I don’t mind folding laundry.
I used to hate it. My closets and drawers were always a disaster. Clothes storage was a source of stress for me. Now it is one of my best meditative coping skills.
It all started on the P-Town ferry with a golden retriever I did not know snuggling me while I found myself reading the impulse buy “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up” by Marie Kondo.
I…really like Marie Kondo.
I say it like because I like to talk about Marie Kondo and the most common response I get from anyone who is familiar with the name says “Oh yeah, I know all about that. Threw everything out or donated it and stuff.”
Discarding and decluttering is one aspect of Kondo’s, but there is so much more; an entire philosophy that feels aligned in a way with Taoism that, upon first discovering it, felt perfect for me. I felt enlightened, if you will.
My favorite part of the book became my favorite chore. It hurts me to even call it a chore as it is also my favorite form of meditation.
I really like folding laundry.
I enjoy the origami-like satisfying folds and creases. I love smoothing out wrinkles and making sharp edges. I relish in experimenting with various folds to find the perfect one that makes the item look happiest.
I love to put folded laundry in drawers. I arrange it in a gradient order so every time I open the drawer I see the natural progression of the ombre. There is no feeling quite like replacing an item to the same exact spot because the clothes fit together like puzzle pieces with no forcing, cramming, or stuffing.
I look forward to having clothes to fold.
I take my time with Sören’s.
I take the first onesie, a yellow Star Wars one that seemingly grows with him as he’s been wearing it for months. I smooth it out on the floor, working out every single wrinkle until there are none left, and I continue smoothing it because that’s my favorite part.
As I am smoothing out this onesie I can see him wearing it. I can feel picking him up, I can see his toothy smile, I can hear his laugh as vivid as if he were in front of me. This makes me miss him while he sleeps, so I check the monitor and see him sleeping soundly, and I realize that I am disappointed. I wouldn’t mind holding him right now.
Since I can’t hold him, I smooth the onesie a little bit more.
When I fold adult shirts, I fold the sleeves into the middle first. Smooth out the wrinkles. If the cuffs are thin, I fold half the arm back up before folding each side of the shirt into the middle and then folding in half, lengthwise. After that, I fold in half widthwise, and finish with quarter folds. Soren’s shirts and onesies are different because they are so much smaller.
His clothes are smaller, because he is smaller.
He’s small. He is so small.
I remind myself that he is small because it hits me that all day long I notice all the ways that he is big. Yesterday he pointed to a banana for the first time and said “Nanana!”. He called the dog over by name to his high chair, and then offered him Brussel sprouts. He has mastered “Skål!”, and touches his cup to ours before taking a sip.
Noting his bigness is both the sweetest part of motherhood and the hardest, so far. I don’t ever want to feel sad to see him get big. I am lucky to see him grow. It is a wonderful, beautiful, perfectly natural process, and it is truly my greatest honor. I am grateful for it every minute of every day. It fills me with love and joy and it fills me with sadness that time goes by so quickly.
So I strive to soak up every moment. My existence is a constant practice of striving to be genuinely present. And when I fold clothes, I remind myself that while he is big, he is still so small.
He is learning words. He is in a high chair. He toasts with a sippy cup.
I can pick him up and hold him.
As I fold this onesie, I realize that there will come a time, not far away, that I will fold it and put it in a box because then it will be too small for Soren.
And I will wish that I had spent this time when he was this small soaking up everything wonderful about him being this small. I will tell myself that I didn’t know what “big” was, and I wish I could go back and just hold this small version of him once more.
I recognize that thought and let it go, because while valuable, it is taking me out of this moment. So I fold the onesie.
I smooth it out, telling myself this is the last one I get. I look at the characters on the front, appreciating that they are innocent and playful and happy. I smile when I see the total length is around a foot long. So little. Baby clothes.
I fold it in half and don’t even need to fold the sleeves in at all because they are so small. I fold the bottom part of the onesie up- the little snaps! I have taken for granted how much I love him in a onesie. This is his onesie stage, and it is adorable.
I fold this one in half again, and then again, and then again. I am amused to realize I can also just roll these up and stick them in a sock organizer. Because they are so small.
That’s it. I am done now. I did the folding part too fast because I got carried away thinking about how many times I could fold such a little piece of clothing. But it’s ok. I enjoyed it.
I hold the onesie, now folded with the colorful image inside, smooth as can be and perfectly rectangular. I marvel at how small it is in my hands compared to my shirts. My little boy. My baby boy.
He is growing and he is bigger every day, and he is also small and little. Each article of his clothing reminds me of this. His pants suddenly look like the smallest pants I have ever seen and I struggle to remember what his previous sizes would look like in comparison. It doesn’t seem possible that anything could be smaller.
Tonight I give thanks for these little and small days. The days that I can carry him. The days he sits on my lap as we read “Brown Bear Brown Bear What Do You See?” 7 times in a row. The days he wakes up crying and rests his head on my shoulder and just like that, Mama can fix it. The days with my baby.
The laundry is folded. I am excited for tomorrow when we will go to his room together and put his clothes away. I know that while “helping” me, he will undo a good portion of my folding work, and I am excited for that too; not only do I get to fold again, but I enjoy these days when his joyfully curious skills in “helping” me creates more “work” for myself.
I don’t mind folding laundry.
But I love folding Sören’s laundry.
Singing Sweet Songs
Christina and I met in kindergarten. My first memory of her is Halloween of 1989. I couldn’t tell you what my costume was, but I remember that Christina dressed as a flower, a hand sewn costume that looked professional but that her mother made, and during our sharing circle she stood up and spun around and I was in awe of the petals that framed her face.
We were bonded from an early age because we were both class pariahs with summer birthdays. While every other student brought in cupcakes on their birthdays, the “summer kids” had to have accommodations like celebrating a half birthday, or sharing a rush of fake birthday cupcakes the last week of June. My birthday is July 9th and Christina’s was July 21st. She was always taller than me, but I was always older than her, so we were even.
In 3rd grade, I decided to join Brownies like many of the other girls in our grade. I’ll be honest- I was there for the cookies. I quit after one year. Christina continued with Girl Scouts until she reached their highest honor.
In 4th grade, Christina and I both chose to play the clarinet. We had private lessons together and then in 5th grade we joined the band. Christina and I both played clarinet in 2 school bands, for a total of 8 years. She was a first clarinet, I played second. She would choose to sit next to me when the opportunity arose, but by high school was usually redirected to her spot in the front row. She always sat directly in front of me so we could still chat and when I had no idea where we were supposed to be in the music because I was chatting to anyone else or otherwise not paying attention, all I had to do was tap her shoulder one time and she would point quickly to the correct measure in the music. She never once got annoyed with me. At least, if she did, she never showed it.
I joined field hockey in 8th grade. She had already been playing since 6th grade. She was good. I was not.
We both chose the same high school, out of town, in 9th grade. We both continued to play field hockey. I continued to be not good. She continued to be far better. I think the only reason I stuck with it is because I had fun on the bus rides, I had fun cheering on my team mates, and I had fun socializing over snacks; all largely because of Christina.
Because we both were in band, we had roughly the same class schedule for most of high school. We stuck together in study hall, in the same seats in the corner, two shy girls quietly gossiping with each other and loosely spiraling about being the new students in a new school. We had grown up in the same school building from kindergarten through 8th grade before this, spending all 9 years with fewer than 50 students in our class, feeling like each person in the building was family, to suddenly knowing only a handful of peers in what felt like an endless sea of uncertainty for the first time in our lives.
In 9th grade Christina discovered Flowers in the Attic by V.C Andrews. She brought it to history class one day, shoved it into my hands and said it was “amazing” and we needed to talk about it. I brought it home and started reading. And then I brought it to school and kept reading. And I brought it to history class and continued reading. She had happened upon the motherload of this series, from her aunt if I remember correctly, and she would always be one book ahead of me. We would sit beside each other in Western Civilization with these novels in our laps, secretly reading. Then we would eagerly discuss them, through notes or whispers. We read about generations of these bizarre attic children. I didn’t do well in Western Civ. Christina was able to somehow read V.C. Andrews and pay attention, though, and she continued to get A’s.
In 10th grade, both members of the St. John the Baptist Church, Christina and I took CCD classes on Monday nights. We volunteered locally, raking leaves at retirement home communities together. These were perfect opportunities for us to continue to discuss our secret obsession with trash novels and we later celebrated our Confirmation together.
For the last couple of years of high school, Christina and I both chose different electives that interfered with band and so we attended Night Band. Although she was younger than me by a whole 2 weeks, she saved up for a car before I did and got her license before me too. She would pick me up in her Ford Bronco and we would drive together to school on Tuesday and Thursday nights. She was a stickler for a pristine windshield and I remember being in awe of her confidence barreling around in her truck.
Christina was one of the most consistent friends I have ever had. She was also kind, always open, and always supportive. We didn’t argue or fight like I did with most friends. I remember only one real conflict we had. I don’t remember what started it, but I remember her saying that sometimes she felt like I didn’t like her. I don’t know if she said this, but what I heard was that she was a better friend to me than I was to her. I became defensive and disagreed with her because I knew she was right. The argument didn’t last long. Christina never cared about being right even when she was. She just wanted peace. We made up quickly and went back to our consistency, and we were both happy.
We both went away to college, and both found ourselves back in our hometown. Then we both left again, got married, and had kids. The last time I saw Christina was almost a year ago. We were both in attendance at a town celebration. I was in line at a food truck with another friend. I saw her from a distance and waved. I considered going over to chat in person, but we had been waiting in line for a while. I told myself I would catch her next time, because there had always been a next time.
That was the last time.
I’ve had about 24 hours now to process the fact that she has passed. I can’t believe it. I don’t understand it. Nothing makes sense and I wish she was still here.
Today, I pull out one of my top coping skills- Bob Marley. I felt myself begin to descend into a distracted spiral and I had a bright eyed, 6 month old boy in front of me, ready and needing to play. So I put on Bob Marley and we dance, I sing. I make a mental note to remember to sing Three Little Birds to him at bedtime tonight, because he likes it, and because it has nice words to listen to right before falling asleep.
It is his wake up a few hours after bedtime that does it to me. We sit in the chair in his room. I start to sing. Always my most captive audience, my son adjusts his body and turns his head up so he can stare at me and nothing else.
Rise up this mornin’
Smiled with the risin’ sun
Three little birds
Pitch by my doorstep
Singin’ sweet songs
Of melodies pure and true
Saying’, (this is my message to you)
Singing’ don’t worry ’bout a thing
‘Cause every little thing gonna be alright
Singing’ don’t worry (don’t worry) ’bout a thing
‘Cause every little thing gonna be alright.
I sing this on a loop, like I do every song, every night, until it feels just right in the room to go to bed. But this night is different. This night, about 5 loops in, I start crying. And I can’t stop. My son has his eyes closed and I think he’s asleep. But he opens them when he hears my voice getting thin and shaking and I realize in all the times I have soothed his tears, he’s never watched me cry before.
Because the whole time I’m singing, I’m thinking of all the memories I have with Christina, many, but not nearly all, listed above. And I’m thinking about how we did so many things together, and how she was better than me at all of them.
And she was probably a better mother than me, too.
I try to stop the tears and regain the strength in my voice. I don’t want my son to watch me cry. But I’m having trouble with that so I just continue singing as best I can. My son watches me intently and I don’t know if I’m projecting but I think I can see vague confusion in his eyes. He keeps staring and then he closes his eyes again and nuzzles in close. I am still crying, but holding him helps. He falls asleep and I stay there, holding him, telling him not to worry, that every little thing will be alright, and wondering how convincing I really sound through the tears.
Let’s Destroy White Fragility: I’ll Go First.
There is a hard truth that White people need to face right now.
The truth is, WE are the biggest perpetrators of systemic oppression and until WE agree to face ownership of that, racism will thrive in this country.
That statement alone will cause many White people to stop reading.
It is not my place to say this, but I am tired today. I am tired of hearing and reading micro aggressions, deflections, and personal insults. I am tired of willful ignorance and overt racism. And I say all of this knowing fully well that as a White person, I will never understand how truly tired in every way my friends of Color are, now and every day before this.
I am tired of White people getting offended at my pointing out the existence of White Fragility, and I am tired of them not seeing the irony in that.
I am going to try to show how we can be self-reflective, admit our own wrongdoing and areas for improvement, and shed our White Fragility and still be okay at the end of the day. Maybe even better for it.
This is what happened, and how I learned from it.
Before teaching in my current district, I worked as a paraprofessional and then student teacher in an elementary school in an affluent suburb. The school was reasonably culturally diverse and heavily focused on inclusion. There was also a group of Students of Color from Boston who participated in the METCO program (Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity, Inc.), meaning that they attended the school in the suburb while living in Boston. This program began in 1965 as a response to Boston refusing to improve inadequate schools in Black and African-American neighborhoods and contributing to school segregation and inequity. METCO aims to provide and lead to equal opportunities for all students.
I worked closely with a young African-American student who participated in the METCO program. He was playful, bright, and curious. I enjoyed his thoughtful questions and witty humor. I also struggled with managing this student’s “behavior” more than the other students. For a few years now I have realized that the challenges I had were most likely due to my own cultural and implicit biases, as well as sheer ignorance. Perhaps even willful ignorance at times.
Once data was analyzed regarding school discipline that year, it was found that all of the Black male students from the METCO program were disciplined more frequently than the students who did not participate in this program*. To me, this is evidence of the cultural biases in the school as a system. It wasn’t just me, one student teacher who was perceiving the behavior of this one student as “bad”. It was all of the teachers, all of the students, and all of the administrators. It is also consistent with national data regarding discipline in schools and Students of Color.
I should clarify that all of this is unconscious. It is not that teachers and administrators are aware that they may be unfairly assessing the behavior of young African-American boys. It is that throughout this country, African-American and Black males are disproportionately disciplined compared to their peers, and that alone should force us to be honest with ourselves about how powerful our biases may be in assessing and interpreting behavior.
And when you are experiencing a challenge that is also happening on a systemic level, you should analyze the systems as well as the individuals.
These are the things that I never considered in all of the time I spent trying to figure out how to “improve” this student’s “behavior”:
-That there are differences in social norms between cultures
-That attending school in a community that is not your own can lead to Imposter Syndrome, which is difficult and painful
-That sometimes students have experiences with teachers that look like you, and those experiences contribute to their impression of you, for better or for worse
-That a White person from a predominantly White community cannot possibly understand the experience of a Black person, especially while integrating into a community other than their own.
-That the media’s derogatory portrayal of Black males contributes to implicit bias
-That I am not exempt from having biases
-That we all, teachers, and students, have unconscious experiences and biases
-That even while striving to fight racism, I will make mistakes as a result of my own biases
-That there is a long and ugly history involving a White person being given authority over a Black person, and remnants of that trickle into every system
-That there is a long history of toxic and oppressive relationships between White teachers and Students of Color
-That there is a long history of educational marginalization for Students of Color
-The School to Prison Pipeline
-White Feminism
-Listening
-Empathy.
Multiple adults sat down with this student to tell him that he needs to fix his behavior and show me (and other teachers) respect. I did not analyze whether there was anything I should do to fix my behavior. I did not consider that the respect that he needs from me might look different than I expect. I don’t know if the other teachers thought of these things. If they did, we didn’t talk about it.
I barely remember much that this student did that warranted him discipline. Clearly the infractions weren’t important enough to stick in my memory. Generally, I remember the same group of students in trouble for things like “talking back“, “disrespect“, “insubordination“, and “repeated rule breaking.” Now that I know about the history of education in the U.S. and the School to Prison Pipeline, I know that these vague terms regarding compliance are dangerous, particularly for Students of Color. I was complicit in this.
Rather than focusing on a rule being broken, I should have considered what might be behind the behavior. I should told myself to choose my battles, and to be mindful of my approach to the behavior.
I should have known that praising him for the good is not enough to make up for my reaction to the “bad”.
And for the love of everything, when I caught him with spelling words on his hands, I should have asked him if he was having a hard time studying, I should have asked if my lesson left him confused or with questions he didn’t feel comfortable asking, and I should have had realized how damn endearing it is for any student to want to be successful in school even if that means that they risk getting into trouble in order to get there**.
It brings me to tears today to think of how I handled it. I reprimanded him, told his teacher he was cheating, and for some reason I can’t explain, I felt personally insulted.
In other words, I made it about me.
I should have, and could have, done better. So much better.
It wasn’t until I left that school and began teaching in my current district, 8 years ago now, that this truth hit me like a ton of bricks to the face. One of the major differences between the two districts is that in my current school, I am frequently the only white person in the classroom.
And in the first few weeks of teaching here, I said to a student after much frustration, “WHY are you yelling??” To which my student replied, “Miss, I’m not yelling. I’m Dominican. This is how we talk.”
And just like that, I realized that my perceptions are influenced by my experiences and biases, and that can be dangerous, especially for a person in a position of authority, and especially for a teacher.
I realized that I was judging the behavior of all students based on my experiences in school growing up and my social norms within the community I came from. I was projecting my own biases onto them and expecting them to meet me where I was rather than my meeting them where they were.
This is wrong.
Since then, I have been very much aware that I have a lot to learn and much to improve. It was a conscious choice to face my own White Fragility and that is when I began to see the world with more clarity, no longer fogged up by my subconscious and vain attempts to separate myself from the atrocities of this country.
At the very least, I now believe that had I been more aware of my own biases, I could have vastly improved the relationship I had with my student in my first school as well as his experience in the classroom. I deeply regret not looking inwards for solutions at that time and not educating myself on culture, implicit bias, and classism. Whether I was aware of it at the time or not, I approached this student with “color blindness” rather than by honoring his color. I believed at that time that it was best to treat all students equally regardless of race, and while that sounds good, now I understand that this leaves gaps in cultural awareness and social emotional well-being.
What I should have done is treated students with equity, which would mean giving each student what they needed from me in order to be equally successful. I should have been interacting with each student in individualized ways to ensure the best chances that they would access equal opportunities. While I was educated by a prestigious (and stupidly expensive) university in individualized education on the basis of ability, I was completely ignorant about individualizing by considering culture and race.
That limited my progress as a teacher at the time, and what’s worse, I have to imagine that it limited the progress of my students as well. I wish I could go back in time and do better. Since I can’t, I hope that this student moved on to have teachers who were better than me. I hope they were more thoughtful than I was and were able to connect with him in ways that I didn’t and in the ways that he needed and in ways that I wish I did.
I can’t go back. I have since done better. I do better and I will continue to do better, knowing that I will always have more to learn. I will always have ways to improve when it comes to eradicating all forms of racism in this country.
But I didn’t start improving until I faced my part in it. It wasn’t comfortable, and it shouldn’t be.
Systemic oppression has never been comfortable for People of Color. It doesn’t have to be comfortable for White people as we actively participate in dismantling it.
Let’s do better. Better than we did 20 years ago, 10 years ago, 1 year ago, yesterday. Let’s do better tomorrow than we did today. Let’s listen when we are wrong without defending ourselves, knowing that we are unlearning everything an oppressive system engrained in us. Knowing that we are not that system if we choose not to be.
Let’s stop getting anxious when anyone suggests that we don’t need to have the floor right now and stop letting feeling uncomfortable prevent us from dialogue.
Let’s all choose to be works in progress.
I know I am.
*I do not have proof of this data. I didn’t then, and I don’t now. My awareness of it comes from discussions with highly reputable faculty members who were privvy to the information.
**Of course I do not condone cheating. I do, however, empathize with feeling desperate under the pressure to succeed in school, and I wish my response at that time reflected that.
We can do better.
Before I became a parent, I used to roll my eyes at the women who would say that they interpreted [any given topic] differently since becoming a mother. To me, it sounded like an ambiguous moral high ground that had no place in the conversation.
I get it now, though.
When I became a mother, I became keenly aware that everyone is someone’s child. Death and pain of strangers resonate even more deeply because I became every mother and every child became my child.
Before I became a parent, I imagined that it would be a terrifying experience. I imagined that it would be difficult and confusing and I wouldn’t know what to do or how to handle it. I was partly right.
It is terrifying, but not in the way that I imagined.
I got through the newborn stage and to my surprise, I realized I knew what to do. I didn’t take any classes, didn’t read any books, hadn’t spent any time with newborns, so I had no idea what to expect. What I didn’t expect was that with every cry, I would learn. As my son adjusted to the world, I adjusted to him in it, and every day, we both learned a little more as we settled into our new lives. I was tired, I was in pain, but I wasn’t totally lost, and we got through it.
The terrifying part is how much you love them.
This might sound silly and maybe even cute, but it’s not. It is a realization that fills me with anxiety and fear and hopelessness if I allow it to. The love I have for my son is more powerful than I was prepared to experience. The fear comes in when you realize that now that you have this love, you will never be okay without it. If the natural course of life were to be disrupted, I would never, ever, be okay. So much so that I can’t even put into writing anything more specific than that and I hope the reader can read between the lines.
And it’s this love that propels me to put his survival above absolutely everything in my world. It sounds so corny to say that I will literally go to the ends of the Earth for him if I needed to, but it’s true. There is no limit to what I will do to protect him.
I have to admit that I have been thinking about something that used to serve as pure entertainment to me, more and more since becoming a mother, and that is an old episode of Howard Stern.
In this episode, Sal, a listener-turned-friend of the show, went through a past life regression on air. What I am about to say sounds completely made up and I don’t blame the reader if they chalk it up to radio show theatrics, but I think anyone who listens to the episode will agree with it’s potential authenticity.
In his past life, Sal discovered that he was a sea turtle.
He didn’t automatically know he was a turtle. He described his surroundings, his point of view on a vast beach, and was able to conclude that he was a turtle. He explained that he was resting on the beach, but not totally resting, because he had just laid turtle eggs, which were to hatch, with countless baby turtles charging towards the ocean (I’ve seen the videos of them do this and they are great).
Sal’s voice was low, shaky at times, even in the interview he seemed distracted. After some prodding, Sal revealed that he was very scared and nervous for his baby turtles because there was a predator circling overhead.
That predator was a pteradoctyl, by the way. Sal had gone back to DINOSAUR TIMES.
(pause to appreciate the history)
My point is, as a Mama Turtle, Sal was frightened, preoccupied, and completely beside himself at the thought of a predator reaching his babies. He expressed feelings of gut wrenching sadness as he described knowing the babies needed to reach the ocean but the uncertainty of knowing if they would. He began to cry.
And now, I understand that every animal in nature feels the same terrifying love for their babies that I feel for my son. Even if “all” they are doing is laying eggs and letting nature do the rest. In order for our species to survive, we not only need to procreate, we need to keep our offspring alive so that they can grow and procreate, and in order to do that, we have to love them fiercely. Because otherwise we wouldn’t do it. It’s hard and exhausting and at times counterintuitive to our own individual survival but we do it because we love our babies. Love is what pushes us to put their survival above everything else in our world.
Becoming a parent has made me feel connected to nature and to others in a way I didn’t expect, in a way that compels me to become vegan, make my own clothes, live off the grid and the fatta’ the lan’, in every unrealistic way possible.
It also makes a lot of injustices in the world completely unbearable. I used to be passionate and inspired by seeking justice, for as long as I can remember, and I would like to believe that I will be again; but in the last 4 months I find myself crumbling with emotion when I read the news. News stories that previously sparked my passion for social justice now also come with the burning fire of survival and an endless ocean of tears. I feel a deep responsibility to not only protect my son but…everyone. And that’s impossible.
Tatyana was one of the first people I told about my pregnancy- roughly 5 minutes after I found out myself. A mother herself, she shared my excitement and looked forward to my joy. She assured me that morning sickness would come to an end when I bitterly told her I didn’t believe her (she was right). When I was shocked to learn my maternal instinct was wrong and I would be having a boy instead of a girl, she laughed and talked about how much fun she has with her son. She reminded me about how cute a nice bow-tie is, showed me photos of her matching clothes with her son, and said more times than I can remember, “Boys love their mamas”.
And she’s right, of course. She’s talked me through a lot of anxiety from the moment I learned I would become a mother. She’s been through it and she’s wise. And she faces an entirely different battle as a mother that I will never truly understand. Because her son is black, and my son is white.
When I think about how much more danger her son faces in this country simply because he has a darker skin color, my head spins and I feel sick.
I spend a lot of time thinking about how to protect my son- I need to make sure he can swim, I need to make sure he always wears a bike helmet, I need to make sure he knows the dangers of distracted driving.
In order to protect her son, Tatyana needs to make sure he knows how to protect himself from people who look like my son.
And when we learn about people like George Floyd- killed by police after being accused of a non-violent crime he did not commit- that feels impossible. From everything I’ve seen, Floyd could not have done anything differently to change the outcome. His story is like far too many others. His mother could not have possibly prepared him for or protected him from the assault that ended his life. All of the innate, pre-historic, instinctual love from a mother would not have made a difference, and that is unacceptable.
I need answers, because this is the world we are raising our children in, and we all need to be screaming and demanding better.
All I can come up with is that all of the mothers* need to tune into that universal connection we have. The one where we feel like every mother and every child feels like our child. We need to be thinking beyond how we can protect our own children in our own home and extend that love that knows no bounds to the children of mothers who are doing everything they can and still can be no match for the systems put in place to oppress people of color in this country.
Specifically, white parents of white children have an obligation to be actively and constantly striving to raise our children with specific goals of making the world safer for black and African American children and adults.
Especially our sons.
I need to protect my son, and I need to help protect Tatyana’s son. I need to teach my son to swim, to wear a helmet, to drive safely, and I need to raise my son in a way that I can ensure that he will be an active part of the solution that will make the world safer for black men in America.
Because what we’re doing isn’t working. And that is terrifying.
*I chose to repeatedly use the word “mother’ because that is the label I identify with. All of these sentiments also apply to fathers, guardians, and non-binary parents.
Wilson Phillips Vibes
I held my son just a little bit longer tonight.
He’s woken up twice within 2 hours since his bedtime, which is unusual for him. My husband took care of him the first time and discovered he was hungry (“must be going through a growth spurt” we say roughly 3 times a week). So while I was surprised when he woke up screaming a second time, I shouldn’t have been surprised that as soon as I picked him up, he spit up all the way down my shirt, then over my shoulder, into my hair. I’m not sure which one of us was more relieved. I wiped his mouth and covered my shoulder with a towel and held and rocked him. He fell asleep pretty quickly on me, nuzzling his head a little, mumbling baby babbles a little, sighing a little.
We aren’t officially sleep training, but we’re not not sleep training. We got excellent advice shared from a friend who paid a good chunk of change to a baby sleep expert and it seems to be working. We let him cry as he settles and if he doesn’t after 5 minutes, we go in and pat his back and reassure him that we love him but that it’s time for sleep. We can deal with the crying because we know we are teaching him the skill of sleeping and running in to scoop him up every time he whimpers would be placating ourselves and doing nothing for him (or us, in the long run).
So technically, after he spit up, I should have laid him back down, awake, so he can continue to learn how to fall asleep independently. That would have been the responsible and correct choice. But I was gifted this piece of wall art at my shower that sometimes stares into my soul, and it says “Hold him just a little bit longer, for he is only little once”. And because I was already feeling down, exhausted, and because it’s possible that I am too easily persuaded by wall art, and definitely because I guess I needed a hug myself, I held him until he fell asleep on me and longer, throwing away the expert sleep training rules.
Rocking him, I thought about the balance I am learning in parenting. I am training myself to constantly reflect and analyze my motivations for doing basically anything- is it because it’s best for him, or is it because it’s easiest for me? Am I bathing him enough to keep him clean but not so much as to irritate his skin? Am I getting him enough fresh air to be healthy, or should I keep him inside more to avoid getting sick? Do I let him cry in his jumper while we both are in virtual meetings, or do I let him sit in my lap, happy, but looking at a screen? Am I draining myself of every ounce of physical and mental energy exclusively breastfeeding because it’s worth it for his health, or am I draining his mother’s energy out of guilt? Do I offer him affection and comfort, or do I teach him to sleep alone?
I knew that if I wanted to continue to teach him how to be an independent sleeper, I should not have held him so long. But I also knew that I didn’t have it in me to put him down too soon either. Because he is growing so fast every day and before I know it, I won’t be able to.
Literally and figuratively, every day, my son is teaching me about holding on and about letting go.
Tonight I chose to hold on.
For Jack.
This week we lost one of my favorite people in the world, my Father-in-law Jack. Below is my eulogy for him.
We had the privilege of living with Jack for the last 5 and a half years. He was the best roommate. Jack would pleasantly surprise us by putting snacks in our cabinets that he thought we might like. He brought home copies of the Eagle Tribune whenever he saw something nice written about our students and any kids from Lawrence. He got to know all of our neighbors right away and showed Mike and I that we need to step out of our comfort zone and chat with those around us more often.
There is an added pain to losing someone who shares your daily space. But there is an added privilege there as well. While it feels empty, we also really still feel his presence there. I think we always will.
In the last couple of years I have explored various spiritual and mindfulness practices, mostly based in Buddhism and I have learned that the root of all suffering is the attachment to something that was never ours in the first place. I am going to say that again. The root of all suffering is the attachment to something that was never ours in the first place. Accepting that so much of my pain today is connected to my attachment to a future that was never to be ours is hard to swallow. Jack was going to be the best Grandpa.
How do we know this? Because of how he treated our dogs.
As new parents to a puppy Doug the Pug, we were determined to raise a disciplined pug, maybe the first of his kind. Grandpa Jack had other plans. Many times we came home after Jack and Doug spent the afternoon together and Jack would announce our puppy’s milestones: “Guess what, Doug likes bacon!”, “Well, it looks like Doug likes hot dogs!” and our personal favorite, “Doug likes eggnog ice cream!”
When the dogs started to get a little chubby in the winter time and we realized they were getting double meals up and down stairs, we tried to subtly tell Jack to cool it on Doug’s portions. “Ok, Doug already ate dinner,” we would say, to which Jack would throw his hand up in the air, shake his head, and say, “Well, that won’t stop him from eating again!” as if the dog had been opening the cabinets and pouring his own bowls of food this whole time. We weren’t going to argue with Grandpa Jack so we doubled up the doggy exercise instead.
When Jack brought Newman home, we saw him light up from the inside out. We could hear them “talking” and we joked that Newman was his roommate and not “just” his dog, but it was true. Sometimes they bickered. And he showered Newman in toys and treats. One time when Jack was working and we were in charge of Doggy Dinners, Jack texted and said “make sure you give Newman blueberries with dinner”. We wondered if there was a particular dietary reason that Newman needed blueberries, and when we asked, Jack responded, “He just really loves blueberries.” When he wasn’t working, it was standard to go downstairs and find Jack and Newman sitting together in one recliner chair, both watching TV, looking like a best friend bobsled team. We can see that Newman misses Jack and our one consolation there is that we never had to see Jack miss Newman.
We had long term plans of having a “Downstairs Grandpa” and visions of our children mimicking what Doug the Pug has done for years: running downstairs and pounding on Grandpa’s door for treats. Trading “upstairs dinner” for whatever Grandpa was serving downstairs, because even if it was the same exact meal, something must have tasted better about eating at Grandpa’s. We thought Jack might walk our children to school and wait for them in the afternoon.
And letting go of those plans is really painful. But they were never ours in the first place and we can’t control that. So instead we need to try our best to keep Jack’s legacy alive and all around us. Science tells us that matter cannot be destroyed, it can only change forms and quantum physics says that this applies to soul energy as well. I choose to believe that he isn’t really gone, and that he has just changed forms, and similarly, our plans for a future with Jack don’t need to be gone, but we do need to adjust them so that they can shift forms.
So as we prepare to bring his grandson into this world, we will raise him with all of the best parts of his Grandpa:
We will teach him to value hard work and we will not make excuses for him. We will teach him to get up early enough and be ready for wherever you are going so that if the opportunity arises to chat with a neighbor on the way, there is time. We will raise him to be a foodie, as we loved to go to various restaurants with Jack and analyze every aspect of the experience. Maybe he will even join me in ranking restaurants based on their quality of iced tea (Jack and I both agreed that the ice tea at the Copper Door in Salem, NH is the best by far).
We will continue to watch sports. We will continue to talk about sports. I promise to invest myself more so I can fill in some of those conversations.
We will teach him the value of dry, subtle jokes. Bonus points if the person on the receiving end doesn’t realize you were joking until much later.
We will teach him to enjoy simplicity. A brief conversation just to let someone know you care. Laughing off an annoying experience in public because it reminds you of that Seinfeld episode about car rental reservations, the Soup Nazi, yadda yadda yadda.
We will teach him to treat all animals with loving respect. To honor their presence and be present with them. Animals will teach him unconditional love and loyalty, and through them, so will Jack.
We will fill our home with his pictures and stories and will have a surplus of dog treats for Jack’s best friends.
We are so grateful to have the memories of sharing the excitement of our baby with Grandpa Jack and that is carrying us through this indescribably difficult time.
I hope everyone here can help us keep Jack’s legacy alive however you see fit.
I saw that Jack was recently watching a DVD of Queen performances and so I’d like to leave us with these words from the song “The Show Must Go On”:
“My soul is painted like the wings of butterflies.
Fairy tales of yesterday will grow but never die.
I can fly, my friends.”
Jack and Newman.
More like all day, every day, all night, every night, seemingly forever.
I wrote recently that it’s hard to write when things are good. Since then, I have learned another time in life that may cause a writer to struggle with inspiration and motivation.
Morning* sickness.
For someone who draws a lot of inspiration from food and accompanying experiences, morning sickness is kryptonite. Even writing about since passed morning sickness right now is…difficult.
When all of your favorite foods suddenly repulse you, when you feel an overwhelming craving for, say, mashed potatoes, and then muster up the courage to make an enormous batch, presumably to last forever, as nothing else appeals to you, and then after one bite all you want to do is launch the whole pot of potatoes into the wall because you certainly will not be eating one more bite of these godforsaken dirt potatoes as long as you live…
…When your body is begging for rich, nutrient dense asparagus and so you make the trip to Whole Foods to buy the best, and you throw down half of your mortgage on bunches of organic asparagus without batting an eye, certain this will save you today, and then by the time you get home, the sight and smell of the raw asparagus is so nauseating that you can not only not stomach the thought of cooking and eating it but you threaten your husband with bodily harm if he dares even THINKS of cooking and eating it…
…When you are writhing in pain, knowing only eating will alleviate the nausea, knowing that there appears to be nothing you can eat that will alleviate the nausea without promptly contributing to it…
…When you desperately text your husband at 6 am while he is walking the dogs and demand that he picks up a Ho-Ho because you just saw an ad for them and it didn’t make you projectile vomit all over your TV…
…When you can’t move all day and even have to set your computer aside because scrolling a page induces motion sickness akin to the Turkish Twist at Canobie Lake Park…
…it’s hard to find the inspiration to write.
*24/7 sickness.
Painting the Roses Red
Sometimes it’s hard to find inspiration to write when things are good.
When you’re living in a sea of chaos that has been building for too long, under the thumb of an oppressor who both insecurely feared and amusingly underestimated you, when you are shamelessly lied to and repeatedly sabotaged, when you watch the most innocent, far more innocent than you, unnecessarily suffer at the hands of a spiraling disaster…
When you lose friends who you learn the hard way were never really your friends to begin with, the writing comes easily. Pain is powerful inspiration, I’ll give it that.
When a dictatorship implodes on itself and then democracy begins to rebuild a traumatized and confused community, there is a collective sigh of relief from the masses and anger from a few. And then, with more time, most of the angry wake up and realize that no one can deny that peace, harmony, and collaboration feel a hell of a lot better than paranoia and struggling to learn all the rules to save yourself (because the rules change as soon as you learn them anyway). While sighing in relief, don’t hold your breath for all of the angry to join you. Let them go, wish them well, and move forward with everyone else.
So it can be hard to find the inspiration to write when all of the energy that used to be devoted to figuring out how to survive can now be spent on other things- like pruning the rose bushes in preparation for spring after a winter that lasted far too long, and not because of the weather.
I like to prune the roses because each clip reminds me how to let go. When I first started I didn’t know what I was doing. When the flowers died, I left them there on the bush because for some reason I didn’t know that in order for more roses to bloom, I needed to clear the bush of all of the dead ones. I think I expected the dead flowers to regenerate or something, maybe because I have always struggled with endings and with letting go.
And doing that- clipping the dead pieces- is so quick. No looking back, not even a hesitation. If the leaves are brown, if the flower is wilting, if the crisp, green stem has hardened into a whitish gray stick, cut it off. Brush it away. And then admire the appreciative, crisp green stem, eagerly waiting to bloom the next rose.
And do it over and over. Quickly and naturally. After a while I got the hang of it and I began to connect with my rose bush- planted by someone I have never met, long before it was mine. Over the years I have grown to be excited to see what has bloomed each morning and look forward to clearing it of anything stifling such beautiful progress.
I used to be scared to cut the flowers before they died. I wanted them on the bush as long as possible. And then slowly I started to cut a few at a time and decorate my physical spaces with small vases of vibrant roses. I learned that I shouldn’t try to hold on to something that will make it’s way out anyway- instead, I should maximize my opportunities to soak up the joy it brings me while I can. I am not limited to enjoying my roses when I see them in my yard. They can bring joy to my kitchen, my foyer, my bedroom, my bathroom, my classroom. My car.
And I didn’t even miss them in the bush once I started cutting them, because I noticed that the more I cut them, the more grew.
That’s when I learned that mindfully appreciating beauty multiplies the beauty, exponentially.
It can be hard to find the inspiration to write when you discover that you are healing amongst nature, in ways that you simply cannot express with words.
When the letting go part gets me down, I visit the roses. No hesitation, no judgment, no regret as I silently thank each piece for it’s contribution and cut it out because that is the only way I can make room for new life, new beauty.
Roses don’t look back. Roses don’t try to hold onto something that needs to leave and they don’t get sad about pruning. The roses almost seem to have a collective sigh of relief themselves after a good pruning. They stand taller and stronger and brighter when they are no longer bogged down. Roses don’t look back, and neither should I.
It can be hard to find the inspiration to write when things are good- until you go outside to prune the roses.
MCAS Was Unconstitutional Long Before The Most Recent (Shamefully, Inexcusably) Racist Blunder (Crime).
Before I get into this, I want to be clear- I am not a teacher who has been opposing MCAS my entire career, or even at all. I don’t lament over what a burden it is or feel overwhelmingly stifled by it’s existence and any perceived limitations it places on my teaching. My students have always done (extremely) well on MCAS testing and I have always found joy in preparing them for an exam, seeing how powerful they feel dominating it, and seeing more students than I can count exceed their own expectations, earn scholarships, and even break records in my district each year. So, just to be clear, I am not typically an MCAS hater.
That being said, it is unconstitutional, racist, classist, and generally discriminatory against students who belong to a wide range of marginalized groups.
I guess that’s partially why I love teaching students how to destroy it, because that’s all that seems to be in my, and their, power, as actually changing it seems too far out of reach.
So I was surprised, to say the least, to see that on pretty much every news source I could find, an article either about how one of the essays will not be scored, as it was found to be racist and traumatizing, or about how N.A.A.C.P. and countless teaching and educational organizations are demanding that the entire test be invalidated. I found this surprising because I truly never expected the MCAS to be held accountable or even publicly called out for all of it’s dangerously discriminatory crimes.
I was also surprised because the first time I heard about this shockingly racist question was on the news. I didn’t see it myself while I proctored my students responding to it. I didn’t hear any student or teacher talking about it. And now, that is terrifying.
In short, part of the exam included a brief passage from Colson Whitehead’s novel The Underground Railroad, and the essay required students to write a journal entry from the perspective of the character Ethel, a white woman who is openly racist and derogatory towards the character Cora, a black woman who is a slave seeking freedom.
Feedback from the courageous students, teachers, and administrators who broke the cardinal rule of not discussing the exam shows that many students, white as well as students of color, were deeply disturbed and even traumatized by having to channel their creative writing skills into an offensive and racist narrative for an exam that determines whether or not they earn a diploma (and, best case scenario, college scholarships).
Whitehead himself, who did not consent to his writing being used in this context, expressed outrage that students were put in such a position that threatened invalidation of their exam if they dared to discuss it.
Also..this is the first year that the 10th Grade ELA MCAS was on the computer. This theoretically brings a lot of advantages- copy and paste, quicker scoring, catching up to the rest of the world in terms of technology. Unfortunately, it also favors students who have had the privilege of consistent access to computers throughout their lives and can type and navigate a computer with ease (there are not standardized tests for typing or computer skills, so- and as far as I know- my district eliminated such classes years ago).
Another perceived advantage, that now is beyond disturbing, is that students who require the accommodation of having the exam read aloud to them, are now able to have the test read to them by the computer through headphones. As a teacher with a Special Education background, this was exciting to me. Not only does it foster independence for students, it allows students to be more mainstreamed in testing rooms. These are Inclusion Wins.
However- this also means that any educators who would have otherwise been exposed to the test and noticed the shockingly inappropriate task….weren’t.
Which means that, if all goes according to plan, no adults in the building would have any idea what their students were enduring, and the students, threatened with the reality that their exams could be immediately invalidated and future diploma preemptively revoked, knew better than to try to voice their concerns to their teachers.
Besides, as my student so eloquently explained today after learning the news, “I did think it was racist, but I know the world can be cruel and all and just figured this was another one of those times.”
Too many of the students taking this test are so desensitized to systemic racism that it doesn’t even occur to them to complain about it.
Let that sink in.
My classes sat in a Community Circle today to read the articles and discuss our thoughts and feelings about it. We passed around the Conch shell, our talking piece, and suddenly it hit me like a ton of bricks.
Students often complain about the process of test taking while they are taking the test. The days are long, it’s boring, silent, exhausting, sitting in uncomfortable desks and chair from 8 am until 2:45, some without so much as a stretch break. They complain all the time, rightfully so, and psyching them back up and encouraging them and throwing peppermints and granola bars and thumbs up! signs at them in response is so second nature that I didn’t process the gravity of this memory until we were knee-deep in an emotional and thoughtful debrief about the question.
The day of this test question, one of my students repeatedly told me that she was refusing to answer one of the open response questions. A student who stands out among her peers for being hard-working, academically driven. I had never seen her refuse to do work, especially something so high stakes. I attributed it to exhaustion, and encouraged her.
She refused, and I patted her on the shoulder and told her I was confident in her and that she needs to be confident in herself.
She refused, and I told her to take a walk, to drink some water.
She refused, and I told her to put her head down for a couple minutes and meditate, like we practiced in class.
She refused, and I told her that this test was important, and if she just accepted that this was one of those times where we have to do things we don’t enjoy because they are important, it would all be over soon and she would never have to take another ELA MCAS for the rest of her life.
She refused, and I didn’t stop to ask her, really ask her, why.
I wish I did.
This memory hit me with a wave of nausea like a tsunami.
I am their teacher, and I was complicit in their forced silence.
…in invalidating their instincts.
…in promoting racism.
I reinforced systemic oppression when I should have been an ally and an upstander.
Because I trusted that this exam would be no more racist than previous ones, which meant that it’s run-of-the-mill, ignorant errors in judgment would be easily spotted and navigated and decimated, thanks to our pre-test pep talks, and then added to the growing list of micro-aggressions we see everywhere in education in this country.
I was wrong, and I felt sick.
This student sat to my right in our circle. When the Conch reached me, I asked her if she remembered how many times she expressed that she didn’t want to answer the question, and how many times I had encouraged her to answer it anyway.
She nodded, and I thought I might cry.
“I should have asked you why you didn’t want to. I should have. I wish I did. I’m really sorry.”
She smiled and let me know that it was okay. But it isn’t.
“I wish I did. I’m sorry.”
At this point, several students spoke at once, breaking the rules of the Conch talking piece. Because maybe, if nothing else, this experience has shown them the importance of
speaking when they know they have something important to say, even (and especially) when there are clear rules threatening them not to.
They assured me that I didn’t have to feel bad, that I was only doing what I thought I was supposed to do, knowing not to ask specifics because I could possibly lose my teaching license if I did.
That I was doing the same thing they were- not talking about the test.
We were all following the rules for fear of punishment, and that’s why none of us had woken up to the fact that something really, really wrong was happening.
I momentarily felt guilty in that moment that my students were comforting me, when I intended to be comforting them, but realized that this is one of infinite moments where my students demonstrate the empathy and compassion that I all too often find lacking in the adults who criticize them, and remembered the hope they give me for the future.
Our conversation continued, with other examples and personal stories about how we have observed the MCAS test to be racially and culturally insensitive, as well as sexist, classist, and ableist.
The truth is, the MCAS has *always* been unconstitutional. It began, probably, with Question #2 on the ballots in 2002, the year I graduated high school and the last year that students didn’t need to pass MCAS to graduate with a diploma.
Question #2 was also known as The Massachusetts English Language Education in Public Schools Initiative. It passed, which meant that all students in Massachusetts were required to be “taught English by being taught all subjects in English and being placed in English language classrooms.“* This includes students who have just moved to the country, who have few to no skills in English, and means that, for example, a student who moves here from Germany**, speaking only German, is required to demonstrate proficiency in comprehending Biology completely in English, and has the same requirements as their peer, who was born in this country and has grown up with English as their first language.
It also meant that the English Language Arts MCAS, a test alleging to solely assess skills in reading and writing, would be in English, without exception.
Which means, regardless of how skilled a student is in reading and writing in German, or Italian, or Spanish, or Creole, or Swahili, that a student would be told that they do not, in fact, have developmentally appropriate reading and/or writing skills because they do not currently demonstrate the same mastery of a second language compared to their peers in their first language.
And because, according to our Constitution, the United States of America intentionally does not declare a national language, refusing a student a diploma for their progress in learning the English language is absolutely, unequivocally, 100% unconstitutional.
And within that, it is also xenophonic, and then racist, and classist.
And until now, that understanding has felt too far away for people to care about enough to actually change.
But then, I used to think the same thing about collecting plastic grocery bags, laughing at homophobic humor in mainstream sitcoms, and overlooking men in power who ignore social cues while invading the personal space of others.
In short: Time’s Up. For everyone who is abusing power and harming anyone with a limited voice.
And today, Time’s Up for racially and culturally insensitive high-stakes tests. You were able to slide under the radar, for the most part, for a long time. But the day you required students of color to identify with and adopt the perspective of a disgustingly racist white person sabotaging the freedom of slaves in order to graduate from high school was the day you blew your own cover. It’s all coming out now.
We ALL deserve better than this. Time’s Up, and this is our catalyst to fight back.
What a time to be alive.
*https://ballotpedia.org/Massachusetts_English_in_Public_Schools_Initiative,_Question_2_(2002)
**I used Germany as a first example, because I have found that, for *some* reason, society tends to be far more understanding to immigrants who are English Language Learners when they are come from predominantly white countries. It’s not right. It’s just true.
Knowing that you do not know is the best. Not knowing that you do not know is an illness…Okurrrrr?
I love a strong juxtaposition. I think it gives me the illusion that I am achieving balance in life. Especially when I am not. I like salty, chocolate-covered pretzels, tart green apples with creamy brie, jarringly spicy hot sauce relieved by chunky guac, crunchy oreos on peppermint gelato, and a bourbon, neat, with a fresh, brined-in-house Pickleback.
I need to meditate every day. I also need Cardi B every day. Sometimes, they feel like one and the same.
,
At the end of a long day I remind myself of favorite Tao-isms. I read nearly memorized passages like:
“Simplicity, patience, compassion.
These three are your greatest treasures.
Simple in actions and thoughts, you return to the source of being.
Patient with both friends and enemies,
you accord with the way things are.
Compassionate toward yourself,
you reconcile all beings in the world.”
(Tao Te Ching)
And then, I get in my car, turn up the volume, and make my way home.
“You gon’ run up on who and do what?
I think y’all got your story screwed up.
I came here to ball, is you nuts?
I don’t want your punk-ass man, I’m too tough.
I’m the one that’s killin’ sh**, hands down.
If you got a problem with me, say it now.
Cause I don’t wanna hear no sneak dissin’
‘Specially not from one you weak b*****s.”
(Cardi B)
Namaste, my fellow Boss B’s.
*All* of you.
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