what we need

"It makes sense that if a plant is separated from the sun it dies, and if people are separated from God, they die. And so now it feels as if we live on a planet where there is just a little bit of water left, poisoned as it is, and we are all trying to get it and drink it so we can stay alive. But what we really need is God. What we really need is somebody who loves us so much we don't worry about death, about our hair thinning, about other drivers pulling in front of us on the road, about whether people are poor or rich, good looking or ugly, about whether we feel lonely or not.

We need this; we need this so we can love other people purely and not for selfish gain, we need this so we can see everybody as equals, we need this so our relationships can be sincere, we need this so we can stop kicking ourselves around, we need this so we can lose all self-awareness and find ourselves for the first time, not by realizing some dream, but by being told who we are by the only Being who has the authority to know, by that I mean a Creator. " Miller, Searching for God Knows What

first week top ten

I don't have time to update this thing much lately. But I've had lots of people ask me how teaching is going, so I thought I'd put some of the funny things I've encountered thus far in the second grade subuniverse I've found myself living in...

Top ten things that struck me this last week:

1. I'm spending my days with a bunch of wannabe gangbangers who wear miniature bling around their necks, have gold caps on their little teeth and sport FUBU backpacks. And who knew they made Dickies for 7 year olds?
2. The Lunch Lady is alive and well. She lives at my school. Her name is Ms. Harris. And yes, she still wears a hairnet, still hates her life and is still waiting for Mr. Sloppy Joe to rescue her from cafeteria hell.
3. Last week, drawing time produced pictures of: an older brother with a thought bubble by the side of his head that had a machine gun in it, a Chucky doll holding a knife, and a picture of Ms. Roseann holding hands with a boy in the park (who was of course wearing a baseball cap turned to the side and packing a gun in his pants).
4. The crazy bus driver that gives the evacuation drill is still really frightening. I think he is the same guy that did mine when I was in second grade. Shouldn't he be dead or at least retired by now? He warned the kids, as they looked at him with round frightened eyes, that if they run after the bus and he hits them, he won't clean up their mess on the sidewalk. He also warned them, pointing to the metal handle that opens the door, that they would be "kissing his brass" if the bus suddenly stopped short while they were standing in the aisle. "Do you want to fly to the front of the bus and kiss my brass?" he asks. "No thank you, Mr. Freaky Bus Driver."
5. A "balanced" meal still consists of tater tots, stale nachos drenched with processed cheese, a small carton of chocolate milk and a browning iceberg lettuce salad with a couple carrot shreds in it. Dig in, kids.
6. I've been having dreams with the words "Tight", "Dang!" and "Nah..whatever" in them. And I'm pretty sure I'm playing Xbox while I am saying them.
7. I believe I received an informal marriage proposal in Spanish from Mario this week, written on a piece of paper, delivered to my desk by his friend Salvador. "He is just too scared to ask you himself...but he hopes you'll say yes."
8. I'm so impressed by little Ruthie, who has got to be the world's youngest translator, translating everything to others in the class who are still learning English. I tell her all the time how cool she is that she can already speak two languages.
9. Underwear is still really funny. Some boy decided to leave his underwear in the boys bathroom and our class happened to stumble across it during bathroom break time (you can imagine the chaos that ensued -- shrieking, uncontrollable giggling), resulting in me having to walk in there and say, "It's just underwear! It's not that funny... and stop touching it!!"
10. I laugh everyday. A lot. They give me a new perspective on life. But on the serious side, I've started praying for each one of them, that their little minds would be able to grasp that there is so much more to life than the drugs and gangs that so many around them are caught up in. I'm praying they will realize the potential they have to be so much more than that.

...

"If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to save the world and a desire to savor the world. This makes it hard to plan the day." -E.B. White