"it's not an excuse, it's an explanation." so said an article i was reading about relationships between poor test scores and poverty.
because the counter argument, whenever one brings up that poverty is the best predictor of low test scores, is that you are making excuses. excuses for lots of things, they claim. excuses for bad teachers, excuses for failure, excuses for the horrible unions. excuses, excuses, excuses.
and so this article was seeking to anticipate that all-too-familiar cry with "no, Poverty is not an excuse for anything, rather, it's an explanation for lots of things. lots of things that contribute to children of poverty getting poor test scores.
but somehow, i don't think that those who don't get it, will discern this distinction between an excuse and an explanation. and while i could, it's not my intention at this time to debate those people about school issues, but instead, it's my intention today to discuss this inability to discern the difference between an excuse and an explanation.
because yes, this is personal to me. once upon a time in a land far away, an ugly monster, disguised as a handsome prince, hurled this at me- that i should not connect an apology (that i was trying to make) with an excuse. because the excuse rendered my apology not an apology.
ARRGGG! that's how i felt at the time, and truthfully that's how i still feel now. because i wasn't trying to excuse myself, i was TRYING to explain why i might have felt the way that i did, and how that might have caused me to act the way i did or to say what i had said. i was trying to EXPLAIN!
to me it came down to something like this: you're not supposed to scream outloud on a bus. it's rude. it scares other people, it distracts the driver. no question, you are not supposed to scream on a bus.
so one day, you're riding the bus, and you scream. really loud. and you are about to be thrown off the bus by the angry bus driver, until the passenger standing beside you notices that your hand is trapped in the door. and he makes the suggestion that perhaps the reason you are screaming is because you are in pain. so is that fellow passenger making an excuse for you? or is he perhaps explaining why you screamed.
so now, should the bus driver take that explanation as just an excuse by a couple of rowdy passengers? or perhaps should the bus driver consider that it was an explanation for the screaming and that he should seek to do something about it. like perhaps, listen to what's been said and then open the damn door to release your hand? and maybe, just maybe, even give you an apology for not understanding that your hand was caught in the door.
but no, ugly monster guy not only doesn't consider it an explanation, he calls it an excuse, that i'm making to what? to make excuses for what i said and how evil i was. and who else does that? he continues. that's right. abusers.
and that's about when i really lost it. SERIOUSLY? who the hell accuses someone of such a thing? really, who?
especially, who the hell accuses you of such a thing while you are trying your best to make an apology. if they supposedly love you? really, who does that?
ugly monster guy, that's who.
now in a fairy tale, disney-pixar movie type world, in the end, misunderstandings would have been cleared up with explanations, and love would have prevailed, and the ugly monster guy would have peeled off his ugly monster face to once again reveal, a sweet handsome one underneath those other two masks. but that's not what happened. instead he kept wearing the ugly monster face and walked away leaving me to behave as something of a banshee, myself. and this is not an excuse for my bansheeness, not because it's not an explanation, but because there is no excuse of that for myself. i sunk to new lows. and that is that. no excuses here. it is what it is. i was human. and so at times, i suck.
and the sequel to the story is that when he walked away, he slapped the handsome face back on and pretended it all never happened, and went on to live happily ever after with someone either better than me or luckier than me, or both. hakuna matata to you, darlin'.
me? well, yes, i've made improvements in my life, and i've done an awful lot (read: too much) of introspection about myself, and i've moved a bit forward. but even still, i feel that i'm the loser here. i'm the one who obsesses in a diary/blog about it all. and relates almost every experience i have or thing that i read against that now long-ago event.
and on this, i'm not making an excuse, but once again, rather an apology (to any reader)- hooked with the explanation that i've been able to come up with for myself. you'd think that i'd just be glad that my hand was no longer trapped in the door, wouldn't you? instead, i obsess. and i'm truly sorry.
but just so you know, dear reader- i actually am better through this obsession. the obsession helped me gain and helps me keep perspective. i AM glad that my hand is no longer trapped in the door. No longer do i shed tears or gnash my teeth or sob uncontrollably. no longer do i seek out counselors or therapists or divine intervention or death. no longer, am i truly unhappy. in fact, most of the time now, i am quite happy. i love my new life, my new apt., my new job, many new friends. i love my family.
but i gotta tell you, i still wish the whole thing- soup to nuts, good to bad, would have never ever happened. i'm MAD that my hand is damaged, ok? yes, i can use my left hand quite well, i'm adaptable. but i miss my right hand ok? and i'm not one of those who was glad she got cancer to teach her the meaning of life or that life is good and precious. i had a pretty good grasp that life was good before i met him. i had a pretty good grasp that i should be grateful for all that i had before i knew him. i did not need a lesson or even a wake-up call. i am better yes, but i am not a better person because of it all. so, i'm not willing to make that excuse for it all. but i might make that explanation.
Thursday, November 7, 2013
Wednesday, November 6, 2013
fractions and smoking saves a life
so there really is rarely a dull moment at the center i work at on monday and wednesday nights. it's an inner-city site. some of our staff won't work there. it's too inner city for them. but i like it there. and i get along very well with our clients who are working to get their geds there. i actually always look forward to mon and wed. nights.
and the evening started with me subbing for the regular teacher. when he called to ask if i could cover for him until he got there, i said, "sure, anything particular you want me to cover?" and to my dismay, he said "anything with math, because i'm doing language arts when i get there." i said, "ok." but as you might well know, i hate math. i'm bad at math. no, i really truly suck at math.
but i'm a trooper so i go into the classroom, and i tell the class that the teacher will be late, and that i've been asked to work with them on math, so what i want to know before i pull out materials is what they'd been working on and what was giving them trouble, so we could jumble through it together.
and right away, they all agreed on fractions. they are struggling with fractions. and i'm thinking "yeah, i can do fractions. i get them! i can handle this! yeah!" so i go back to our storage cabinet and grab some materials to use to get us started.
and i start very simply. just review. and slowly, together we worked, and it's one of those great teacher moments when you actually see lightbulbs going off above their heads.
when the teacher got there an hour in, he tells them they can go take a break, and when they come back they'll work on the language arts. well usually, all of these people are smokers. and so about half of them went outside to smoke, and the other half came over to tell me how much they had appreciated my math lesson. and they told me how no disrespect to xxxxxx, but that they really liked it better when i was teaching math, because i was both funny, and i explained things so simply and step by step, that they actually got it. according to them, xxxxxxx goes too fast.
so i laughed, and said "well, that's because i suck at math, and i know exactly where a mistake can be made, so i slow it down, and break it down how i've always needed it broken down."
so part of the reason i'm telling you this is to brag. -that while i suck at math, it appears that i'm a great math teacher. but also part of the reason is to tell you that my flatterers did not get outside to smoke during this break.
so because they didn't, about an hour later, they asked xxxxxxx, if they could have another break to go out to smoke.
and he agrees, and i'm sitting at the computer doing my work, when xxxxxxx comes up, and says, "can you call for an ambulance, there's an old man out in the parking lot who has fallen down, and he thinks he broke his hip, he can't move."
and so i go to the phone and call 911 to have the ambulance come while xxxxxxx goes out to hold an umbrella over the poor guy who is lying on the ground in the rain.
and then i hear the story of how he was found. on the second smoke break, that was called for the nicotine-deprived smokers who spent their first break inside with me, the smokers found the guy on the ground and they came in to get xxxxxxx, who told me to call 911.
and the guy was an older man, in his late 70's i guess, who had been at a meeting upstairs at the center earlier but had left the meeting early because he needed to get home because he was preparing to go in to have a defibrilator placed in the morning. and the meeting he'd left was scheduled to go on for at least another hour. our class was scheduled to meet for another hour and 1/2. so potentially, the poor guy with a heart problem would have laid in the cold rain for 2 hours in all if my smokers hadn't discovered him. i can't think it would have ended well.
but discover him they did, 911 was called, and they came and took him to the local hospital, and it appears that all will be well, afterall.
and that's how fractions and smoking saved a life.
and the evening started with me subbing for the regular teacher. when he called to ask if i could cover for him until he got there, i said, "sure, anything particular you want me to cover?" and to my dismay, he said "anything with math, because i'm doing language arts when i get there." i said, "ok." but as you might well know, i hate math. i'm bad at math. no, i really truly suck at math.
but i'm a trooper so i go into the classroom, and i tell the class that the teacher will be late, and that i've been asked to work with them on math, so what i want to know before i pull out materials is what they'd been working on and what was giving them trouble, so we could jumble through it together.
and right away, they all agreed on fractions. they are struggling with fractions. and i'm thinking "yeah, i can do fractions. i get them! i can handle this! yeah!" so i go back to our storage cabinet and grab some materials to use to get us started.
and i start very simply. just review. and slowly, together we worked, and it's one of those great teacher moments when you actually see lightbulbs going off above their heads.
when the teacher got there an hour in, he tells them they can go take a break, and when they come back they'll work on the language arts. well usually, all of these people are smokers. and so about half of them went outside to smoke, and the other half came over to tell me how much they had appreciated my math lesson. and they told me how no disrespect to xxxxxx, but that they really liked it better when i was teaching math, because i was both funny, and i explained things so simply and step by step, that they actually got it. according to them, xxxxxxx goes too fast.
so i laughed, and said "well, that's because i suck at math, and i know exactly where a mistake can be made, so i slow it down, and break it down how i've always needed it broken down."
so part of the reason i'm telling you this is to brag. -that while i suck at math, it appears that i'm a great math teacher. but also part of the reason is to tell you that my flatterers did not get outside to smoke during this break.
so because they didn't, about an hour later, they asked xxxxxxx, if they could have another break to go out to smoke.
and he agrees, and i'm sitting at the computer doing my work, when xxxxxxx comes up, and says, "can you call for an ambulance, there's an old man out in the parking lot who has fallen down, and he thinks he broke his hip, he can't move."
and so i go to the phone and call 911 to have the ambulance come while xxxxxxx goes out to hold an umbrella over the poor guy who is lying on the ground in the rain.
and then i hear the story of how he was found. on the second smoke break, that was called for the nicotine-deprived smokers who spent their first break inside with me, the smokers found the guy on the ground and they came in to get xxxxxxx, who told me to call 911.
and the guy was an older man, in his late 70's i guess, who had been at a meeting upstairs at the center earlier but had left the meeting early because he needed to get home because he was preparing to go in to have a defibrilator placed in the morning. and the meeting he'd left was scheduled to go on for at least another hour. our class was scheduled to meet for another hour and 1/2. so potentially, the poor guy with a heart problem would have laid in the cold rain for 2 hours in all if my smokers hadn't discovered him. i can't think it would have ended well.
but discover him they did, 911 was called, and they came and took him to the local hospital, and it appears that all will be well, afterall.
and that's how fractions and smoking saved a life.
Sunday, November 3, 2013
walls of brick
so there are just going to be people you disagree with. people you can't reconcile with. and ideologies that people hold that can't be squared with your own.
i used to think people could work things out, if only reason and facts and fairness and the right words were introduced to the situation. but now i don't. i just think that there are some chasms that can't be bridged or crawled or swum or flown acorss. sometimes there is just no meeting in the middle.
sometimes it's people that refuse to hear you. sometimes it's that their side of things is plain repulsive to you. sometimes it's that a person can't be forgiving. sometimes it's that a person cannot be trusted.
and i have to tell you that i've got less and less respect these days for people that pretend they can bring sides together. mediators, therapists, psychologists, lawyers, politicians. i mostly think these days, that the only thing accomplished by employing one of these folks is some commerce is transacted.
anyway, i think that the best you can ever hope for is that people who you disagree with are decent folk, who won't try to hurt you if you disagree. and that you can agree to live on other sides of the fence. peaceably.
the problem comes in though when public resources must be shared or agreed upon. and i guess that is why there are laws. sad though that some people won't respect those laws either by out and out breaking them or by buying their way out of them or by bullying or manipulating their way out.
anyway, it makes me sad. for about 3 weeks now I've been trying to get something written. A letter to some of the lawmakers in my state who have decided to circumvent the laws of our state and play games with public money and our votes. and if we still used paper, i can't even tell you how many trees i'd have destroyed by now, writing and then crumpling up the paper. i can't find the right words. that would get them to see what i so wish they'd see.
and it occurs to me, that the reason i'm having so much trouble is that there really are no words for these people. no words that will help them to understand. they are brickwalls. they simply do not want to listen or understand. they are being paid to have an opposite opinion. and i can't fight money with my puny words. puny words are no match for brickwalls.
and i might as well save my breath because there aren't words. and apparently there are no numbers i can use either.
because now it appears, according to a Yale study, that numbers (unless they are connected to dollar signs, as in bribes) won't help you change anyone's mind either. did you read about this study? listen to this, "it turns out that highly numerate liberals and conservatives were even more—not less—susceptible to letting politics skew their reasoning than were those with less mathematical ability."
sigh. brickwalls. impervious to everything but money and sledgehammers.
i used to think people could work things out, if only reason and facts and fairness and the right words were introduced to the situation. but now i don't. i just think that there are some chasms that can't be bridged or crawled or swum or flown acorss. sometimes there is just no meeting in the middle.
sometimes it's people that refuse to hear you. sometimes it's that their side of things is plain repulsive to you. sometimes it's that a person can't be forgiving. sometimes it's that a person cannot be trusted.
and i have to tell you that i've got less and less respect these days for people that pretend they can bring sides together. mediators, therapists, psychologists, lawyers, politicians. i mostly think these days, that the only thing accomplished by employing one of these folks is some commerce is transacted.
anyway, i think that the best you can ever hope for is that people who you disagree with are decent folk, who won't try to hurt you if you disagree. and that you can agree to live on other sides of the fence. peaceably.
the problem comes in though when public resources must be shared or agreed upon. and i guess that is why there are laws. sad though that some people won't respect those laws either by out and out breaking them or by buying their way out of them or by bullying or manipulating their way out.
anyway, it makes me sad. for about 3 weeks now I've been trying to get something written. A letter to some of the lawmakers in my state who have decided to circumvent the laws of our state and play games with public money and our votes. and if we still used paper, i can't even tell you how many trees i'd have destroyed by now, writing and then crumpling up the paper. i can't find the right words. that would get them to see what i so wish they'd see.
and it occurs to me, that the reason i'm having so much trouble is that there really are no words for these people. no words that will help them to understand. they are brickwalls. they simply do not want to listen or understand. they are being paid to have an opposite opinion. and i can't fight money with my puny words. puny words are no match for brickwalls.
and i might as well save my breath because there aren't words. and apparently there are no numbers i can use either.
because now it appears, according to a Yale study, that numbers (unless they are connected to dollar signs, as in bribes) won't help you change anyone's mind either. did you read about this study? listen to this, "it turns out that highly numerate liberals and conservatives were even more—not less—susceptible to letting politics skew their reasoning than were those with less mathematical ability."
sigh. brickwalls. impervious to everything but money and sledgehammers.
Friday, November 1, 2013
the weekend!
i am so grateful that it's finally here! not that i'm doing that much besides meeting up with some friends for a bit tomorrow. but heavens to pete, what a week. and i'm SO glad to be home, sweet, apartment. with nothing more challenging than my laundry to do.
i worked every night this week. so roughly, i worked at least 8 hour days each day, even while the days are split up to a.m. and p.m. sessions.
now i know. it's beyond ridiculous for (especially) me to feel like that's a lot of work. i mean, good grief, i used to work close to 80 hours a week, all told. and i did that for years. upon years. and then each day came home and made a horrible stab at raising children and keeping a house. and wow, i even used to volunteer and chair committees on top of that!. and i realize that i would get maybe 4 weeks off in the summer. but still, i was running a sleep debt that was mounting up higher than the federal deficit. and making me next to insane, i think.
and my fatigue right now also seems crazy- because even while i worked more hours than usual this week, this job really has next to none of the mental and emotional stress that the old one did. when i look back on that stress now, i really couldn't tell you how i survived, how i was ever civil to anyone at all ever, or how i didn't either go postal or off myself. it almost seems something of a miracle, now that i look back on it. they really were NOT the good old days. at all. but even while it's nothing compared to what i used to deal with, i do have to say that last night presented a bit of a challenge, dealing with a crazy, rather intense situation. but still. that was nothing compared to the past. and it was one night of intensity. not the every night. and certainly not the "things hanging over my head all the time even while i was supposedly off work" kind of intensity.
so anyway, it seems ludicrous that i'd be so tired tonight. and so very glad to stay in doing nothing but sampling a glass of wine, watching some home & garden tv, while simmering a new recipe in the crockpot. it smells delicious, btw. not even sure i can wait the full six hours of simmmering before diving into it.
all the same- YAY! the WEEKEND!
i worked every night this week. so roughly, i worked at least 8 hour days each day, even while the days are split up to a.m. and p.m. sessions.
now i know. it's beyond ridiculous for (especially) me to feel like that's a lot of work. i mean, good grief, i used to work close to 80 hours a week, all told. and i did that for years. upon years. and then each day came home and made a horrible stab at raising children and keeping a house. and wow, i even used to volunteer and chair committees on top of that!. and i realize that i would get maybe 4 weeks off in the summer. but still, i was running a sleep debt that was mounting up higher than the federal deficit. and making me next to insane, i think.
and my fatigue right now also seems crazy- because even while i worked more hours than usual this week, this job really has next to none of the mental and emotional stress that the old one did. when i look back on that stress now, i really couldn't tell you how i survived, how i was ever civil to anyone at all ever, or how i didn't either go postal or off myself. it almost seems something of a miracle, now that i look back on it. they really were NOT the good old days. at all. but even while it's nothing compared to what i used to deal with, i do have to say that last night presented a bit of a challenge, dealing with a crazy, rather intense situation. but still. that was nothing compared to the past. and it was one night of intensity. not the every night. and certainly not the "things hanging over my head all the time even while i was supposedly off work" kind of intensity.
so anyway, it seems ludicrous that i'd be so tired tonight. and so very glad to stay in doing nothing but sampling a glass of wine, watching some home & garden tv, while simmering a new recipe in the crockpot. it smells delicious, btw. not even sure i can wait the full six hours of simmmering before diving into it.
all the same- YAY! the WEEKEND!
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