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Beginner's Heart

I know education intimately. I’ve worked w/ urban schools, k-university, since 1990. At the district, state, & national levels. I’ve met w/ officials from across the globe (literally: Africa, Europe, Australia…). I have educator friends & colleagues around the country. So keep that in mind. The pro-DeVos argument  is loaded w/ biased rhetoric. Let’s begin w/…

Reading Jessica Livingston’s ‘Sound of Silence‘ struck so many resonant chords it was like she was playing my song. A soundtrack to a current dilemma I’m waffling over. Which is…to FaceBook or not to FaceBook. Livingston articulates the downsides eloquently: I’m sick of being a target for every neocon who buys alt-right agitprop. I’m tired…

In a month of giving thanks for everyday blessings, people sometimes assume that I’m not grateful for the big things: my home, my family. My material well-being. But the point to an entire month of giving thanks for ‘ordinary magic,’ is to remind each of us (me especially!) that in our lives, there is much…

Today I’m grateful, in this month of 30 days to remember all we have to be thankful for, that I’m an aunt. Being an aunt is a gift someone else has to give you — no one gets to ‘pick’ it. And it’s nothing at all like being a sister, or a mother, or even…

During November, I try each day to focus on something I’m grateful for ~ something for which I give thanks. It differs daily, obviously, but it also differs from year to year. When my children have been ill, or needy, my gratitude has focused on how fortunate I am that they have no ‘real’ issues.…

Recently I pruned my FB. I unfollowed several political sites, exhausted by the hatred on both sides. We (liberals) used to be better than this, as my younger son reminds me. We’re often called ‘wishy-washy,’ but I don’t buy that. It used to be that we tried — most of us tried hard — to listen…

…this remains: two adults, armed, in the dark, kidnap a fourteen-year-old boy and take him away to frighten him. Instead of which, the fourteen-year-old boy not only refuses to be frightened, but, unarmed, alone, in the dark, so frightens the two armed adults that they must destroy him…. What are we Mississippians afraid of? William…

So here’s the thing about being a bird nerd: you have to work at it. If you want birds, there’s work to be done. This morning, as I sat on the deck, a hairy woodpecker came to the seed cylinder. Hummingbirds buzz each other at the feeder, then perch one by one on its saucer.…

  Lately I am wallowing in attachment. My beloved has been ill, and much of each day is about what I don’t want: more hospital time, another round of antibiotics, a state that refuses reasonable health insurance assistance. Not to mention the lack of ease & time. What we ‘don’t’ want doesn’t feel like attachment,…

‘Whales Weep Not!’, by D. H. Lawrence is amazing. I like Lawrence’s poetry — many don’t. But who knew he did a whale poem? And that it would so beautifully illustrate all we have in common with all the life around us. We know whales are sentient, of course. But this poem, written with Lawrence’s famous…
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