breathes all over us again. when a student is asking a question about the parallel choices made by the main characters in two novels she read, an administrator who really should not be allowed to use the intercom without writing down what he wants to say first gets on the microphone and talks out the remainder of my class about how students who are scheduled to attend night school should attend night school. i am not kidding. i would love to be kidding.

when i have nine students in one class who have not attended in six weeks and i can't get any response from any of nine sets of parents, my administration has nothing to say. when i am worried about mental health issues affecting my students, nobody has anything to say. so i am saying no. because this gets me an appointment and a little time to say to my adminisrators what i'm saying right here. i will start taking my own responsibilities more seriously when they do. quite simply put, my time with my students is more important than a stupid bulletin board and i will do the stupid bulletin board when my administrators start paying attention to the real needs of my students. for example- a class without five million interruptions. a classroom that isn't 85 degrees, with sealed windows. drinking fountains that work. small thing after small thing after small thing. just like a bulletin board.

but for those of you who worry my mouth will get me in trouble (for instance, my parents, who instilled in me all this obstinate behavior), i have a bulletin board in reserve. and if the wonderful folks i meet with are willing to fix the issue of this constant interruption, i will put it up. i should remind you now that i'm the faculty sponsor for the gay-straight alliance at our school. and my bulletin board will say simply, "gay people shape the world". it will have photos of gay people i think are swell, with a little bio of each, including that person's contributions to society. and just for kicks, here you go, courtesy lambda.org:

alexander the great
socrates
francis bacon
lord byron
walt whitman
oscar wilde
marcel proust
colette
cole porter
virginia woolf
tennesee williams
james baldwin
andy warhol
michelangelo
leonardo da vinci
tchaikovsky
willa cather
amy lowell
bessie smith
eleanor roosevelt
harvey milk
peter the great
langston hughes
frida kahlo
angela y davis
aristotle
and on and on...

root beer float

my trial separation with the tenth graders continues. we have been trying to work things out. we are doing this because, for the first time ever, they're trying to do some work. i mean serious work. in a fit of anger i gave them a story well beyond what seemed like their abilities to understand and they've spent five days talking- talking intelligently- about it. we read something with a reference to root beer floats and only one of them knew what one tasted like. one. the downfall of the american family, really, society in general, is reflected in this situation. you get your first root beer float with your family. maybe at an a&w drive in. at least this is what i raved in class. they had no idea what most of what i said meant. drive in? family?

i have been mentioning in class how i hope we don't have to break up for good and how we should be enjoying class more, enjoying literature more. this relationship should be more fun, i whine. i've been telling them they're representing their own lives as very empty places, places it makes me sad to think they inhabit. i have been telling them how awful it is they don't know what a root beer float tastes like, how it makes me mad. i use words like heartbreaking and tragic and bleak. i have also been mentioning to them every day the good things i see happening in the room, the changes, new choices they're making. i am telling them the truth. i think they might be believing some of it.

our school sends out grades every six weeks- three times a semester. but because someone somewhere thinks that's not enough information for parents, we also send out midperiod academic alerts for students in danger of failing. so pretty much every three weeks parents get an update. they never pay attention to what i write. i use words like immature and depressed and inappropriate and overwhelmed. but they look at numbers. if their kid earns that glorious 65 (the minimum passing grade in nyc) they don't care if he sets things on fire, cries in class or hears voices. so i filled them out for the tenth graders and i tried, like i always do, to be honest, as honest as a person can be on a preprinted form. the school mails them out but i took mine to class and handed them out. they read and were indignant. "i do not ever cut class!" from a child who attended my class last marking period eight times. that's eight times in six weeks. "what do you mean i talk all the time?" i didn't even have to address that one. the other kids laughed so loud they quieted the snarly child. "i don't understand. why do you think i'm not learning anything?"

so there was a little tension in a place we'd been working so hard to make peaceful. they'd been working and it didn't seem fair to them to hold them responsible for anything that happened before the breakup. but i wanted them to see that it takes a long time to repair the damage of not caring and not trying for months. it's not about being good one day. it's about learning how to live in this environment successfully. i wanted them to see that but i didn't want to lose all we'd done the last few days so i suggested they hand write their own letters using the information on the sheet, tempering it with good things they knew they'd been doing lately. they did. they signed the letters and i signed the letters and they took them home. they did this because i made a deal. i don't make too many deals but when i do they're high stakes. very high stakes. here's the deal. i love root beer floats. i feel sad when i think about those ridiculous children not even knowing whether they love them or not. it seems like maybe at least a little bit of why they're so unpleasant might be that they've never experienced anything so incredible. so i want to have root beer floats and i want them to have root beer floats. i want to make some in class so we can all have them together. i want to see them get something new and wonderful and very, very simple. if they will take those letters home, share them with their parents and bring them back signed, i'll make root beer floats for everyone. but if even one person doesn't do it, i will give all the root beer float supplies to the teachers. we are all in the same boat. sink together. sail together. they don't even hesitate.

i have been talking up these floats, saying there aren't really words sufficient to describe the way they make a person happy. i explain how the ice cream gets all crystalline when the root beer hits it and how the root beer smooths out as the ice cream melts into it. i talk about the foam, how it sits on top and if you pour just right you can make the foam crawl up above the edge of the glass. i worry i'm talking it up too much and nothing could be that good for them. i worry they eat things with such intense synthetic flavors they won't be able to taste the soft wonderful rootbeeriness. i get nervous.

i get eight liters of root beer because i have no idea how much root beer i will need to make 12-20 floats (it's nowhere near eight liters). i get four pints of all natural, organic vanilla ice cream and a pint of soy ice cream and a few small cups of italian ice for a kid who won't ingest dairy. i get black spoons, black straws, black napkins. i get clear plastic tumblers that are square. is is absolutely crucial to get clear tumblers so folks can see the root beer and ice cream dancing together in the cup. halfway through class, two kids go downstairs to get the supplies from the fridge in the teachers' room. the cups are set out in rows on the napkins, a straw and spoon in each. i start dropping small plastic spoonfuls of ice cream into the cups as we talk about themes in the two stories they've read. i pour root beer into the first cup. they are appalled. it is hideous, they say. there's scum on top. they have never seen root beer foam. but one child wants to try it and i hand him a cup. it is delicious. i hand out the rest of the cups and for the most part they are in love. one little boy, a child i've considered duct taping to his desk, a child others have considered duct taping around the mouth, says at least six different times, i've got to start making these at home.

one boy gets out his phone. i glance over but he's holding it up toward his float cup. he's taking a picture of it. i'm not even joking. a few children want to make some. i step away from the table and wave them up. they don't know what to do. they watched me put in ice cream and root beer but they can't believe it's that simple. the flavor is too complex. one child finishes making one and says, amazed, it's so beautiful. she holds it up and turns the cup, watching the swirls, the root beer, the ice cream, the foam. root beer floats are heavy and although the kids can't really drink more than one (well, two boys had seconds) they want to keep making them. they ask what to do with the extra ones they're making. because it is near the end of the period, i suggest they stop by classrooms and offer them to teachers. they find students wandering the halls, children who have lunch but can't bear to be in a stinking, shrieking basement full of things that pass for food but really aren't. now i'm not suggesting root beer floats are lunch, but they're better than not eating at all. so the kids use every bit of ice cream and the ices and hand out all the floats they can make to random teachers and occasional students. some teachers demure and the students are disgusted by this. how could you not accept a root beer float when it's offered to you? but the random lucky students stroll down the halls, sipping from straws, spooning small lumps of crystally ice cream into their mouths. and when other students ask what they have and where they got it, they just smile and keep walking.

i did not tell them today that i don't want to break up anymore, but it's true. i don't want to. i think they know because they have been handing in real live assignments and they even did homework last night. and i know one or two of them didn't want root beer floats but they took them and tried them and helped make some for other people. but here's how i know they know i love them. they all knew i bought everything and they knew i really wanted to make the floats. they also knew one child didn't get his sheet signed. now, this is bad. i'm not saying they did the right thing here. i'm just saying i get the sentiment. they had a conversation with him before class and he spent class in the lunchroom so we could have floats (i found this out after class). they knew we wouldn't have floats if he showed up without the sheet. now, he only shows up about half the time anyway and i'm sure there wasn't any arm twisting involved, but i'm pretty sure he learned something today, which is that his peers will cut him loose for a root beer float and he better start keeping up with them if he doesn't want to get lost.

but i really hope the kids who showed up today learned that trying just a little, working, being smart, has real rewards. not just a passing grade or a decent job or even a root beer float, but a better shot at spending time with others, doing something simple and fun together, giving something without demanding something back. a shot at real joy.

mad max update

for those of you following max's drama, his recent completely terrifying near-death experience seems to have been some sort of ploy to get and abuse doggy vicodin. he spent yesterday lying on a pillow on the floor. we had to hand feed him and he didn't notice he was peeing on the floor even after i mentioned it very politely. i even spent the night on the couch so i could be nearby in case he needed something. he didn't. today he is up and walking around. he even jumped up on his short back legs when he heard food moving around. we are not quite sure what happened, but we're not asking any questions. we're just glad to have him back a while longer. gravy.

max v. everyone

i am home from school today. there is a large puncture wound on the top of my right index finger, just behind the first knuckle. on the bottom of the same finger are three smaller punctures, opposite the large one on top. there is, near the tip of my finger on the underneath, a small dot that was intended to be yet another puncture but didn't quite manage. at the nailbed, my finger and nail are starting to bruise. max bit me. in my mind i've tried to blame others. guthrie or jim. the sweetie. but i distinctly recall max's surprisingly fierce jaws clamped on my hand this morning. i was impressed that he wouldn't let go.

this all started this morning when max realized he was too tired to keep being max and started trying to go toward the light. with his cloudy eyes and his stumbling, stubby legs he was having quite some bit of trouble finding it and maybe there's something to suggest he'd been looking a few days. but at some point in the early morning he had a screaming fit, the kind that promises with its sound a sort of pain there are no words at all for and so the sweetie and i were trying our best to figure out what to do. i chose poorly. max did not want to be touched on any of himself. i stayed home today in case he needed me. in case he figured out that light.

after a morning alone, eyes open but completely unseeing, unable to manage any of us, max wanted to be held. i wrapped him in his stripey sweater and brought him to the couch where he snuggled up against me. guthrie, who spent the morning afraid from the screaming, sniffed around max and ran back to his own blanket. jim, though, kept hopping up next to max. i was afraid he would hurt max accidentally and max would destroy him without even knowing but finally i figured maybe jim was working on instinct and since i had no idea how to make max feel better, i stopped shoving jim off the couch. he hopped up immediately and sniffed all around max. he hauled his giant orange self right up next to max, next to the busted foot and wadded up back legs and the tail with a furless hole at the end. he plopped himself right down on top of his dog. and i watched max's whole self ease into the warmth of the cat. his eyes closed for the first time since the morning's screaming. we spent the rest of the time there on the couch together, max wedged up against my leg, the stripes on his sweater moving up and down just barely with his sleeping breath, jim spread out over him like a blanket, warm and orange, his head rising and falling on top of max's stripes.

when the sweetie came home we headed to the dog doctor. they're so used to us now i'm surprised we haven't financed a new wing on the place. we waited in a room. max's photo was up on the screen, a few years younger, but cloudy-eyed even then and ridiculously adorable. the doctor asked us to put max down and let him walk. he started out unsteady, all shipwrecky and drunk, head twisted. the longer he wandered around, though, the more steady he got. another doctor peeked in and asked to see him, said she'd seen his photo up and just had to get a look at such adorableness. our doctor said good things. none of this going toward the light. max didn't have a clue what was going on. he was nosed into the corner of the room and was trying to figure out how to turn himself around. but my whole body turned into a balloon and floated all around the room. i put his stripey sweater back on him and grabbed him up in my arms. i kissed the top of his head maybe nine million times, knowing it makes him feel better. this is what i tell myself so i don't feel so selfish.

max came home. i don't know what will happen the next time, what we will do when he doesn't come home. but today guthrie is draped over the sweetie's chair, up against his neck. jim is resting with his head on my arm. max is curled up on his green pillow all by himself. but he is here and that changes everything.

how to approach jury duty: a primer for special people

wake up at 5:53 even though you don't have to be there until 8:30. this is because you know if you don't wake up at your normal time, your day will fall apart. you do not do well with change. if anyone asks, tell them the dogs want to pee at 5:53 and not a minute later. although you've been to this exact courthouse before, mapquest several routes to it from your house. include train routes, bus routes and walking routes. you will not need them but having them will reassure you. leave early. you do not normally travel with rush hour traffic and you don't often travel on the trains when they're underground. you only have five stops to your transfer and then another two stops, but who knows what can happen on a tuesday morning during rush hour. lose your metrocard. yes, you lost one last week, but lose this one, too. buy another one and go through the turnstile. walk down to the platform outside even though it is fourteen degrees. you need to make your way to the end so you can be in the first car. this car will be less crowded and although you feel confident you have some power over your moderate claustophobia, why push it? get in the car. read. do not make eye contact. the car is less crowded than you expected although several people are standing. ignore the man in front of you who is talking to himself. tell your own self he is on the phone. when you are three stops into your ride and fully underground, notice that the guy in front of you is still talking, arguing, really. note there is no cell phone service here underground. tell your brain to shut up. realize the one thing that completely trumps your claustrophobia is your mild paranoia. your paranoid brain makes you get off the train at stop number three. wait while three trains you don't need pass by. get on your train. listen to your stupid brain point out all the potential maniacs on the train. tell it to shut up. consider whether there are medications designed specifically to get a brain to shut up for five minutes. figure there probably aren't. get off the train at stop number four. decide you can't win over your stupid brain and take the steps to the outside.

look at your map. congratulate yourself on your cleverness for having printed it out. do not realize you have printed it out not for the actual street number but just for the general street name. follow the line on the map. be mad at your brain that it is now seventeen degrees and you are outside. be proud of yourself that you are wearing wool socks, boots, silk long underwear, a sweater, a wool coat, wool hat, big wool scarf and fleece lined wool gloves. say something to your brain along the lines of "take that!" your brain ignores you. walk along flabush avenue for what seems like a long time until you notice nobody else is walking where you are. look for landmarks. fail to see the brooklyn bridge directly ahead of you. turn left according to your map directions. stop where you think the courthouse should be. be completely surprised there is no such thing there. walk around in increasingly colder circles. remember you didn't eat yet and head for a bank. come to terms with the fact that your atm card, which has been growing fainter by the day, no longer has a working magnetic strip. dig through your pockets and find three dollars. look at your watch. 8:22. look at your map. swear at your stupid brain for getting you into this situation. you are cold, tired, hungry, possibly sick and lost. keep wandering. look up and see the courthouse directly in front of you. you passed it on all three off sides before running up aginst the front door. look at your map. see that you've walked more than a mile out of your way. resent the fact that your stupid brain is laughing at you.

be happy the sweetie tossed a moose munch bar into your bag. eat it and find that your body does not fare well on chocolate flecked with pretzel bits as its primary fuel source. wonder if your brain and your body have joined forces. hate them both, just in case. be selected to be seated for a jury. hear the brief about the case. realize that the person involved in the case carries around the same specialness you do, the same diagnosis. the same label. know you can't be objective. spend a great deal of time thinking about a dignified way to present this information. listen to others talk about their own views. be impressed by how many smart people are in your jury pool of 30. go to lunch. come back. listen some more. be part of the second wave of public interviews. hear the prosecutor ask if anyone in your group can't be objective. hate the fact that you can't be objective. raise your hand. say out loud to thirty strangers that you are special. you are like the man in the case. this does not embarrass you. in fact, you consider yourself to be a very good example of someone living successfully with a mental illness. you are not embarrassed by who you are or what label you bring with you. it is the awkwardness of the room that makes you feel a little sad. the prosecutor stammers thank you for serving and the defense lawyer smiles that smile that suggests she wants to feel your pain but can't. consider telling her you don't have pain, at least not the sort she worries you have, although you've had an ear infection more than a week. try not to look at the other jurors as you leave. you do not want them to be uncomfortable with the weight of your label and what they think it means. smile generously at the prosecutor as he hands you back your jury form and stammers thank you again. stand up straight. everyone is speaking softly and smiling the way they do when they deal with children at funerals. wish you could tell all the people in the room you just left how mind-numbingly normal your life is and how happy you are. realize how happy you are. wonder what makes some people with your special label turn into you while others turn into someone who dies. blame the people around you. the family. the wild children. the sweetie. it is their fault you are alive. it is their fault you are happy. be glad. be grateful. be a little smug. notice your stupid brain has shut up and your swirling stomach is still.

sit and wait another two hours for someone to tell you you can go home.