My letter to the eidtor about my girls not being allowed to go on a field trip.

This is a copy of the letter I sent to the editor:

I am a single mom of two boys ages 5 and 9. My 9 year old is Autistic and my 5 year old has ADHD. I also have two girls ages 11 and 13. My 13 year old has Aspergers.
___________________________

My girls were not allowed to go on the #### Middle School summer school field trip today because they were often late and had one absent day due to me being very sick. Late has always been an issue in my family that I fight to overcome. However, this time it actually wasn’t our fault.

The boys are in the summer school program at #### Elem. School which is clear across town and we only gave us 15 min to get between schools. Maybe if I sped and ran red lights I might have made it every day on time but I won’t do that, it’s illegal and dangerous.

I even tried dropping the boys off early, I thought the school would allow them to be at least 15 min early but the doors didn’t actually open till about 5 min prior so that didn’t work either.

Apparently even if the girls had been on time everyday they still wouldn’t get to go on the field trip because of my sick day. So basically they are being punished because I was in a ton of pain and couldn’t get them to school. After all the summer school has a 100% attendance policy.

I talked to the ladies at the #### summer school office about this and they just kept reminding me they have a 100% attendance policy and there was nothing they could do. They said other students who were late had the same result of not being allowed to go on the field trip. I wonder how many of them were unfairly judged as well. I told the #### summer school office I wanted to talk to the school board and the lady gave me Billy Gosnell’s office number which I called and left a detailed message on. I looked him up on line and when I got home and it says he is Administrative Services -Summer School & Records.

It is too late to send my daughters on the field trip, but something still needs to be done about this. I want a promise that they will make the necessary changes for all children by next summer. I don’t want any more children punished for being sick or a parent being sick or because they refuse to break the law by speeding and running red lights to get their children from one school to another school clear across town. Missing a field trip may seem simple to an adult but it can really hurt a kid. It give them the feeling of being left out and unfairly punished.

This all happened after my high functioning Autistic son had to be taken out of summer school because they didn’t “have the staff” to deal with him. Apparently listening to simple hints and implementing them from his mom about how to work with autistic kids was just too overwhelming for them. No thought that what I have to say may help them in the future as well. There are a lot of ASD kids in the public schools, not just mine.

I hope the public schools here in Springfield will make the necessary changes so children may have a more positive summer school experience next year and thereafter.

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Embracing Your Black Hole

Embracing Your Black Hole

If you fill a black hole with something pre-made you are interjecting something foreign and if it fits or at least seems to fit you have just created a droid. Something unoriginal, pre-programmed and eventually in time it will likely be unfulfilling.

A black hole is an opportunity to create.  Whole universes have been created out of black holes. If I give an artist a paper filled up with writings and diagrams and asks him to create an original drawing it just wouldn’t come out right. Maybe the artist would draw things around the edges and in-between paragraph breaks but the focal point would just be one of confusion and not a true clear expression of the artist.  In order to get a clear expression of the artist they need to have a blank page, a black hole.

We all start out with black holes inside of us. Each of us differs on how we fill it over the years. I filled mine dutifully as I was taught to and as time went by as I understood to. There is a common Christian expression that says, “There is a Christ sized hole in all of us that only Christ can fill”. Most religions have similar teachings, that only the deity or deities of that religion will complete ones inner black hole. Then there is family and friends who either offer suggestions or manipulate and control doing their part to fill the hole. Sometimes these things seem to create more of an ulcer effect than a fulfillment and no matter how you may hurt they will insist on helping by stuffing more of their acidic used oil into your bleeding black hole. It just creates more clutter, for me it just a droid effect.

Though I say I was a droid I don’t mean my heart wasn’t in it. I wanted nothing more than to please the Lord Jesus Christ. It was my ultimate goal, my desire of my every day.  I read and studied the scriptures, prayed and meditated on the Lord and I was in church and fellowship as well as having parents who “reared me in the ways of the Lord”.  It was my heart and soul and I totally believed that filling my heart and soul with Jesus would take care of that black hole as well as anything and everything else. It can work, for some longer than others anyway. For those who just accept the droid way it could be much longer. There are many who found the black hole still there and the cluttered design unacceptable. Those are the folks who end up in depression or a constant feeling of emptiness or dissatisfaction. Some just trudge on that way or take drastic measures. For those who leave their religion or “family way” they are labeled as rebellious, back slidden, or never really saved and so on. I have been called all three of those I just listed; those judgments passed on me were far from true.

Yesterday I was reading a chapter in Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert and this morning a gentleman in Sunday class said something very similar to what I reading. It was about how we look to outside things to fill us, like god or gods as well as other things, but what we need to be doing is to look inside for whom we are and what we are and fill ourselves, finding the divinity within. Only then can we truly serve and help other and be true to what we worship.  

So there I was in church during the quite meditation time thinking about this. I looked within me. In the past after leaving the lies of my youth I found a black hole. I found it to be sad, depressing and heart breaking. But I was certainly not going to refill it with more lies just because others wanted me to or to do what some do and make my life easier. I’d rather live with the cold hard truth than to live in a warm cushy lie.  So there I was looking. This time instead of seeing a black hole I saw the black hole with a little glowing flame swirling around. That’s when it came to me; a black hole is an opportunity to create. Rather than being depressed it gave me joy to realize I have the opportunity to create. And it will be my own creation, not someone else’s, not pre-made, but me just being me.  During the Sunday class this morning the subject was “slow creating” (or something like that). It was a spinoff of the “slow foods” movement. It was about the benefits of taking time to create quality things in our life by taking our time and not being in a hurry. It sounds like an ideal plan for creating in one owns black hole. Don’t be in a hurry, but enjoy your own handiwork. Take time to pause and look at what you are creating from time to time then go on with new and fresh insight to better and better it in your own way. Have the patience to stop and untangle mistakes without frustrations and then go on.

Creating in your own black hole will make you a better person, a better friend, a better partner, a better patron, and even a better worshiper of your deity because it will make you truly whole. And what you give out will be from you, not regurgitated from someone else.  A true gift is one created with personal care by oneself.

I really like that crafting in my black hole is something I can take my time at, an on going process that I can continuously make adjust and better.

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An Ode To Rude People

To those who are rude
that pass my way
I wave my hand
and calmly say
a little sugar
a little spice
I am determined
to stay nice
I send your energy
right back to you
So all that remains
is the sky so blue
Peace and love
be in my heart
I will not think of
that little fart!

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