bigots and bluebirds

thinking about sayings we heard from our grandparents and our parents before politically correct became the rule: bluebirds fly with bluebirds, stick to your own kind, not our kind of people ...

in our politically sanitized world, racists are bad, right? racist, as in people whose beliefs are racially or religiously intolerant, prone to racist remarks, who discriminate on the base of race or religion, or push the belief that their race or religion is superior.

but doesn't that also fit the definition of a bigot? a bigot is someone who favors their own group, religion, race, or politics, and is intolerant or pejorative of others who are different ...

although my parents were fairly stuck in their ways, they tried hard to raise us without the emotive baggage they were raised with. dad used to embarrass us when he'd make it a point to get a stranger talking; it didn't matter how the person looked, or talked, or even smelled ... dad made sure we knew that every person on this planet has a story to tell, a history, a personality, feelings that we should be aware of.

it makes for interesting situations, though, because it makes me painfully aware that other people don't think the same way.

it's amazing to me that people at school think nothing is wrong with keeping a sharper eye on poor people or minority kids because they might steal, are "not as reliable," or "get into trouble more." you sort of wonder how it is that people "just know" that that's "going to be a problem" even without knowing anything about that kid. and they don't even BOTHER to get to know anything meaningful about "that kid" ...

it's like they don't even realize that they don't jump as hard on athletes or honor students because "they're just being kids" (as opposed to THAT kid who has a "history of that kind of behavior" or "comes from that kind of family") ... athletes can do things like shove other kids into lockers or push them down stairs, and that's "just horsing around" but if one of THOSE kids ever did that, they'd be in the principal's office with the campus cop glaring at them, because physical aggression is just not tolerated. yeah.

ever notice that honor kids can lie about where they were, blow off coursework and cheat on tests, but of course, that doesn't get on their records, because they're smart enough to have passed anyway. if one of THOSE kids is even suspected of things like that, it's documented because "we have to keep on top of these things."

and of course, honor kids get better grades than THOSE kids because "they're better prepared," "smarter," and "keep up." teachers don't seem to notice when the honor kids slack off, or screw around, or lie and say the teacher must have lost their paper. honor kids don't do such things. that's only a problem with THOSE kids.

the racial and gender stereotypes are weird, too. even if an oriental kid's math test scores say otherwise, "we're sure this student will excel in math" ... but then, they figure, oriental kids are good at puters, too. but they also figure oriental kids naturally have a problem with english. and have you ever noticed that oriental boys are "nerds" but oriental girls are "exotic" ???

that ranks right up there with people who figure the black kids like rap, the hispanic kids are bad at reading, the boys will always do better in math and science, and that a girl in a suit is a debate nerd but a boy in a suit is professional looking.

and i guess in our politically sanitized world, it's still okay for teachers and students to believe things like "dropping the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki is justified because they bombed Pearl Harbor." say what???

that our government retaliated to an attack on a military base by destroying two major population centers and doing untold genetic damage to subsequent generations ... HOW is that justified?

and out of curiosity, why is it that when the democrats at school want something, that's "liberal crap" but when the republicans want something, that's "american" ???

it was simpler before

its the new year so here's a toast to before. a toast to holding hands with no implications, hugs that didn't have to mean anything, smiles that didn't get dissected and analyzed to death by all your enemies and friends. here's a toast to talking with someone of the opposite sex without someone else having a major cow, and to friends that aren't focused on how big, or how much, or how many times you did or didn't do what they would have. a toast for all those times you could talk without hormones being an issue. a toast to simpler pleasures, like breaking a cookie instead of a nail, getting a valentine from a friend, putting on clothes you like not clothes they like you in. or out. a toast to a time when cool was the water in the fountain, not the way he looks. a toast to simpler times, simpler relationships, simpler friends. a toast to before.

a little bit of kid inside

act your age be mature don't be such a child
comments like those make me wild
inside where a little bit of kid still lurks
waiting to sneak out among the jerks
gummi bears cocoa dance in the gym
marshmallow mountains drip over the rim
tic tac toe doughnut or the hole
tootsie pops when you reach your goal
(do you bite or wait for the chocolate
rush inside) the closer you get
to 24/7 grown up sheeeesh
just be yourself unleash
the little bit of kid inside
wish that kid didn't have to hide

dream house

ever think about what your dream house would be like? you list down all the things that are totally important and how much space these things are gonna need, and then try to put it together. you sketch it out. you put it aside for awhile. then you go back to it and try to trace yourself going through that house on a normal day. dang. okay, this room is too small. yeah. hmmmm. back to the drawing board. maybe if you cut the pieces out and grab a glue stick. hmmmm. okay, either it's going to be tucked away on a HUGE farm or country estate, ewwwwww commuting, or it's gonna have to scale back. maybe we could build upwards? wait ... don't make the mistake our school architects did ... you have to remember bathrooms (more than one. yeah.) and storage. don't forget storage for all your cool stuff. and don't forget that the refrigerator, freezer, and sink at home are never big enough. neither are the closets. wait. where ARE you going to put the laundry stuff? hold on. need a bigger paper. should have used restickable glue sticks. hmmmmm. that's the difference between dream houses and reality. in the dream house, you don't have to wash the dishes or do the laundry lol

songs you get stuck in your head

you know how sometimes you get a song stuck in your head? okay. this lady, Janis Ian, sang the most incredible songs, with this moody, "thinking out loud" voice. but this one song, At Seventeen (lyrics http://www.janisian.com/lyrics/At%20Seventeen.pdf) got stuck in my head. so, i'm walking around talking to people and hearing this song going through my brain, in janis ian's meditative, yearning croon. yeah. even singing along with bits of it. someone asked, "what did you say?" not enough, wish i could say it like she does.

drama queen

sometimes you get so tired of drama queens. dq's have to be the center of attention all the time. if you're sick, i guarrantee the dq is sicker. if someone's talking to you, the dq makes sure to tell you he's a jerk. or ugly. dq's are kind of selfish. they have to talk to you right now. they have to have YOUR attention all the time but when you really need to talk about something, their problems are so much bigger. they don't share well. if you get attention, it's because you were flirting or something. and don't you think it's weird when you need a break from them and you tell them to their faces, go away all ready! get a life! they want to know what you mean???

what did you say?

ever say something and the person accidentally hears it? you almost don't know whether to repeat exactly what you said and then say well if you don't like it you shouldn't be listening in, or try to be nice and scramble to make up something, you know?

its like when your friend is wearing something that looked really cool in the store but then at school you see her wearing it and you're like, omg i'm glad i didn't buy it. god, that's UGLY!!! and she says "WHAT did you say????" and you think, either way, you're screwed. uh, i said i'm glad i didn't try it because the test was ugly. "sure. whatEVER." and you watch the pms queen stomp off and think, ohhh yeah THAT went well. NOT.

but there are some people that make you wonder, why bother being nice? they never say nice things to you without sneaking in some kind of put down. do they think you're too stupid to understand? or are they too socially stupid to catch on to what people think of them?

you know what's really fun ... when you have two friends who are both being pms queens and you're tired of being the target of opportunity ... you stick them together and walk away.

what does cool mean?

yeah. when someone says you're cool, what does that mean?? wondering how people decide a person's cool. looks? personality? style? talk? huh. cool.

suki is cool. she can take a crappy looking old outfit and make it look totally retro, or change her look from goth to anime in seconds. she can scan a bunch of evi and put together a case that leaves the other team going "wait! what??" she can read people and instantly figure out how to get them to talk, even if she doesn't like them. which is a different sort of cool, right?

j-alex is cool in a mindbending way. he stands out in a crowd, sort of got a bubble thing going. you can walk into a huge crowd and instantly there he is. and when you get him really talking about stuff that matters, he has a really twisted way of thinking. you can get a whole convo going for hours and then you sit back and say, huh? yeah. that was cool.

pugerly is cool, but it's kind of like a whole image thing. when you see him, you think, ohh he totally looks cool. if you get him talking though, he's a totally different kind of cool. not the cool like he looks cool, but cool as in, you never realized how personally interesting he is, kind of cool.

the d-god is cool on a whole 'nother level. he's a kind of hits you when you're not looking cool. he can be going off at someone about something totally stupid, and then suddenly say or do something that totally re-establishes his cool.

i don't know. it's easier to describe not-cool. or uncool. or cool-less. but cool? it gets weird.

what's in a name?

my kids have been asking questions about our family and i don't really know much about their dad's side. he isn't around to ask. got started sleuthing info. this quickly turned into one big hairy mess.

hubby was adopted but his birth certificate lists his adoptive parents. his parents know the names of his birth parents, but this topic is verboten. (since we don't come from a very large gene pool, this presents a dilemma of sorts for our kids, because in terms of potential spouses, we're talking only one generation removed and we aren't going to find out the birth parents' names in the near future. genetically speaking, its quite possible that if they married someone whose racial extractions are atleast half their dad's, the person could be directly related. hmmm.)

more strangeness. most of us only daydream at some point or another about changing our names, but mom in law seems to have changed hers four times that we've figured out so far. name changes correspond to different phases of her life, but since we don't know very much about her life (she isn't one to share confidences), this makes it a challenge. we don't even know what town she was born in, because we were each told a different one. oddly enough, i can't find any info on dad in law prior to high school. i could ask again, but i'm not a fan of being yelled at. apparently, asking about past history is prying.

we have a slim lead, in that we know which cemetary their paternal grandfather's family members are in. so. i guess we'll be spending part of spring break poring over cemetary records, if we can get access to them.

i knew you when

when i first became a teen, dad sat me down for a heart to heart talk. no, it wasn't the birds and bees lecture. it was about I KNEW YOU WHEN. basically, what it boils down to is this:

in life you have lots of decisions you make about things you will or won't do. according to dad, you should always take a step back and think before you do something, because you don't want someone someday to be able to laugh and tell your kids embarrassing "yeah, i knew your mom/dad when ..." stories.

my friends and family tell me they go through this all the time. as a parent you have to decide whether its better that the kids hear directly from you about what you were like, or if they hear about it from the people you used to party with. because if there are things you did as a teen, bet on it ... your kids are going to hear about it someday.

so, i tell my kids what i was like back then. they don't seem particularly disturbed by how stupid i was. oddly enough, they simply attribute it all to "the old days." makes me kind of wonder sometimes.

the mom curse

we called it THE MOM CURSE when we were kids. maybe you've never heard it (lucky if that's so!). we were a rowdy bunch, and when we were being particularly horrible, at some point she'd shake her head and quietly say "I hope someday you have kids exactly like you."

needless to say, as we grew older, it sounded increasingly ominous. we'd find ourselves pausing in the middle of contemplating some incredibly heinous teen prank because those words just seemed to echo through our consciences. we weren't angels, by any measure of the yardstick, but it sure did cramp our teen style.

okay, so we grew up and several of us got married. unbelievable as it may have seemed back then, now we're the parents. and we find ourselves intoning those same words. our kids, when they get together with the cousins, talk about THE MOM CURSE in the same hushed tones we did at their ages.

the funny thing is, our kids are so different. i tell them about some of the stupid things we did, and they often are amazed that i survived to become a parent. (but haven't we all tried driving down tantalus at night without headlights? the fact that i didn't have a license at the time was, um, an oversight.) i never have to worry that my own kids will do any of those things. i am often astounded at some of the things they do, but i also know that i don't have half the sleepless nights my parents did.

every time i find myself saying THE MOM CURSE, i thank god i had such great parents, and hope i can do as good a job as they did. (you can't blame the factory for how the results turn out, you can only hope you find the problem and solve it.)

Losing a friend ...

funny how it works. losing someone, whether the person was a parent, a child, a significant other, is so hard, especially if you think of yourself as very self-reliant. when you lose someone you love, you go through a huge spectrum of emotions, 'way beyond devastation. sometimes you get frustrated with simple tasks. sometimes it's frightening realizing that that person isn't there anymore and you can't just pick up the phone or walk in the door and talk. and sometimes you feel so angry at the person and guilty that you're angry.

a close friend lost a member of her family. she was devastated, and asked me to help her get through it. we spent hours and hours talking about what she was going through, and i had really mixed feelings. not because i didn't want to help, but because of what would happen.

one of the things i tried to warn her about, is that there would come a time when she'd be ready to fly solo, and that when that time came, she would know. she asked how she was supposed know so i told her that she needed to carefully monitor how much she was depending on me because that would turn into resenting that she felt so dependent. i tried to reassure her that this is also a normal part of the grieving process, but that i didn't want to lose her as a friend.

of course, she didn't really listen. who really does, in times like that? i worried so much because she would fall apart in the middle of something and want me to take over. this happens. but i know that she felt terrible that she wasn't able to do things. that she had to get help from someone, depend on someone, was really taking a toll, and it worried me. i began phasing back gradually when i could see, even if she said she wasn't ready, that she was getting back on an even keel. you do that, you know. you don't "get over it" but you do find a new equilibrium.

so it didn't surprise me a couple of weeks ago when she said she was ready to get on with her life. what saddened me was when she went on to say that she was upset at how much i'd taken over. whoa. she doesn't know how hard it was to keep up with my own life and still be there when she needed me. taken over? no thank you, i have my own life to live. but it isn't for me to say anything, because you know, this is what i tried to warn her about. this, too, is a part of the whole process.

it's hard sometimes, to be a good friend.

tough to love a bully

have you ever thought about how different someone else's view can be? my mother in law is a firm believer in what she calls tough love, or "tell it like it is" by which she means that she speaks her mind, doesn't beat around the proverbial bush, can be "brutally honest" (her words).

when i first met her, she was pretty outspoken about what she thought of my religion. i tried to reason with her. ohhhh, big mistake. i will forever be "that heathen hussy" her son married. (it made for interesting reactions when i was introduced to people.)

to maintain wa, i developed a self-defense mechanism -- when she opens her mouth, i go silent. "why don't you ever talk??" she yells, but it's just safer to let her rant. painful experience has taught me that nothing i say or do will change what she's decided to think about me, or anyone or anything i care about. trying to reason with her is hazardous to wa. she will not let things drop; not for a moment, and it doesn't bother her in the least to make a scene in public places. she's rather good at that.

my kids have a different way of dealing with her. they refuse to. they avoid her. i try to tell them that contact is important, but they tell me that even if they love her, they can't stand her. she started complaining at a family gathering that i make my family avoid her. when she wouldn't stop, my son yelled "mom says we gotta love you but she can't make us like you." he apologized for being rude, but would not apologize for how he felt.

what a conflict. i was raised believing that you respect your elders. not saying that my own parents are perfect, but simply that when all is said and done, i loved and respected them. it's harder with kids. they learn in school that bullying is never right. you know, i'm proud that my children refuse to be bullied by anyone, but inside i hurt for the wonderful times that our family could share, if only there were some way to get past all her hostility. i wonder why things have to be this way.