Dream, motherf****r

Mikayla leaned out of the school bus window.
"Ms. Wagner, is this your only job?" she asked, matter of factly.
"Do you go to another one after here?"
"No, Mikayla....I'm lucky...I only have to work at one job at a time...."
She nodded her head as if she was mulling over the concept of an adult that doesn't have to work day and night to survive.
"Mr. Roberts!!!!" another girl screamed, jutting her head through the window.
"Bye!  Bye!" she yelled.
He smiled and waved.
Another head popped out of a window.
"BYE...daddy" the third said with a sneaky smile.
Mr. Robert's eyes widened as the bus pulled away and off to the Housing Authority apartments.

I read the email with a mix of sadness, frustration and extreme pissed-offness.  It was from someone I've been antiquated with through activist stuff.  It referred to your garden variety American Jew as a "Zionist" and was filled with vitriolic nonsense, knee-jerk anti-Semitic nonsense that was intended to school me in some way about the evils of those darn Jews and that my involvement with any of THEM made me one oppressive motherfucker.  I needed a break.  I stood in the shower when again, the metal ring that holds our shower curtain and surrounds our claw foot tub came crashing down around me.  I climbed out, soaking wet while water sprayed everywhere, disguised my nudity and walked into the kitchen.  I smelled electrical burning and noticed smoke, not steam, smoke billowing from the dishwasher.  My phone was beeping with texts saying that both of my co-workers would not be at work tomorrow.  I flipped the breaker and left the room, determined not to enter the back of the house for as long as possible.

I watched the video of a group of our students rapping and dancing around a community pool.  I clicked it again, and again and again and again.  It was infectious, cool, and a song about the joy and ease of making friends.  It is quickly becoming an internet sensation.

I stood on the corner of the autobahn in front of the school at seven-something in the morning, trying to help kids survive the morning Frogger game of dodging cars in the crosswalk.  The mysterious station wagon that is definitely up to something nefarious came wheeling through again, its incredibly wide bulk filling the street, tinted windows raised, red accented rims spinning and both spoilers on the hood raging.  Everyone cleared the street.

My niece turned eighteen on Thursday.  At the stroke of midnight, she met up with a photographer at  an abandoned building and took a series of creative photos to commemorate her birth.  Hours later, she got one of the coolest tattoos I have ever seen.  I have decided whatever I did on my eighteenth birthday was completely lame. 

As I ran into my second favorite beer man while buying some um, beer, I had to comment on how well his sweet, inky-eyed son is doing in Spanish class.
"Awww, thank you!" he responded.
"It will be great to know who his teacher is going to be!"
Uh yeah, the random, six weeks into the year fucked up quitting by his principal teacher.  Awkward.

Something was definitely up with the toilet.  As I struggled over and over again to make it flush, I thought of the other video I saw this week from another extremely talented kid from our school who is already an internet sensation.   It extols the virtues of valuing creativity in a wildly cool way.  It's inspiring, really makes you think that the only thing that is really important in the world is tapping your inner imaginative being and nurturing that instinct in others.

Hands occupied by plunger, my mind's eye pictured the boy's face commanding me to "Dream, motherfucker, dream".
 

Cool Like That

"Now you need a million dollars!" my favorite beer man commented as I bought a 12 pack and a Mega Millions ticket to rein in the beginning of my week long fall break.
"You get two days off A WEEK!  And you are always on vacation!"
"Yeah, I get benefits, too.  And a pension".
"Yes!"
"Don't worry, I'll settle for fifty thousand, doesn't have to be a million" I added, picking up my 12 pack AND my lottery ticket.
"I take you to India when you win.  But be sure to save me some of those beers.  I will be by later".
"It's on.  Don't worry, I've got your back".

I stood in the new snake house at the zoo, staring at the Black Mamba.  I hate snakes, but always go to look at them at zoos where they are safely enclosed behind glass.  Or I hope they are enclosed....whenever I see an empty habitat half of me wonders if the thing just escaped and is slithering around me on the floor.

I've broken up with my family, well at least everyone except my mom.  Or maybe they broke up with me.  I am sure it is the kind of thing that could be argued, like most break ups.  Sometimes it is a relief.  Sometimes I think of the years of traveling together and dinners together and wonder how everything has come to this.  I have a terrible feeling that things have gone beyond fixable.

Alec and I celebrated nineteen years together on the thirteenth.  People find our relationship unconventional because we are not married and we do not own nice furniture.  We have never shown an interest in kids, which I think adds to some belief that we have circumvented adulthood.  Fine by me.  I actually think you cannot get more conservative -  a nineteen year relationship that started when I was twenty-four.  What do people want, high school sweethearts?  I bet Alec was pretty hot in high school.

The weather has started to turn remotely fall like, the sky looking like it did on September 11th, 2001.  It was if Al Queda waited until one of the prettiest early fall days to do their business.   It is my favorite season.  On a whim I set a tent up in the backyard, thinking it would be fun for Lola and I to sleep outside in the cool weather.  I was surprised when Alec wanted to join us.  The three of us climbed in and zipped the door shut, laying outside in the middle of the city.  Just a block away, I imagined the lions and tigers of the zoo sleeping under the same sky.

This is the End

"Adiós amigos...." I chanted to my class.
"Ya, me voy"
"¡Ciao!"
"Ciao, darling!!"  one of my new fourth graders exclaimed, pushing his shoulder forward dramatically and raising his chin.
I might have a keeper.

I stood on the corner of the busy street in front of the school, watching school buses arrive and walkers and bicycle riders navigate the intricate network of crosswalks, attempting not to get killed by speeding motorists.  It is my new duty assignment; no more easy-ass coffee clutch hang out with the kids in the mornings and afternoons, seated on a stairwell landing.
This new shit is war.

"The wood guy thinks we have termites.  The inspector can come Friday afternoon.  Can you meet him?".
"Of course,"  I answered, picturing our house falling into the ground.  

I came home from Madrid almost ten years ago to the day.  There wasn't gas in any of the stations and when I turned on the television, American citizens were trapped on roof tops while a horse trainer appointed by George W. Bush failed to coordinate any type of federal rescue effort after Army maintained levees allowed the seas to wash away one of the best cities on earth. 

I stood, holding the front door of the school open on Open House night.  I sensed someone coming up to me quickly and felt a hug happening and ending.
"Oh hi!"  I said, greeting the wife and daughter of the man that just hugged me.  The man that I made out with once like, twenty odd years ago.
"You are in my class again!".

If I could braid the weeds growing around my house and the dust forming on the inside, I think it might make a neat, apocalyptic landscape.   But if I am too lazy to clean, I am definitely to lazy to braid.

"In, two weeks, I will assume my new position in the Central Office" my principal at school announced.   Great.  One of the only bosses I've had that actually gets me is going on to bigger horizons. 

"You won't believe the crazy letter we got from your stepfather's brother!"  my mom exclaimed.
"The end is near, the rapture is coming, he has done his own algorithmic shit and he says its next month....or on Christmas" she spat out, bursting into laughter.
"We have to accept Jesus in our hearts or else, mark of fucking Satan, it's over!".

A mental picture of dead people in blue track suits wearing brand new Nike high tops flashed through my mind.

"Do you think we should, I don't know, call some type of authorities about this?".

What Happened to Sandra Bland

I can't stop thinking about Sandra Bland.  I wish I could, but I can't and then I feel like a privileged asshole for thinking I should just stop thinking about it.  I read the comments on various newspaper articles about her unwarranted arrest, manhandling, detention and death and I'm shocked.  "Driving while black doesn't exist", "She should have been polite to him", "Cops have hard jobs".   Sandra Bland is dead and none of the shoulda couldas can justify it.    

I have been on the wrong side of men in authority quite a few times, whether it was the police or the Border Patrol or just some guy that assumed authority that he shouldn't have.  It is scary.  I don't think Sandra Bland did anything wrong.  I don't think we should have to bend over and take a foot up the ass because we fear what the police will do, whether it is getting a ticket, sitting on the side of the road for half a day, having charges added, detention, violence or worse.  We should not have to behave slavishly in front of some little Napoleon in order to avoid maltreatment.  But we do it.  I've done it, especially when you see that hair trigger moment and you discover that you're dealing with a maniac.  I saw it in the video of the attack on Sandra Bland.  She answered his questions.  Yeah, she didn't sound like the hostess on the Love Boat, but again....why should she?  She was about to get a ticket for something ridiculous and she's got this needling weasel trying to pick a fight with her.  Damn, she even had the nerve to ask what he was charging her with.  Yeah, she really had it coming.  Here she was thinking that she had rights even though she was a black, female civilian.

I've read the comment "cops dodge bullets for a living" etc., etc., etc.  My question, when Sandra Bland refused to put out a cigarette, did that pig fear for his life?  Did he think 'Man, I am about to get shot!  This woman is a danger to public safety!'?  Fuck no he didn't.  He knew that he was in no danger.  He was pissed off because SHE DID NOT DO WHAT HE SAID.  Why, she was supposed to be licking his balls and thanking him for writing her a ticket!  'No' is not allowed!

I think the thing that makes me the maddest happens at the beginning of the video, believe it or not.  The condescending, provocative little remarks and questions, designed to annoy.  He wanted a fight and he wouldn't stop until he got one.  My favorite part is when she asks him if he feels good about himself and calls him a pussy.  I would have to say that Sandra Bland hit the nail on the head there.  How did he feel about himself in those moments?  Did it feel good to toss this woman around?  Did he feel powerful?  Was it gratifying to 'give her the punishment she deserved'?

There is a book by an artist I like called "How to Commit Suicide in South Africa".  It is a reflection on the large number of prison "suicides" during the apartheid era.  Variations of those words keep running through my mind inadvertently.  How to commit suicide in police custody.   How to kill yourself in a Texas jail. 

I actually don't think what happened to Sandra Bland was completely about race.  I think the police have made it normal to play by their own rules and subjugate the populace.  I think this specific case had a lot to do with misogyny as well.

I fear the police and do not trust them.  If I feel this way, I can only imagine the feelings and experiences of people of color.       

Home of the Free

"I'm just going to ask her 'dónde está las galletas', I want to see those chickens!" my sister announced.  I tried to imagine our neighbor's reaction when some gringo woman pops her head over the wall that runs between our houses and asks her where the cookies are.

I went to Wal Mart to get my mom and my sister some things that they had forgotten before arriving in Mexico.  As I checked out the booze aisle, a man offered me a free shot of Dewars.  I rarely, if ever, go to Wal Mart in the U.S., but I just might change my toon if they adopted some of Mexican Wal Mart's policies.

Most homes in Mexico use propane tanks instead of, you know, gas that mysteriously shoots out of the wall through some kind of pipe like Americans have.  Roaming trucks with catchy songs cruise the neighborhoods constantly, in case anyone's tank ran out.  Strangely, the trucks in our town do not have a catchy song.  They belch out an airhorn like noise and a deep, pre-recorded voice perpetually asks, "Do you have gas?" as if the whole town is on the verge of a collective fart. 

My sister and I decided to check out a hole in the wall bar that Alec had spotted before heading back to Atlanta.  It featured some interesting local color and a few horses parked out front that had carried a couple of the patrons to their afternoon watering hole.  We sat at the bar and had some beers and observed.  I was surprised when a Mexican woman with a star tattooed on her face suddenly slid between us, simultaneously putting one hand on my sister's thigh and grabbing my left butt cheek with the other.  Without even registering what she was saying to us, I exclaimed "That's my sister!", in way of declining her offer for a three way.

"Wow," Holly stated when she finally walked away, "that's breaking all kinds of laws".

La llegada

We crossed the border three weeks ago.  After a grueling first day on the road, we made it to the Houston area.  Late in the evening, we stopped at a rest area that described itself as "secure".  As I walked on the little raised wooden paths in search of the bathroom, I began seeing signs that were anything but secure.  "Beware of poison ivy" and the more sinister:  "Stay on paths.  You may not see them....but rattlesnakes are watching you".  After locating the bathroom, I got lost on the less than secure paths and ended up where all the eighteen wheelers were parked.  Great, I thought, truckers, poison ivy and rattlesnakes. 

The second day, we drove south toward Nuevo Laredo.  We had our car permit, our Mexican car insurance and Lola's paperwork, as well as our passports.  In true Mexican border fashion, we were waved through without even being asked to slow down, even with Lola barking like a vicious beast.  We actually wanted to get our tourist cards; Alec would be flying home and they ask for it sometimes at the airport.  We circled the town with its bumpy narrow roads for at least an hour and could not find a customs area.  We drove by the river where Mexicans hung out on oneside and Border Patrol sat staring at them from the other.  We finally gave up and headed south.  About ten miles out of town, we were stopped at a customs checkpoint.  Good, I thought, maybe they can give us tourist cards.  The man at the gate asked for our passports, examined them, then asked us where the customs stamps were.  I explained to them that we hunted all over and couldn't find the office.  He looked at us, and told us to drive back to Nuevo Laredo and get stamped. 

We drove back angrily.  It was hot.  We drove all over town again.  Suddenly, Alec hit a massive tope that smacked the bottom of the car loudly.  The smell of gas filled the car.  Liquid was dripping from underneath.  We made it to the customs area and spent nearly an hour getting stamped, then slowly drove around the town, late on a Sunday afternoon, looking for a mechanic.  We actually found one who waived us into his yard.  Alec walked Lola while I stayed behind with five men in a junkyard while they checked the car.  They jacked it up, climbed under it, combed over it and revved the engine.  Finally, the oldest man told me there was not a leak.  We paid him twenty dollars and hit the road again.  When we hit the customs checkpoint, we were waived through emphatically, though we finally had the toursist cards to show them.  When we finally made it to our destination outside of Monterrey, all I could think of was beer, which was not being sold because of an election. 

Monday afteroon, we arrived at our destination near Lake Chapala.  The house we rented was even better than we had thought, with multiple terraces and a pool.  Lola snaked along the stairwalls and terraces as if she had lived there her whole life. 

We had arrived. 

The Love That Won't Give Up

Post planning days are usually pretty easy going affairs.  Post some grades, clean up your desk, check your computer out for the summer in case you actually decide to get ahead for "next year", hand in your keys.

To the contrary, Monday was a grueling, full day of work.  We spent the day with state DOE and district folks, re-writing our new, obligatory, standardized test and the bevy of accompanying paperwork.   By the end, I was stressed out and bitchy.

Tuesday was a second day of fun times with standardized test writing, as well as finishing grading a four part test for 150-ish kids and a two part test for around 100 kids.  And, entering all of those grades in the system.

Wednesday brought a new type of hell, with posting additional end of year grades for all 250 plus kids as well as determining the amount of growth each child accomplished, via heavy data entry on Excel spread sheet and additional entries in the system to report this growth.  And cleaning up the desk and doing the check-list.

Thursday was supposed to be the first day of summer!  Yet, the district requested another day from us.  That morning, I took Lola to the vet for her Health Certificate for international travel.  She nearly trashed the place and by the end, she was panting, I was sweating and shaking and the vets were looking at both of us like we were nuts.  We left with the certificate.  Later in the day I reported to the district offices to finish our work.

Friday, I prepared for vacation.  Late in the day I received a message that the district required still more alterations to our rubrics for our standardized test.  It could be completed via email, but some forms needed to be signed, at the office, within the hour.

Saturday, at seven a.m., Alec, Lola and I pulled out of the driveway and drove to Mexico.