Looking Good

Yesterday as I stood in front of the bathroom mirror, I was caught in a conundrum: Before I go to the dentist, I always floss, brush and rinse my mouth so that when the hygienist or the DDS gets his hands in there, it they will be working with a clean slate. The problem was, I wasn't going to the tooth doctor. I was going to the eye doctor. How should I properly prepare for this exam?
I blinked and then probed for any excess sleep in my eyes. I appeared rested and relaxed, with a nice pair of optics for presentation. Then it occurred to me that I might spend some time cleaning my glasses, since that chore had evaded me for the past couple of days. I am much more conscientious about it than I used to be. The story goes that once, at a very early stage of my glasses-wearing, I was at the circus with my family. I complained to my mother about not being able to see, at which point she offered to wipe my lenses clean for me. The trouble was, I had already been hard at work at just that, by licking them clean. After finishing a mound of cotton candy. The sugar had crystallized and I was now looking through a confectionery kaleidoscope. Bonus points for my mother who eventually returned a pair of usable, mostly clean glasses to the face of her young son.
In the intervening forty years, I have learned not to clean my glasses with my tongue. I have also made a point of using a soft cloth other than my shirt tail to get those spectacles at optimum clarity. Most of the time. Then I started thinking about my friends who insist that I am cheating myself on those trips to the dentist. Why bother making your mouth a sterile field before you go in for a cleaning? That's what you're paying them for, after all. I held my glasses up the light. There were a few smudges, but nothing that resembled crystallized sugar, and so I decided to throw caution to the wind and glasses on my face.
As I sat in the chair, I felt the usual tension about what that line on the bottom of the chart read, and whether one was better than two, or two was better than one. When it was all over, I got a pat on the back for "doing such good work" with my lazy eye over the past year. Then, since the doctor's ten-thirty was running a little late, he asked how my glasses were holding up. I told him they were fine, but I noticed that I had been shoving them back up my nose a little more than usual lately. He offered to tighten them up a touch, and when he handed them back to me, he apologized for any fingerprints he might have left on them.
"Here, let me get that for you," he said, reaching for my glasses one more time. He went to the back room and came back with his special cloth, explaining that he used just a mild hand soap to get rid of any smudges or stains. When I put them back on, it was like a new day. Everything had a sharp edge, and my eyes didn't wander around any of the drops or smears. The lights were on and I was home.
Walking back to my house, I enjoyed the sights of the neighborhood, and felt a twinge of remorse as I realized that I it would be another year before my glasses would be that clean again.

Racing In The Streets

"Maybe this town rips the bones from your back, it's a death trap, a suicide rap, we've got to get out while we're young..." And kudos to the clear heads in New Jersey who, in spite of their obvious love and affection for all things Bruce Springsteen for not making "Born To Run" their state song. I was thinking about The Boss' signature anthem as I rode to work on Friday. As a bike rider, I watched with mild disdain as a PT Cruiser went tearing up a residential street a block away from my school. At not quite seven thirty on a Friday morning, what is the point of racing down a street to a stop sign, only to accelerate another block or two to yet another stop sign? Where's the fire, bub?
Then I remembered my own youth. Our neighbors across the street used to wince in anticipation of my exit from the spot in front of my parent's house. The Chevy Vega was no mean street machine, but inside, with the stereo turned up, you couldn't have convinced me of that. I often left a little rubber next to the curb as I raced off to another day at thoroughly suburban Boulder High School. Or down to K Mart. Or over to a friend's house. When I was seventeen, I didn't go anywhere slow.
Nowhere was this more true than the four block stretch just east of us, where I could really let all four cylinders of that baby roll. Best of all, there were no stop signs on Grape Street. One block over on Glenwood, you had to stop at nearly every block. Not so on Grape, and I took advantage of the difference. I wasn't the only one, either. Both of my brothers, as a rite of passage, tested their vehicles on the drag strip of North Boulder.
Mostly though, I wasn't in a hurry to get anywhere. I was on my way to a place that I hadn't been, but I had no idea where it was. Consequently, I kept accelerating in hopes of getting where I didn't know where I was going. It was that feeling: I had to get out while I was young. It took me another thirteen years, and I still go back there to visit. But when I do, I always obey the posted speed limit. I'm somebody's dad now. It's those darn kids.

The Real World

A recent poll suggests that fifty-seven percent of American surveyed believe that statistics can be misleading. With that in mind, President Obama forged ahead with his forum on health care. alas, unlike the Beer Summit so many months ago, there wasn't much in the way of refreshments to be had there. There wasn't much refreshing to be found at Blair House on Thursday at all. Contentious, confrontational, critical and many other words that start with "c" could be used to describe the seven and a half hour discussion of competing ideologies, but "complete" would not be among them.
President Obama put aside suggestions of starting over, or moving ahead in smaller steps. He wants it all. Now. His proposed overhaul of the health care system is now a year old, and it sits atop a pile of other attempts made in the last fifty years. What was billed as an attempt to bridge partisan differences between Democrats and Republicans ended with the suggestion that he would encourage his party to push legislation through without the support of the Grand Old Party. After all, isn't that what a majority is for?
Then it all comes down to the mid-term elections. If that majority disappears, then all that momentum goes out the window while the divide grows deeper still. I wasn't able to watch the entire debate, since like many Americans I found myself hard at work during those hours, but I did tune in for a few choice exchanges. To read the media's version of it, it was a knock-down, dragout slugfest with plenty of yelling and screaming. There were plenty of pursed lips and terse words, but no name-calling and plenty of outward respect. The contempt that is supposed to exist between the two sides was mostly in evidence when one member of the Congress cut another off, or when the President exerted his authority and his professor's voice on those with whom he disagreed.
That's why I think it would have been much better if beer had been served. Loosen everybody up first, let decorum slip a little, and then see what comes of it. Like they say on MTV, "It's what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real." It's time to get real about health care in America.

"To Teach Is To Learn Twice"

Those rumblings you hear all across the country aren't necessarily seismic. They could be coming from the nervous stomachs of teachers you know. The practice of "pink-slipping" whole batches of school employees come springtime has become as seasonal as the Ides of March or Saint Patrick's Day. It's a way for "troubled districts" to lighten their budgets in anticipation of an ever-leaner future. More than simply getting rid of the "dead wood," it stirs the pot and keeps things moving. It also sends many teachers who yearn for job security looking for the door.
San Francisco, who dodged a budget bullet last year via the city's "rainy day fund," will be sending out more than nine hundred pink slips next month in hopes of managing their current hundred million dollar shortfall. The layoffs will be based on seniority, not performance. Again, if I were a brand new teacher, I would be wondering what sense it makes to land on the front lines of urban education, only to be told my services would no longer be necessary. Along with the job cuts, programs will disappear and class sizes will creep back up. Congratulations, you get to keep your job, but it just got harder.
At least I don't work in Central Falls, Rhode Island. In this corner of the country, they're getting rid of all their teachers. Every one of them. It's not the budget up there. It's the lack of performance. The district wants teachers to get more training and do tutoring. The teachers want to get paid for that time. And that's the rub. Negotiations ended. Will there be a compromise? Eventually, at least half of those teachers could be rehired. Just like those teachers on the left side of the country still have a chance to keep their jobs if there was some creative solution to the budget crisis. If they still want them.

The Thrill Of Victory

It might be simple enough to blame the Olympics. We've got a whole school full of kids who want to go for the gold. It is this spirit of competition that we celebrate every four years, or every two years in an alternating summer to winter fashion. Everywhere I look, I see the results and they are the first thing that is emphasized is the medal count. There is a tally of just how many gold, silver and bronze medals each country has won, while reporters from this country are quick to point out just how many more the United States has compared to other countries. Russia loses out, since the breakup of the Soviet Union. Germany does better since unification. It makes sense, really.
But is winning what it's all about? "Faster, Higher, Stronger" is the credo of the games since 1894. "Let me win, but if I can not win, let me be brave in the attempt," reads the motto of the Special Olympics. Brave in the attempt. I like that. It's the part that I spend most of my time with on Tuesdays when I wear my PE whistle. I work hard to come up with cooperative games for each grade level: activities that avoid the distinction of winners and losers, but there is a constant challenge to steer kids away from faster, higher, stronger. Perhaps it is because I spent so much time standing against the wall, waiting to be the last one picked. I don't want anyone to be last if I can help it.
That's not how kids are wired, however. They have heightened awareness of the smallest differences. "More" and "less" is a huge deal for elementary students. Ultimately it all comes down to a self-esteem issue. Everybody wants to have a moment of being special. Nowhere is that more apparent than at the start of every day when all the classes line up on the yard. A lot of kids will leave their jackets or backpacks as place holders while they go off to pursue fun before the bell rings, but when that moment comes, there is a mad dash. In all that pushing and shoving, there is almost always at least one heart broken. "But I was first," comes the plaintive whine.
I have tried to explain that there has never been a time when a student has not been allowed to enter the classroom if they were second or third in line. There would be a desk waiting. I have even suggested that there is a certain nobility in allowing someone else to get into line ahead of you. These are not words that get much play. After any given dissertation, I will undoubtedly be met with the refrain, "But I was first."
And so it goes. Consequently, I have changed my approach. I drift to the end of the line, where I make a big deal about the person I find there. "Thank you for letting all these other kids in ahead of you. Aren't you the considerate one?" Mostly what I get are blank stares, but I expect that over time, I expect I will eventually have kids racing to the end of the line, but I'm looking forward to hearing it: "But I was last!" At least let them be brave in the attempt.

Nobody Rides For Free

If you walk up the street from my house and stand on a particular curb at a particular time in the morning, you can get a free ride across the Bay Bridge. Normally this little trip would cost you four dollars, if you drove yourself into San Francisco. But if you are willing to ride shotgun into that city by the bay, you're actually helping the driver of that car bypass the toll gate via the carpool lane. Mine is not the only neighborhood, and the Bay Bridge is not the only toll crossing that experiences this communal experience. It's a pretty rare thing, however, when something so simple could really create a win-win situation. It's a little like being paid four dollars to carpool.
All that laissez-faire ends on July the first. That's when the State of California will start charging two dollars and fifty cents to carpool across its state-owned bridges. It's hard to imagine the negotiations necessary to complete what used to be essentially a wordless transaction. Should each prospective rider stand on the curb with a dollar and a quarter? What about those who merely filled up the empty seats in their sedan? Splitting the toll four ways is a mess, and three is even worse. Now that easy commute with a stranger suddenly degenerates into haggling. Free is so much easier to divide.
Then there's the even uglier side: If you've got to pay the toll anyway, why hang out on the street waiting for a stranger? Hop in your own ride, crank up BTO on your stereo, slap five crisp dollar bills on your dashboard and head west. And maybe a few extra bucks for parking. And leave a little earlier since you will now have to wait in line with the rest of the chattel. Or better still, save up your nickels and dimes since they haven't started charging you to get out of San Francisco. Yet.

Somebody Get Me A Doctor!

I know some Republicans. I have friends who are Republicans, but I confess that we tend not to discuss politics because it makes the whole friendship thing harder to manage. Most of the people I associate with on a regular basis are like-minded, left-leaning Democrat types. That gives me comfort at some level, but it makes getting a full understanding of some of our domestic problems difficult. Yesterday morning in the shower I tried to come up with arguments against socialized medicine, just to test my own mettle: How do I feel about paying for everybody else's medical bills? Do I really want another layer of government bureaucracy affecting my family's health care? Do I want the government to decide my health care options? Do I want to stand in line for health care?
The answer to all these questions in the right-leaning part of my brain, not to be confused with the right side of my brain which wouldn't necessarily have to lean right since it was already on that side, is a resounding "no." Not with an exclamation point, but resounding nonetheless. What then, asks the temporarily vanquished left-leaning portion, can be done to fix the health care system that already exists here in the United States? What about all those other "Commie Pinko Countries with Socialized Medicine?" And why can't we get the metric system?
To be sure, there are Republicans out there hard at work reforming our Health Care System. There are also Democrats out there hard at work preserving the rights of gun owners. What's missing is the common ground. How to solve a problem that affects every person in the United States of America? Maybe it's just too hard to get all worked up about a problem that you don't have yourself. Meanwhile, I'll go back to trying to solve the problem of common ground, at least in my own mind.