Things That Are Different

I kept meaning to write some kind of anniversary post last month, since mid-November was the time I came home from the hospital a year ago, but for whatever reason I never got around to it. In some ways last year seems ages ago, but there are other times when it feels like last week. I think part of my problem was that I was trying a little too hard to make a post like that Feel Significant. Instead, here are a few things that are different in my life since being hospitalized.

Armchair Quarterbacks

A recent Feministe thread on education has me irked, yet again, by the way education debates usually seem to go. Why is it that we defer to experts on so many other topics, and yet so many Americans seem to think their opinion on education trumps all merely by virtue of having once been educated themselves? Hey, I fly on lots of airplanes–how come Boeing hasn’t hired me as a consultant yet?

I understand that we all want to use our personal experience to make sense of the world. And I realize that I’m not yet a parent, so I don’t have a parental point of view on what it’s like to send a kid through school. But I’m tired of the opinions of educators–those of us who are actually in schools and communities, fighting for better resources for children and young adults–constantly being shouted down by amateur education reform scholars.

Education is underfunded. If you look at the amount we’re shelling out for national security and defense versus education, our priorities are severely out of whack. The US ranks second in GDP purchasing power parity in the world, but it currently ranks 46th in education spending as a portion of total GDP–behind some of the usual characters, like the UK and the Netherlands, but also behind such nations as Cuba and Lesotho.

Educational funding is also seriously inequitable. The same neighborhoods and communities who find themselves shorted on municipal services, police and fire support, and social services are often the very same ones fighting to keep their schools open and adequately funded. Look at the proposed school closures and mergers for an urban district like Boston Public Schools, then try overlaying with crime data (PDF) from those same areas. Hint: Dorchester is District C, just as one starting point.

But beyond that, education is undervalued and maligned as a profession. Whenever individual school unions make unpopular choices, all educational unions–often all teachers–are demonized. When individual public schools and districts fail to meet benchmarks, the successes of other schools–yes, even inner-city public schools–are dismissed. The perceived power of some metropolitan teachers’ unions lead outsiders to paint teachers (and organized labor) with broad strokes. We’re in it for the money. We don’t care about students. We’re making outrageous demands.

All of this demonization also ignores the very real struggles teachers face in the classroom (and wherever educators may work). Although the profession is still perceived as female-dominated, the narrative of female teachers and male administrators is still sadly alive and well–including in many of our graduate programs. Male teachers, meanwhile, particularly at the lower levels, still face social stigma thanks to the sensationalized threat of sexual predators in classrooms. All of us who work with so-called “troubled” youth have to wade through self-perpetuating narratives of underperformance, not to mention ignorance among parents, colleagues and community members about issues like learning disabilities and mental illness.

Those of you who don’t work in education might have the luxury of throwing up your hands and declaring the system broken. But those of us who are educators can’t, and don’t, do that. We go to work every day, and we bring our jobs home with us every afternoon (or night). Not because we’re getting glory, or money, or power, or fame–because we love what we do, and because we believe in a better world for our students. We are building it with our hearts and minds and hands every day.

Abby… Normal?

I probably needed glasses long before I finally got them. Like so many nearsighted kids before me, I had perfected the fine art of squinting. I didn’t exactly cheat on those regular eye tests at school, but I certainly did my darndest to pass them. I think it was a math teacher who favored red dry-erase markers that finally did me in–I had to see a real eye doctor.

I didn’t have any particular fear of glasses. I was already solidly unpopular, so the threat of being called four-eyes didn’t have much bite for me. I do remember hoping I would still see light sources in the same way. (I did.) I also didn’t see anything particularly “wrong” with my vision. I was having some trouble seeing algebra equations, sure, but things were supposed to get a little fuzzy in the distance, right?

The first time I looked at a lawn with my new glasses, I was stunned. There were individual blades of grass! Did other people see details like that all the time?

I have corrected-to-normal vision.

I also have corrected-to-normal emotions.

Quick Hit: Searching for…

In creating a bibliography to pull some books for a class that’s coming to the library later this week, I’ve been searching for a lot of contemporary issue-type books. So far I’ve been pretty pleased with our selection on most topics–I’ve been actively developing this area of the collection, but we already had some good (actually contemporary!) titles in many cases–but the most recent topic has me stumped (and adding book titles feverishly to order lists).

Hits returned on the following searches:

Contraception: 0
Contraceptives: 0
Birth control: 1
Condom: 1
Adoption: 0
Adopted: 0
Birth parents: 0

I’d keep going, but it’s just depressing me.

Silent Shame

Last week I was eating dinner with a bunch of friends when one of them said something that made me really uncomfortable. I don’t want to give the full context of the comment–mostly because I try to keep my friends and loved ones relatively anonymous when I write about them here–but the important background info is that I’m sure she thought the comment was harmless. She was being self-deprecating, referring to herself and our other friends, many of whom have the usual aches and pains that often come with getting older, many of whom have had minor or major injuries. She referred jokingly to “us cripples.”

Now, I’d like to think that the comment would have bothered me in any set of circumstances, coming from any friend or acquaintance or stranger. And I have reason to believe that’s true–the more I’ve read from amazing writers like the folks at FWD/Forward, and the more I’ve wrestled with the ways that things like mental illness and trauma intersect in my own life, the more I notice problematic language. I’ve been working really hard to erase “lame” and “crazy” from my own vocabulary, for instance.

But I can’t really know if the comment would’ve bothered me in another situation, because it happened in the situation I was in: sitting in a restaurant where, just moments earlier, our waitress had held the door open for someone using forearm crutches–who was seated at the table next to ours.

Teens and Tattoos

I’m fortunate enough to work in a school environment that doesn’t frown upon my visible tattoos. I felt pretty prepared for the opposite to be true–that’s why all my tattoos are in locations easily concealed by professional attire–but I was pleasantly surprised to discover I didn’t have to worry about wearing polo shirts in warmer weather. (And thank goodness, because my library isn’t air conditioned!)

Having my tattoos visible invariably means my students will look at them, ask about them, and want to talk about them. Where did I get them? Did it hurt? How long did they take to heal?

I wasn’t at all surprised to get the questions, and I’m always happy to answer them, but I was a little thrown the first time a kid approached me asking about their own tattoo.

Why I Love Google Voice

Because voicemail transcripts like this show up in my inbox:

Yellow. Yeah. This is an automated voice message from jet blue Airways. Your, Mary go bye. Yes important information on a change to your scheduled flight. Yeah may be helpful to have a piece of paper and pencil to write down your new flight information, your flight number. Gyro, Yeah. 9. Yeah to yeah 3 y’all, November 10th your partying. Yeah, Boston, and arriving in your condo your flight number. Gyro yeah. 9. Yeah too. Yeah 2 yeah. On November 14th. Your partying your condo. Yeah, arriving in Boston. Yeah has been changed. You are now confirmed on flight number. Yeah, 0, yeah. 9. Yeah too. Yeah 3 y’all, November 10th. Yeah, Departing, yeah, Boston, at 7:34 PM, Yeah, arriving in your condo at 9:23 PM, Yelena number. Gyro, Yeah. 9. Yeah 2 yahoo y’all, November 14th. Yeah, Departing, should condo at 7:10 PM, Yeah, arriving in yo often at 10:20, 10 PM, yeah we hope this new flight means with your needs. Yeah, we look forward to serving you, yeah. By.

Both wildly inaccurate, and grammatically incorrect! Now I totally want a gyro.

A Gift from the Chef

So, due in no small part to my general wussiness about camping in 100+ degree weather in Alabama, we decided instead to stop in Atlanta. Specifically, I said, “Hey, want to go find Kevin [Gillespie, of Top Chef season 6 finalist fame]‘s restaurant in Atlanta?”

I would like full credit for what turned out to be a really good idea. [Warning: food porn ahead!]

Speed Enforced by Aircraft

Day one of the Epic Road Trip 2010, having opened shortly before five this morning, is coming to a close. We’re in our seventh state for the day, which only took us about 13 hours.

Observations from the day:

While Massachusetts (and presumably some other states; I can vaguely remember this being true in Oregon and Idaho) considers wearing your seatbelt to be the law, and Virginia espouses said law as a law (we can live with), Pennsylvania is oddly possessive–it’s our law.

I don’t think the temperature got below 96 until well after dark in North Carolina. Everywhere else temperatures were solidly in the 97-102 range.

Virginia claims to enforce its speed limits via aircraft. I won’t deny that aircraft could monitor speeding violations, but when was the last time you saw a speeder pulled over by a chopper?

Virginia also still has pump locks in gas stations. You can actually buy a soda while pumping your gas. It is lovely.

Tomorrow: more driving, with some planned camping in Alabama. The spot we have in mind doesn’t keep any of its maps online, with the exception of the motor vehicle map–which “is black and white and does not provide much information besides the roads and trails open to motor vehicles. It’s not a very good map for recreation orientation use.” Thanks for the honesty, Alabama!

What’s at Stake?

I’ve written before about the euphemizing (euphemization? Neither of these appear to be actual words) of queer relationships–how it marginalizes us, how it feels when straight friends or family do it to us. But lately I’ve been thinking about the dynamics at play when we euphemize ourselves versus when others euphemize us.

What’s at play when I refer to my girlfriend as merely my friend?