Musketeers

"You guys have to understand that when it gets warm outside, Steve is going to want to leave.  He'll want to be with his people, maybe meet the ladies....I've been leaving the top of his terrarium open and so far, he's been choosing to stay with us....but we have to be ready for that to change...."
I looked at the small brown and sometimes green lizard that had taken up residence in the trailer's recycling bin.  He had remained so long that I decided to buy him a small "bedroom" so that he might be more comfortable, and safely enclosed so that he could be hidden from the custodians and not free roam when it wasn't safe.  Forty-five dollars worth of moss, hollowed-out log, feeding dishes and freeze-dried crickets.
"Maybe the ladies will come to him...." Juan mentioned absent-mindedly, eyes glued to the little lizard inside his terrarium in the middle of the table.
"I think Steve will be a gentleman."  Faba seconded, never removing his eyes from the lizard.

"Um, we may have made a mistake when selecting Xavier as our HBCU."  I informed my after-school group.
"What do you mean?!"  Habiba asked, "I researched it myself!"
"I know, I am totally confused.  Miss Evelyn says that there is more than one Xavier and that we picked the...um, you guys, I think we may have picked the white school."  I responded, whispering the end.
"WHAT????"  the group exclaimed, mouths open.
"And their mascot, it's got um, a weird name.  It's like...,"  I lowered my voice, "gold digger, or something like that."
Habiba's eyes widened.
"I am not calling myself that."
"Yeah, I feel you.  Let's stick with Musketeers."  I answered.

I stood in the front office of the school, waiting to check-out my testing materials.  I heard a scuffle in the hall and looked left just in time to see a student in the hall punch an administrator in the arm as two adults struggled to subdue him.
"Bitch!"  he yelled, as parents and children looked on.

I knelt beside Prem's desk, watching him do Math work.  Something caught my attention and I made myself still, willing my ears to rotate like satellites.
"Wa chee ho hon...hee ho hon...."
I looked to my left.  A student was making what appeared to be "Chinese" sounds, derogatory imitations of what he thought any old east Asian language would sound like, while staring at Prem.  He locked eyes with me.  I looked down at his paper and noticed his name, one of the students that had been identified as violent and aggressive and to be avoided at all costs.
"What are you doing?"  I asked firmly, not giving a shit who he was.
"Nothing." he responded.
I looked at Prem.  He was hunched over his work, assuming a submissive, beaten-down posture I had never seen him use before.  His eyes stared straight at his paper.
Prem is a superstar.  He is wildly intelligent, funny and subversive.  He can literally jump three feet in the air whenever he feels like it.  I had never seen him that way.
The intercom cut-in.
"TEACHERS, WE ARE IN A CODE THREE LOCKDOWN."
We slammed the lights off, closed the door and locked it and herded the children behind desks, attempting to make them invisible to anyone peering through windows.  I put my arm around Prem's shoulder and pulled him to a safe place, slamming glowing Chromebooks as I pushed my back to the wall with Prem crouched at my feet, my body between him and the door.
Code three is the highest level and I knew it was real.  No one would call a code three, lock down drill fifteen minutes before dismissal for the day.
We remained that way, until the lock down was dismissed.
Prem looked at me.
"Can we go see the lizard?"
"Yes, let's go see Steve."  I answered.
We walked on the wooded path behind the school.  A school-system police car was parked in front of my trailer.  Another, real police car sat in front of the school.  We walked past and entered the trailer, where Prem sat and stared at Steve, his eyes alight with joy.

I drove to the Housing Authority, weary from days of conducting ACCESS testing and basically, everything else.
"When Justice Roberts refused to read Rand Paul's question exposing the whistleblower's name, he left the Senate chamber during the hearing and conducted his own news conference, reading the whistleblower's name to reporters."
Cunt-faced piece of shit, I found myself muttering, suddenly enraged.  Fuck it all, right?  If you don't get what you want, just do what you want to do, who the fuck cares?  Nothing really matters anyway, right?

I drove home on Friday, Steve riding shotgun in his terrarium.
"Take good care of Steve this weekend!" Adriana had called, waving over her shoulder as she jumped into her mom's car that afternoon.
I looked in at Steve.  He was inside his hollowed-out log, his head nestled next to the wall, eyes closed in a way that made him look like a cat or a puppy, not a reptile.  He didn't move for a really long time, not when I picked up the terrarium, not when I carried it to the car, not when I started the car.  He looked kind of yellow.

I listened to the final arguments, or basically pleading from Democrats for witnesses, of the Senate impeachment trial on the radio.
I over looked at Steve's motionless body and started to cry.

Camino de Belén

"Did you know that cannibalism is when people eat each other?"  Faba asked me.
"Yeah...." I answered.
"Can we try it?"  Prem asked excitedly.
"Flesh...." he whispered under his breath.

I laid on my stomach, ready to roll into the MRI machine.
"I don't think they gave you enough Valium, you're not showing it at all....I think it's going to wear off while you're in there."
I started holding my breath.
"I can't do this.  You have to stop." I finally answered. 
"We are going to get through this together." the technician answered.
I laid there a few minutes, trying to get myself together.
"Okay.  Roll me in."
I lowered my face, gripped a plastic rail and started counting.

"Please set a goal with your grade level about how you can help with our CCRPI score." an administrator stated during a faculty meeting on our first day back from the end of the year break. 
A teacher, who has told me countless times that she wants my job, rose and turned toward me, calling out across the entire room.
"I've done your job and you need to move those kids on the ACCESS tiers!"
"You're setting my goal for me....?"  I mumbled, shocked. 
Those weren't even my scores; I had worked there a week before administering the test.  And who the fuck calls out another teacher about standardized test scores in front of the whole school?   How the hell were her scores?  We are an F school.  My students shouldn't have to balance out everyone else's shitty scores.  Why doesn't she try to teach her own fucking students and bring up our CCRPI? 
But the bottom line was, she was trying to discredit me, in front of everyone, because she wants my job.  My stomach churned. 

"Mr. Pulchic has problem with his legs." Yami announced randomly during after school tutoring.
"Well you see,"  Aazim began, authoritatively, "his middle is quite large and his legs are very small.  It is difficult for them to hold everything up." he explained, fingers on his chin and eyes fixed on Yami.
"Ms. Swort has the same problem."
I found myself snickering, even though I knew it was awful. 

Soberuary has arrived again.  I haven't plied myself with as much yoga and herbal tea as I have in previous years, but I still have that George Constanza feeling in the episode when he gave up sex and became really smart.  I'm not really smart yet, but I am on a steady, manic path of self improvement.  Sans alcohol. 

Snowman, Why Are You Here?

"Pablo, are you excited about Christmas?"  I whispered.
"Yes...." he answered.
"What did you ask for?"
"An iPhone." all six years of him answered, definitely.

"Nunca he visto nieve...."  Rosa informed me while we ran to the trailer.
"Oh, Rosa.  I really hope it snows this year." I answered, knowing every time I see that snowflake on my weather app I would think of her.
"Voy al gimnasio los miércoles ahora.....¡y le entiendo todo!"  she whispered dramatically.
"I am so proud of you, Rosa."  I answered, struggling to make myself speak English instead of Spanish.
"You have been working so hard."

"Hey, Alejandro's brothers are in your classes and they don't celebrate Christmas, so we'll be hanging out in the trailer during the holiday parties.  You can send his brothers to me, if you want."  I emailed various teachers.
No one answered.
"Our mom is picking us up before the parties..."  Gustavo mentioned one day, randomly.  It figured.  Their mom is no fool and would never want her children to be uncomfortable.
"Hey, Alejandro's probably not going to have to go to the trailer on the holiday party day, his mom is coming to pick them up." I informed the second meanest teacher in the school.
"Uh, okay, well, I'm going to send some other kids with you, you know kids that I haven't been able to make parental contact with...."
I don't know why she was so determined to not let me in that room during the party.  Did she want to send the kids with me that she had barred from the party for behavior?  Turn my trailer into a little mini-jail?  Or the kids that didn't pay the eight dollar fee for admission?

"Ms. Q said that all the kids that don't celebrate Christmas are going to the trailer with you."  Veronica whispered, later in the day.
"What!?"  I whispered back, furiously.
I was getting pissed off.  Can't answer an email but can send me fifty kids no one wants to my trailer.  Kids I don't even know.
On the day of the parties, I spirited Gustavo and another little boy from his class out of the classroom before the parties began.  I had my Scrabble game in the trailer and a bunch of candy, in anticipation.  We booked toward Alejandro's classroom.
"His mom is picking him up."  the second meanest teacher in the school informed me, as if I hadn't mentioned this fun fact to her a few days ago.
"Okay, have them buzz the trailer when she comes."  I answered.
"No, she'll be here any minute, you should take them to the Media Center, I told them that's where you'd be."
We collected the third brother and the four of us sat in the Media Center.  It is open at the top and sits in the center of the school.  We could hear the parties all around.  I set up my work laptop and let the other boy and Gustavo play math games on it.  Alejandro and his other brother and I sat around and talked.  Teachers came in with plates full of food and fraternized.  We sat and waited while the clock ticked.  An administrator came in.  She didn't ask me why I wasn't wearing our mandated Christmas clothes or why I was sitting with students in the Media Center during the parties.
Their mom arrived an hour later.

"Snow..ow...ow man!  Why are you here?"  the kids sang, hauntingly.  I locked eyes with Alejandra, who flattered me by looking thrilled when she saw me in the audience. 
"Snow...ow...ow man, why are you here?  You are just a little snowman with your little twig hands.. why would anyone want to talk to you....?"
She saw me wincing at the lyrics and nodded.  And continued to sing, staring at me with a distaste on her face while she sang the mean lyrics.

"Hey...." one of the volunteer mentors at the Housing Authority said in greeting.
"I can't find my girl and her dad said she was here....but I know something happened...."
"Yeah, she's been suspended." another teacher responded.
I looked at Habiba.
"They jumped that girl, the one that was in your class last year at school.  All four of them...."  Four girls I taught at The Center last year and one that I taught at school.
"Her mom came up here and wanted to know what happened to her face."
"But...you know.. the other three didn't hit her...just jumped on her jacket and spit on her...." Habiba said lowly, knowing what they did was just as bad.

"I saw what she was doing!"  the kindergarten teacher said with surprise.  She was talking about Helina, my non-verbal girl.
"Wait, you mean when she tried to poke my eyes out with a pencil?"
"Yeah!  She almost got you!"
"Yeah, I have to watch her.  She tries to stab me."  I answered.  Or rip my finger nails off.  Or tear holes in my clothes.

I crowd-sourced a book buy so that each of my students would have a brand new book to take home and keep and read over the two week, end of the year break.  I told myself not to get too excited, not to be disappointed if they didn't react with glee, but honestly, they were marvelous.  It was more that I could have ever hoped for.

I walked up the hill into the neighborhood with the kids that walk home from school.  Adriana always walks by my side and we talk.
"My mom bought them presents.  They're coming over on Christmas."  she whispered, referring to Juan and Alberto, who her mom also always gives a ride home.
"Oh my god, I am so glad.  Your mom is so nice, you all are so nice."  I responded, relieved.
"Their dad is trying to take them, take them away from her....from their mom."  she responded, with a much more serious look than any ten year old should have.

I entered the kindergarten classroom the day after the the book give away.  I was shocked when Helina set up a chair for me, like the autistic girl usually does who was absent, and sat next to me, resting her elbow on my knee.  I held onto the tiny kindergarten chair while I sat down, afraid she would rip it out from under me and I'd fall on my ass.  I told her how pretty her hijab was and praised her for mouthing sounds that she refuses to vocalize.

About twenty minutes in, she shoved the eraser end of her pencil into my mouth, just when I got complacent.
I swatted it away and laughed.
"Oh, Helina.  No one gets one over on you."  I said and hugged her.  And she hugged me back, her eyes batting and mischievous.

Santa Goes Straight to the Ghetto

I walked from my kindergarten class to my first grade class, around 8:45 in the morning.  I noticed Chance the Rapper.  He is always flattered and grins when I call him by the nickname that his all-day teacher calls him.
He was wandering in the hall, all six years old of him, with a late slip in his hand.
"Chance the Rapper!"  I called out.
He half smiled.
"Chance...are you okay?"
He broke into hysterical crying, his words spilling from his mouth in a way that I could barely understand.
"The car, what happened in the car?"  I asked.
"Did she yell at you?"
He shook his head, hiccuping and crying.
"Did she hit?"
"Yes!" he screamed.
"Where?"
"Across my face!"  he screamed and cried.  I hugged him.  And he cried low, feral cries from the bottom of his soul.

I really hate Mondays.  And there is just so much pain, so much abject pain in every corner of the place where I work.  It's deep and dark and way down in the recesses where no one needs to go.

"I have a low...." Adriana whispered, while I set up her computer for small group MAP testing.  She and Veronica were absent on Monday and I had hoped they were doing something fun.  I always do "highs and lows" at the beginning of my lessons, but I was still surprised that it had infiltrated our normal conversations.
"My mom's in the hospital..."
"Her diabetes?"  I asked.
"We didn't buy the $300 stuff from Kroger.  We got the $10 stuff...."

I went to check on the Martínez family again, a family who normally is never absent, trying to find out if they were there for testing.   I found Alberto, a member of a different family, who came in late though he normally doesn't.
He reeked of urine.
I pretended not to notice, and brought him to the testing room.  He has been under a lot of stress, his dad left for another woman, leaving his mom with four kids to care for.  And she won't update her phone numbers for us, no matter how many notes I send home.  And Alberto, my tough little dude, has started peeing his pants, even though he's in third grade.  This was the first time I had known him to arrive in school in that condition.

I walked through the Cafetorium with Veronica and Prem, on the look out for Faba and Juan that are in the Band class, whom we watch, pick up and then, run out to the trailer and do our thing.
Juan was shaking and his head was down.  Faba hovered nearby.
"He had to sit out...."  Faba whispered.
"He doesn't know his notes... his mom won't let him practice at home...."  the Band teacher said, exasperated, knowing that I had gotten him his trumpet so that he could participate and worried what I would think, though I wished he wouldn't worry about that.
I put my arm around Juan and he started to shake.  And then, he cried.
"I'll call her!"  the Band teacher said, but I knew none of the phone numbers worked.
I knew I was going to cry, too.  I pulled Juan to my side and asked him if he wanted to go get a drink of water or stay with us.
"Stay with you." he responded, and we went to the trailer.
"Adult problems,"  I said over and over.
"We are going to solve this, Juan, because we are adults and we've got this."

I sat with third grade, during the last hour of the day.  Alberto still smelled terrible.
"Juan, he's been hurting me...." he said, his strong Mexican accent dragging out his vowels.
"What did he do?"
"He hit me, he hit me a lot...."
"Why?"
"I don't know why.... I just cried and grabbed the puppy and went in my bed, under the covers...."
"I am so sorry, Alberto.  This should not be happening.  I'll talk to Juan.  I will talk to him about this..."

I stood in the Cafetorium, watching kids eat lunch while people yelled at them.  The nicest teacher at the school took over the "silent music" that was supposed to signify silence, and played "Santa Goes Straight to the Ghetto", loud as hell.

Children snickered and shoulders grooved.
And the nicest teacher at the school danced for them, right up on the stage of the Cafetorium.

Up In Here

I walked behind the school toward my trailer.  It was dark.  I heard weird howling sounds, sounds that really didn't sound normal, in the woods.  The woods behind our trailers.  I paused.  Miss W. was out there, our head custodian.
"What the fuck is that?"  I whispered.
"I think it's the kids...." she answered.
The yelps and howls continued.
"It might be animals killing something...." she continued, in a suddenly hushed voice.
"Miss W., this is the part where both of us die in the horror movie.  I'm going to the trailer.  You should go inside."  I responded.

"You're gonna make me lose my mind!  Up in here!  Up in here!  Habiba's gonna make me lose my mind!"
"Up in here, up in here!"  the Center kids echoed.
"Ms. Wagner's gonna make me lose my mind!"
"Up in here! Up in here!" Habiba vocalized.
"Habiba gonna make me kiss my hand!"
"Up in here, up in here!"  we all laughed and sang.
"Bud, Not Buddy" had suddenly turned romantic, and even when I drove out of the apartments, I rolled down the window and tooted my car's horn, or Alec's car's horn, at Habiba and kissed my hand, while she kissed her own and ran, laughing.

"How was your break?"  I asked various students.
"We ate goat." Prem informed me.
"Really?  That's nice."  I continued, about to pontificate how goat is not a common American food choice but is well regarded throughout the rest of the world.
"My dad got it.  He slit its throat."
I love Prem.  He is one of the most interesting and spry kids I have taught in years.  I tried to distract myself from what they did. 
"I had a devil egg."  Robert informed us.  My big boy.  I had no idea what he was talking about.  And, he has been difficult, lately.
"Wait, you mean deviled eggs!"  I finally responded.
"I love those, I eat them for breakfast, right here in the trailer, every morning."
"It is the best thing I have ever eaten."  he responded.

"Things got crazy this morning"  Aazim informed me, at The Center, after school.
"Someone tore all the underwear out of the drawer, and the socks, too, and threw them all over our room."
"Wait, who did it, Mahja, Suleymann, Jabez?  Or the little boy I don't know yet?  Wait, or the girl baby?"
"No.  Mahja discovered it and started screaming, it wasn't him.  Suleymann was putting on cologne in the bathroom....Abdarahim was sleeping....the baby can't walk, Jabez, I don't know what he was doing...."
"So, um, that leaves you right, Aazim?  Did you tear the drawer apart, with all of the underwear?  or...Jabez?"
"I don't trust that Suleymann was putting on cologne in the bathroom, that really only takes a second."  Yami stated.
"I have to agree, Yami.  Suleymann, I think you are a suspect."
"No!  I was putting on deodorant!"  Suleymann replied, eyes wide.
"Now Suleymann, I am confused.  Is there a difference between deodorant and cologne?  Or are we just...you know spray spraying our underarms and necks and wrists with the same thing?"  I replied.
He looked perplexed.
"I believe we have two mysteries to solve now,"  I continued.
"Who threw the underwear and socks all over the Abduhalli household and whether deodorant and cologne are the same things.  I would like to table this discussion until our next meeting and would like to request that you pull out your copy of Smile and turn to the appropriate page."

"So the Kamikazes weren't regular soldiers...they went down with the plane....the used the plane as a weapon,"  the nicest teacher in our school instructed, because one of the meanest teachers in the school had to leave, unexpectedly, and he took over.
"Man, when I started teaching, down in Miami, we had a lot of kids coming in from El Salvador...." he continued.
I felt myself stiffen.
"Kids, thirteen, twelve, kinda hard kids.  They had been soldiers...."
Adriana's mom is from El Salvador.
I sat next to Nsimba and started trying to help her with her work.
"Ms. Wagner, you know that thing, that thing Mr. Walker was talking about?"  she asked.
"Yeah, the kids with guns...." I whispered back.
"They do that in Africa too....."
"Central African Republic is still in a war, isn't it?"
"Yeah....my brothers didn't want to come here....."  I never knew she had brothers.  All the girls are here.
"Are they safe?"
"Yes... they left...."
"To the Congo?"
"Yes, to the Congo..." she answered.

I walked into my daily lunch duty and made I high pitched squeak at a kid who likes to communicate with me in that way.  He squeaked back and smiled. 

"Do you want to dig in the box or wait in the classroom?"  I asked Prem while we stood outside of our push-in classroom.  There has been a large box of hundreds of dollars of discarded instructional items in the hall for months.
"Dig in the box...." he sang lowly, yet in a high pitched song.  He does it when we talk in secret.
We entered the room a few minutes later, hiding the things we had taken from the box.
"Come and get paper!"  the general ed. teacher screamed out at him.
"I already have paper." he sang to me, in his little high pitched song, without answering the teacher.    We got to work.

"So during the holiday party,"  the second meanest teacher in the school said, loudly.
"You should just take Alejandro to your trailer.  His family's religion doesn't allow holiday celebrations so you two should just go there."
"Okay."  I answered immediately.  We'll go to the fucking woodshed.
I have four other students in that class.  Their parents might be there.  It will be fun, there'll be snacks.  And she will smile and wave and pretend like she's actually nice and does this whole operation by herself while I am in the woodshed.

It's fine.  I'll invite his brothers.  The woodshed is the place to be, anyway.

Thanks

"Um, Hilary, the oven is not heating up......"  Alec said lowly, while pushing all of the buttons over and over.  

I looked at the million dollars worth of food lined up on the table, ready to be put in the oven in waves before my family and their boos arrived for Thanksgiving in a matter of hours.

"I'm going to take a shower."  

I have a lot of faith in Alec.  After a long shower, I crept out, hoping he would say it was all fixed.  And, it was.   Or, at least the oven was shooting between one hundred and three hundred degrees, randomly, but it was better than nothing.   

"You have dense breasts." the letter and email from my doctor and the dear people at the mammogram place at Emory let me know.

Hmmmm.  Dense.  Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

"Your mammogram was normal, but you should get an MRI."  it informed me.

An MRI.  The five hundred dollar option that can only occur in the mornings, Monday through Friday, as opposed to after work and covered as preventative by my insurance. I made the appointment on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, because I get the whole week off.  

I took my rock-hard, dense tits to Emory.  Paid up the $525 on my credit card.

"Have you had an MRI before?"  the nurse asked, while running the IV for the contrast stuff.

"Yeah," I responded, unworried.  It was on my neck.  I had to lay on my back and roll in barely beyond my shoulders while some guy spoke to me through some kind of speaker, informing what was going on, every step of the way.  

"You have to take off all your clothes, except your underwear.  Here are two robes.  You can keep your shoes on."

"On the breast is kind of different...." she continued, her accent kind of heavy and for the first time, I felt like she might be at a loss for words.

"You are on your stomach....in a weird position...." her nose crinkled up a little.

"You're not claustrophobic, are you?"

"No." I answered.

"If you have to throw up, tell us.  But don't move."

We walked down the hall, where other people were dressed and I was walking around in two robes, my underwear and shoes.

"You're going to be in there about thirty minutes." I heard some medical person tell a guy in a wheelchair.

Thirty minutes?  That sounded long.  Maybe he was having some other test.  They opened the door and I realized I gasped, the machine looked kind of monstrous and it barely fit in the room.  The other place had the MRI thing in a giant room, this one was stuffed in a closet.  

They hustled me onto my stomach with my rock hard tits sort of hanging through some weird device.  They told me to grip something, which I did, white knuckle.  They put something under my knees and my feet were sort of up, like some sort of hog-tied animal.  

"Squeeze the ball in your hand if you need anything.  You can't move, don't move at all, or they will make us do it again."

I gripped harder and they rolled me in and left.  

It was radio silent.  No one said anything.  The machine started clanging and making that outer space sound.  I gripped harder.  I opened my eyes, they were about two inches above some sort of plastic bottom of the machine.  I realized I had no idea how long I would be in there.  I could not figure out spatially what was going on.  I felt nauseas.  I realized pretty early on I was in trouble, but I had to make it.  It was stupid.  The clanging started and stopped.  I jumped when it began again and feared I had already ruined the image.  No one said anything.  It wasn't like before when they would warn me, warn me when the scary noises would start, when the contrast would start, how much longer I had to go.  I felt the contrast shooting into my arm and no one said anything.  I tasted it in my mouth and my scalp felt like it was on fire.  I remembered climbing in a cave in Laos, clandestinely, no ropes no guides, and told myself not to think it.  The machine stopped.  Was I done?  I laid in silence, in terror, more uncomfortable than I could ever imagine being.  The clanging started again.   I could feel my brain vibrating inside of my skull.  Esther the Wonder Pig had an MRI.  I pictured pig heads with dead eyes, it was flashing in front of me.  Lola has had an MRI.  What if she was dead, what if Alec was dead, my mind was racing.  I remembered the part in the Exorcist with Reagan screaming in pain while she was in some machine.  How much longer, what if I was going to be in this thing for six hours, what if it would be four in the afternoon and I was still there...

I squeezed the thing.  

"Let me out of here....."

No one said anything.

"LET ME OUT OF HERE!"  I started screaming.

"LET ME OUT!  LET ME OUT!  LET ME OUT!!!!!!"

"I AM BEGGING YOU!!!!!"

And then, I started moving myself out, backwards.

I heard the door swing open and felt them rolling the thing backwards.

"Close the door!" one of the people yelled to the other.  

I sat up while they tried to get the IV out.  I clutched my chest, a strong hard pain on my left side.

"You had an anxiety attack.   We were almost done.  You will have to come back, talk to your doctor, and we will give you a sedative beforehand."

I just sat there, numb but half crying, dazed, clutching my chest.  They took me where my clothes were, I changed and drove home, taking a random route that didn't make any sense.  

Might Need a New Life

I routinely have to dig through the files of my students.  It's a big pain in the ass.  I have to stand in this weird closet and balance my stuff on whatever is there.  Computer, pen, clipboard, all of it.  I have left my coffee cup in there, by accident.  It's like the closet from the movie Carrie, lacking the mirrors.

But the files.  That's when I see the parents that say there are from Mexico and have ID cards on record from El Salvador or Honduras or Guatemala.  When I see refugee identification.  My Burmese babies that have been mostly born in Thailand, or anywhere through hell's half acre but still identify as BURMESE.  Or Karen.  When I see African children that have moved from Central African Republic, to the Congo, to Sierra Leon, my babies, my children that sit in front of me everyday and I see this photo of them, as a child, as a real baby, running, hustling, fleeing.  They are these haunting little black and white passport photos, smeared and ghosty.

I never know what to do.  How I can do anything.  How I can fix this shit.  And sometimes, I go to my knees in that little closet and thank the monkey Jesus god that I don't even believe in for these children and ask for help.  Beg for it.

I slept walked last night.  I've only done it once, when I was on Chantix, and some other time, that I clearly can't remember, but Alec told me about it.  He told me about last night, too.

Thanksgiving is coming.  And I miss them.  We have been on break for three days.  I know they are okay but I hope, I hope in this new year that I can do everything, everything I can for them.