60 Years Are Too Many: Pony School Day 1 July 2026

     6 July 12026

        First of all, a clerical error enrolled me in the Pony School 401k... for a summer job. I never received a warning email or word from the director--this didn't happen last year. So.

        I had to unearth the notice that they're processing in my trash email, but their help line and dashboard and AI Bot do not acknowledge the existence of my email address.

        Neat. So I've been on hold to talk to a person for ten minutes, which puts me in hold music and a friendly bot voice telling me I can access help much easier by going to their website, which also does not acknowledge my email address. Neat.

        In the meantime, I'm writing and waiting.

        Rough first day back. I'd say 90% of the kids are repeats from the June session, which in theory is great: they know the drill. The flipside is now they're comfortable, and are revealing themselves for Who They Are.

        Right out of the cannon, C revealed a hidden bossy bully we didn't see in June. He forcibly held the doors to the playhouse closed, refusing entry to other kids. He was asked three times to stop the behavior. The third time I stood a foot away from him and said "No. Stop. Leave the door open for friends."

        Two minutes later, he's screaming and crying in pain.        

        Because another kid who wanted in forced the pinned door open and smashed his finger. I just looked at him and said "Consequences are real, Buddy." I also got him a bandaid, I'm not cruel, just realistic.

        Also M, who turned five in June, is now too old and too cool for pony camp and is practicing her adult RBF. She's not acting out, or refusing to participate, she's just making sure we all know she's bored and soooooooo over this baby stuff.

        In addition, one kid apparently got a bladder infection after June camp because she won't use the kids' bathroom. I don't police who does and does not actually go, I just walk them through and make sure they wash their hands. Apparently she won't use it because there is no privacy. Good luck in school, kid. 

    So. Today grandma let us know, and now she will be allowed to use the adult restroom when she needs to go. Which is a single seater with a door, the size of a closet. It's separate and clearly "special for grown ups". Which is not going to cause any issues at all with the other girls.

       I'm not saying I have a better solution; I do not. I am saying that special treatment for any reason causes social issues. Everyone will want to use the adult bathroom, and all I have to argue with is "She's shy". At least when a kid has their special snack it's due to an allergy, and I can say "That's his snack from home, he can't have what we're having" and there's a tangible reason a four year old can grasp. "She's shy" is not going to work, friends. I can name three kids right now who will pipe up and say "I'm shy", and two others who will volunteer to go to the kid bathroom with her and guard the stall. Which warms my heart, actually.

        Ok, got a human after locating a phone number. Turns out I was unknowingly enrolled last summer,and disenrolling means being returned the money I put in last year as well as this pay period. There is no penalty for action on this 401k because I'm 60 which they consider "retirement age".

        Yet I was enrolled as an employee...so I'm working, but cool. I'll take the money back. It's an unexpected bonus, I just wanted to disenroll and get my money back from this paycheck. It's not a life changing amount, but July historically sucks for us financially and it will be a welcome perk. Or gratuity. I like that. I'm being tipped as a teacher.

        Because I want every penny, especially if the June repeat kiddos in July prove to be as challenging as they were today. Oof.

        Ok. Now I have to scrub the carpet downstairs where the dog pooped. My life is just one glamorous moment after another.

        Scene.

 

        

60 Years Are Too Many: Next Door Is Worse Than Facebook

 5 July 2026

        His Nextdoor post read "Nobody here gives a damn, but we're moving back to Tennessee. Colorado is boring. We were out yesterday hiking and biking and there was nobody around. I don't get this isolationism..." 

        I do not respond to people like this directly. "Nobody here gives a damn, we're moving" is an unnecessary post unless you're looking for a fight. I have no interest in fighting. He's leaving, why does it have to be A Whole Thing?

    Just move. Literally--nobody cares dude. Buh bye. Also, Dear, many of us are watching the fires burning around our state and are actively figuring out how we can help. Sorry you're bored.

        Now that I have that out of way, let me tell you a story about my neighbor-years ago- from Louisiana, and a current colleague who is also from Louisiana. I had the same conversation with each of them about fifteen years apart.

        They both struggled with the culture here. My neighbor chose to relentlessly charge up the street with food or a random gift, inviting herself in and talking nonstop. I felt invaded. I am socially ackward on a good day, and alarmingly passive when faced with this kind of behavior, which to me reads as bullying and to her read as friendly. 

    My colleague is laid back, and clearly lives and works in a completely different time zone than I do. His pacing would doom him in theatre, but he teaches film so it doesn't matter to me how fast he moves. He thinks the Louisiana school system is better at discipline than ours, and I have no choice but to nod because I've never worked there, only here. He also feels the same lack of what he believes is "community" and what I believe is "smothering" that he had back home.

        After a year of choosing which invitations to accept and understanding her mindset, and a year of listening to his tales of How Great Is Louisiana, I found myself having the same conversation with my colleage that I had with my neighbor fifteen years ago. I asked both first what it was about the south that was so different.

        "It's a southern thing" was essentially the answer both times. They want to talk to one another. They need to force other people to listen to their inner thoughts.There is a relentless expectation of engagement no matter what a person is talking about. They like to cook gumbo, gather for picnics and graduations and promotions and stop light installations, share their concerns, their racist pontifications (on both sides, as my colleague is Creole) and trauma. Mostly trauma. Largely trauma dumping. 

        I enjoyed my conversations with my colleague, and felt that it was definitely more two sided than those with my neighbor. He is, however, unequivocally home sick and I hope he returns to New Orleans so he can live his best life because he really hates it here.

        Their descriptions of their beloved "southern life" were both dripping with trauma. I argue that is not community, that's trauma bonding. Potato---potAHtoe. 

        It was then my turn. I am an OC-Original Coloradan. With the exception of a brief stint at the University of Houston, I've been here my whole life. I explained to them the Jeremiah Johnson philosophy, of which all OC are keenly acquainted.

        First, I had to explain to them who Jeremiah Johnson was. Apparently nobody south of us has seen the film, but they do know who Robert Redford was. So that's a start.

        I assumed that once the plot was explained, I would be able to just wait while the pieces clicked. Alas, they did not. Either time. 

        So all in all in conclusion to sum up: y'all screwed things up pretty nastily down there during the Civil War, and folks came out here so they could live their lives in peace.

        We don't need relentless carport gatherings and beauty parlor gossip sessions. We like to be alone. We are comfortable in our own company.  We don't want neighbors constantly in our yards yakking at us. Occasionally is perfect, but constant is too much. We like being alone.

        That's why we moved out here.

        We have a different community. We schlep horse trailers to help relocate livestock during fires. We offer spare rooms and couches to those displaced by fires, or stranded by snow storms. We shovel each other's driveways and rock one another's stuck cars out of snow banks. We bitch about drought regulations while following them.

        And then we go home and read a book and have a beer. We have community--it's just different than yours. We are also "isolationists" outside --as in outdoors-- enjoying the spectacular scenery. Two things can be true.

        There is no humidity here. There is fresh air, educated people, hikers, snowboarders, runners, skiers---notice how these are individual activites? We're progammed for "isolation" and we like it that way. It's what we signed up for. We're very happy.

        It's fair that you don't like it. Cool; don't move here. But to move here and then be a dick because you moved here and we aren't the south is a jerky thing to do. That's a you problem, friend, keep my state out of it.

        I know I won't like it there, so I don't move there. I stay here. 

        See how it works?

        I don't move there, attack the residents for Not Beiing Like I Am and then gather my Scattegories and stomp home. 

        That's the difference. That's it. Simple.

        I did not respond to your post with anger or even at all. I made a few statements and conclusions based on my own experiences in my own little blog that you would not like,and that's OK because it's not a public thread. That isn't an attack. "You're boring, we're moving" is an attack.

        That is another big difference friend. Instead of yelling back at you behind a keyboard,  I synthesized your post into my own experiences and drew a reasonable and personal conclusion.

        Bye Felicia.

        Safe Travels.

250 Years Are Too Many

     4 July 2026

        I see that last night at Mt. Rushmore Trump said communists will take over the country.

       How retro of him, and thanks for starting the next Red Scare.

       Yet Momdani spoke from Washington's desk at City Hall in NYC, and knocked an authentic patriot's speech out of the ballpark.

        Trump's MO has always been "blame someone else". He shifts--remember during Covid it was the Chinese. He hated/loved/hated/loved Putin. Their relationship is "complicated" according to Truth Social. So I'm not surprised it's "communists" this time, because he's an idiot and cannot differentiate between democratic socialists and progressives, let alone communism and socialism.

        He attacks anyone who disagrees with him. A four year old can recognize the pattern.

        I'd say "We're doomed" but honestly, where Americans have failed, other countries and Mother Nature have stepped up.

        We watched a few My Cat From Hell's yesterday while Jim made chicken rice soup for Genoa, who has strep. Yes I threw that in there. He was dealing with a cat bully, and was focused on the victim--a beautiful black cat named Scout. I took umbrage with that, I thought he should have focused on the fluffy villian of the story. He said "A bully will back off when the victim stands up to them". Ok, he said it more cat friendly, but he said it. I still don't agree with his focus, but when he spent time with Scout...well, he uncovers other issues. Not unlike Bar Rescue, when Tanner diagnoses spousal issues, or management bullying, or incompetence that are the cause of the faillure. Jackson called out the mom for allowing her kids to not contribute in any way to feeding/ cleaning/helping with the cats. 

        So mom was actually being "bullied" by her three kids' apathy, and she was allowing it.

        Hmmmm.

        I only have six people who read this, I don't need to connect the dots on these stories any further, do I? Y'all are smarter than I am.

        The Irish Dance Festival in Florida was having none of the right wing flag waving --he wasn't even a politician, he was some Hoo Ha with an adjacent company---who decided that Ireland's one transgender dancer be disallowed to perform. Because transgender.

        You don't get to boss an Irish dance company around, Florida Dick.

        And the dance company quietly batted him on the nose. They wrote a few words about inclusion and the history of dance and how nobody in Ireland gives any shits about gender, and the festival continued as planned.

        It's always other countries. They will not allow themselves to be bullied. That's it. That's the bottom line. 

        For all the protests at Delany and elsewhere, there have been no prison breaks. Nobody's been busted out. Nobody stormed the Bastille. 

        But Mother Nature saw to the coldest day of the year for his inaugeration and is burning DC for his "America 250" nonsense. Hail at Mt. Rushmore. DC will be one of the hottest places on earth today for his "speech". So ya.

        Everyone is stepping up except our own congress.

        I came across a nasty repost---Heather Delaney Reese/ Cox Richardson or The Other 98% or some such commie liberal site I follow---that said:

     "So a cockroach can enter this country and have a baby and in 18 years that cockroach's vote will cancel out mine."

        I'd like to take a moment to unpack this. 

        Firstly--cockroaches cannot vote. Your posit is dismissed because you don't understand that you just used a metaphor, you were just being a dick.          

        Secondly--you are racist. You just referred to a human being as a cockroach. You should be censured or deprogrammed or something. You Need Help.

        Third--you assume this "cockroach" will have different views than yours. What if they believe in racism and exlusion and cruelty the same way that you do? Then their vote does not cancel out yours. They could be on your side for all you know.

        Fourth--cockroaches have up to 50 babies. You will have more than one who votes against you--or with you--or split.

        Birthright citizenship has been the law of the nation since 1868. 

        It's why you, "Bridget" (I avoid Karen-calling, other names are fun), are an American Citizen. I have no idea what your cockroach origins are, but unless they are indiginous or you are a descendent from slaves (which I can assume you are not because you sound Really White) your great great X(how many generations back) grandparents were considered cockroaches from Ireland, or Poland, or Yugoslovia, or Germany or even Russia.

        It's also why I am an American Citizen.

        We were all --OK, not all ---wound up excited about 23 and Me to discover our roots and celebrated learning Where We Were From. Did you do that too?

        I did. I am a meatloaf cockroach hailing from Ireland, Wales, Poland and Germany. Sadly I do not have any Chinese which I understand most of us do thanks to Atilla The Hun, or any Neanderthal thanks to the fact that they were kinda dicks, if I remember? They were warlike...or the others were warlike...shoot. I have to do research. Anyway, I had 1% "other" which I like to believe is Neanderthal. I have zero indiginous, which I already knew. Someday I'll tell you the story of how my family was misled somewhere along the line, and my mom believed we were Cherokee.

        We are not. Not even remotely. But definitely Irish. 

        All Americans are immigrants, you stupid woman. Your ancestors benefitted from birthright citizenship so your vote could cancel out mine.

        In response to all of this, I chose to post three favorite poems on Facebook:

        "I Am Waiting" by Lawrence Ferlinghetti

        "I Hear America Singing" by Walt Whitman

        "I Too Sing America" by Langston Hughes

        Look 'em up. It's clear why they are a fabulous trio of American Voices.

        Enjoy your day. Turn your flag upside down, eat a bagel, do a dance, sleep in, start your house on fire by exploding your grill---live your life. We're all Americans.

60 Years Are Too Many: When The Old Ways Are Actually Cooler But My Brain Still Skips Around.

 3 July 2026

        While I wonder at congress' inability to physically move and form a human chain in front of 100 year old cherry trees, and can't understand how being against Israel's bullying make someone an anti semite, and listen to CPR and mourn so much fire in my state, I am heartened by a small blip.

        Ya gotta take the delights even when they're small.

        I hear Gen Z is dialing it back-pun intended;ditching iPhones and social media for flip phones. I wish I could take credit for this, as a person who has taught high schoolers how to dial old rotary phones for many years. The trend includes many who are getting "into" old school photography---buying Canons and sending film off for developing. I actually know of one 18 year old doing this, and a kid on the musical had an old polaroid. Deeeeelightful.

        As someone who was dragged kicking and screaming into the digital age; someone who sitll refuses to put apps on her phone. I refuse to attach my school's email to my phone. Someone who does not use instant messenger on facebook any more because they want a PIN and I don't think I should have to do that. I am someone who will go to the bank to make deposits and use the ATM to deliberately use cash. Someone who has analog clocks and my dad's analog watch. 

        Someone who is addicted to facebook.

        Which I am not going to get on at all today. I've done it for 24 hours before, I can do it again. I can find my news--Meidas Touch and Aaron Parnas---on my computer, and I'm currently listening to morning addition on NPR. I long for a newspaper dropped on my driveway.

        I doubt this little spark of interest in old school photography and phones will translate into a beautiful wave of anti tech sentiment. But if it did, I would be delighted. I would not be one of the New Leaders, there are others more staunch than I about turntables and radios with batteries and VCR's. Yet I would definitely rejoice, as I would take their interest as younger people as a positive sign that All Is Not Lost. I would celebrate by waving my old red slider phone that I was forced to give up when the slider broke, and they stopped making them!

        I still need to follow through and figure out how to get a land line again.

        I have some great old typewriters in the props closet, I just need to clean one up and buy a ribbon. Doesn't Jeff Goldblum restore old typewriters? What a cool hobby.

        I'd love a real homecoming parade with actual floats.

        I am dreading the new tech they're installing in the theatre. Apparently we're getting a tablet to control the fly system. That'll go well. It works in professional theatre because they get superior equipment with appropriate support. We get whatever they have the most of, or misordered and have an overstock. That is how every theatre in Aurora got the same light board that was intended to be for DJ's. To be fair, once I learned the thing it was fabulous-really user friendly and easy peasy to set cues.

        When we did Earnest at Littleton, the light designer found an old fixture with gel rotators and worked tirelessly to make it work. It added to the steampunk vibe on the show. We were both pretty jazzed about it.

         There are a stack of old instruments on the second floor of the Kennedy cat, but I am not qualified to sort through it and figure out how to use it. Especially if we're going to all LED color changers now. No room for anything cool old school. 

            I've done my share of creative lighting. Borrowing light trees for side light. Building footlights-which I do not take credit for I supplied the materials and said "I want footlights" and the kid made it happen. I lit NYC behind the window of Odd Couple this fall with two floor lamps with blue bulbs and one sourcie par with a blue gel. Kennedy has zero trees. I had trees at Hinkley and Littleton and used the heck of out of them, because schools don't have side light fixtures. They like to claim that they do because they mount trees in the house on both sides of the house, but those only throw the the apron and people are stupid.

            I know just enough about lighting to sound like I know about lighting.

            I am the kid that would hold a clear jug of colored water in front of a spot light for effect. I like old school. 

            I am heartened by the news that others younger than myself feel as I do about old stuff. I switched from NPR to 93.3, and I am loving having a radio in my house. I love local.

            Sometimes writing is truly just a journal. But I'll hit "publish" anyway, because that's part of the ritual.

            

60 Years Are Too Many: Readycare and 1984

     30 June 2026

        I first acknowledge that I predicted "the end" by 1 June, but I do not believe I was entirely wrong. I assumed a human death. 

        It's crumbling. The last week of his state fair and the supreme court shockingly blocking him---except the whole You Can Fire Anybody moment-- and his own party digging in so hard against him that Mike Jokeston had a tantrum and sent them home. This means it is coming apart. I was "right" just not "accurate". Just so you know I'm still keeping track. NPR All Things Considered caught me up when I got home because...

        Today I went to ReadyCare with Jim.They needed some filing done and I am willing to volunteer my time. I have taken a hard left turn into community and volunteering, even if it's for a small company, this summer. My kids are deep in their community, and embarassingly they didn't get it from me. The only way out of the mess our country is in is to make two choices:

        Just Be Kind.

       Connect to your community and get involved.

        Even if that "community" is a small company for which your husband works.

        Ready Care is a small import company, independent and locally run. They made it through Covid and tarriffs,and I admire that. Jim is the CFO.

        I worked there over the summer of ...2019? 2018? Unsure. I worked on the assembly line, I put together dispensers for shampoos/conditioners for a month. I worked alongside people who were relentlessly kind and hardworking, just trying to make it. They shared rides, rode the bus and steadfastly adhered to the work/break schedule. It was wonderful.

        I can't do that now, my arthritis in my hands is too advanced to assemble on the line and my feet are trashed-I can't stand in one place for hours. They let me rotate from the line to being "Russ' Bitch" which was awesome. He's the quality control manager, so I did what he told me---I emptied the "wrong" sunscreen from bottles into a drum, opened and repackaged damaged shipments and in general did whatever he asked. It was a glorious time. 

    I moved to the line as I was needed there more than Russ needed me and they were struggling to hire reliable people. I acknowledge my privelege. It was glorious because I did not "have" to work there. One of the line managers called me "Mrs. Jim", which admittedly was awkward considering the color of his skin and mine. I was never sure how lighthearted that comment was meant to be, so I smiled and tread carefully and kindly, because these really were honest, hardworking people and I did not want to make them feel like I was doing anything more than helping out until someone could be hired. Only they can say whether that was the case. I do suspect they viewed me as a spy from management. Heavy sigh.

        It's deliriously zen to work like this. I suspect people who garden feel this way---but I don't garden. I'm a vegetable murderer. I don't knit, it makes me angry. Crochet frustrates me. Puzzles take up room on the table the cats need to play. The list goes on. 

        But. BUT. Put me on a an assembly line and I am At Peace. When I was in high school/college, I worked at Fashion Gal. I was ready to quit when they offered me the job of Shipment Coordinator. Which is code for "You never have to talk to customers and you get to hide in back all day". 

        I didn't quit.

        Jim said a few weeks ago that they needed someone to sort invoices, and my first response was "hire someone, people need jobs". But he pointed out it was only 10, maybe 20 hours of work at the out. They just didn't have time and there are not other tasks for which to hire a person. 

        In my mind I decided to prove it could be done in eight hours, by a volunteer (me) but if it would take longer or I discovered Other Things, I was going to bully them into hiring. The filing is backed up because someone quit, but four other people have absorbed her job duties. Which is not sustatinable, but I'm not in charge. I'm just a teacher who lives "Just one more thing on your plate".

        Honestly, the filing seems to be the only thing falling through the cracks. And naturally, I feel like I should be running things. Because of course I should.

        So...tell me to alphabatize and numerically sort a thousand sales tax resale tickets and dude....DUDE. 

        Heaven.

         I used my phone for zen music and exchanged two texts all day! I didn't get on social media at all. I was ridiculously dialed in.

        The work needed today was minor. I would never take a job someone else needs. I was "extra" as Russ' bitch and on the line. I want to be clear about that.

        Jim estimated maybe 20 hours of work was needed. I volunteered, I don't need to get paid, AND I will do it in less time because if it was really 20 hours, I would have insisted they hire someone to do it.

        I worked six and a half hours today and got the filing 95% done. The next step, however, will require more time than I have, and I am lobbying for them to hire someone. But until then...I got most of it done. I'll go back and finish it up in the next two weeks. I left detailed notes on the piles in case anyone else wanted to help.

        I sat in an empty office. ReadyCare imports from Fiji and creates scented lotions, shampoos, and conditioners for hotels, resorts and gyms. I learned while doing their paperwork today that they provide products to the gym for the FBI.

       The building smells sooooo good.

       And there is an employee restroom that I can use whenever I want. I don't have to rush between classes. Nobody notices that I'm not in the office.

        People stop by just to say hi, and they're happy to see me. The owner dropped by to ask if I'd done my onboarding. He's a funny guy-he knew I was volunteering. Russ dropped by even though I'm not his bitch this time, I told him I was the filing bitch today. He's a good human, plays guitar in a band. The warehouse manager that bought my motorcycle after I wrecked it-and fixed her up beautifully-also stopped by to say hi. Both men let me know there were snacks in the office next door. I guess I looked snacky.

        I sat at a foot deep pile of paper and dug in with great glee. Because the alphabet makes sense. Numbers make sense. You line them up and sing the alphabet song and put them in order. I lined up stacks on the desk and turned Zen music on my phone via You Tube. 

       It was 8.45 am. Outside of smiling at people who stopped by, I didn't look up until noon.

      Jim bought lunch for the office, and I declined to accompany him to pick it up because I was in the zone. I started thinking about that movie The Accountant and how upset he got when he couldn't finish. I almost barked at Jim when he asked if I wanted to take a break to help schlep lunch, "I'm not finished!" He took it in stride, as one does after almost 40 years of such reactive behavior.

        Again, there is no timeline or rush. These invoices have been piling up for months and nobody had time to go through them. But I didn't want to stop. At 1 pm I realized I wouldn't be able to finish by 3.30---Jim was leaving early, he had Togo with him and it's end of month, it's a whole thing--and I panicked. I had to stop and remind myself that I'm just doing a favor, there are no strings or deadlines attached.

        Nonetheless, I left notes on the alphabet stack and on the "still to be filed" stack, just in case anyone was going to try and finish this. I might, just not this week. This is my only week off from pony school, so likely it'll be a week or two before I can return. Unless they figure out they need to hire someone to do this plus the other jobs. 

        I had a rolly chair on a plastic mat so I could stand and walk and roll whenever I needed. My back still hurts from sitting for six and a half hours, but...it was awesome.

        Did I mention that it smelled really nice? And I could go to the bathroom whenever I wanted? And nobody asked me to do anything, or listen to their problems, or mix glue and shaving cream or build a set or submit grades or validate my vocation with data.

        When I came home, my new "old fashioned" radio that Jim bought was charged. I turned on NPR and listened to devestating reports on the fires, and wrote in my journal and went...WAIT. I just had a day like it was 1984.

        I had to go to an office and alphabatize paper for filing. I did use my phone for zen music from you tube which is a cheat, there isn't a radio in the office. But I sat in a chair all day and sorted invoices by letters and numbers, and clipped them together. Then I came home and listened to the radio!

        It's not complete, there are still elements that need to be addressed for a full day of 1984. But this was pretty damn close, and I didn't even have to plan it!

        Which may be the most 1984 thing of the entire day.

        In conclusion, all in all, to sum up-Scene.

60 Years Are Too Many: The Least Of You

 29 June 2026

               Matthew 25:40 "What you do for the least of you, you do for me." I -ished that but I'm not wrong.

        This is a line from a parable. As a kid being fed the Bible twice on Sundays and on Wednesday nights, I came to appreciate the parables. Even at a young age I understood what they were, and Immma sucker for a metaphor. Also, I was a child, and they teach Jesus in Sunday school downstairs, who is nice and kind and full of lovely stories. Upstairs in church they teach God who is mad absolutely all of the time because nobody does what he says. There is also that whole "jealous God" thing that is open for interpretation.

        Since God was always yelling I didn't hear much of what he said. But I heard Jesus, who did not yell at all, he just told nice stories, so I follow his advice.

         To Be Very Clear: I am not a Christian. I do not attend church. Read the above paragraph as to how often I was forced to attend church and the reason is clear. I do like parts of the Bible, and I took a class called "The Bible As Literature" in college that was pretty cool, cause I discovered parts they never taught in church.  Church doesn't work for me, even as an adult. I researched Judiaism but had no interest in converting. I did the same with Buddism. And for a minute I practiced Transendentalism because it made a ton of sense and was close to what I think the tribal ideals were. Mix that up with some Joseph Campbell and the Greeks with a dash of inherited intuition and the unwanted ability to chat with the dead and...here I am.

        Jesus' parables line up with a lot of other stories "out there". I didn't make that up, but I also don't have the energy to teach this morning. Look it up. So do a lot of the God wrath stories. Zeus is up there having tantrums daily, and can't keep it in his pants. Part of the appeal of Budda is his lack of rage meltdowns.

        Historically, the Matthew passage has been used  in reference to the unhoused, the poor, the "less fortunate". It should be a pillar of Christian action, as it is easily expanded to war refugees, immigrants,folks just down on their luck, children and special needs.

        That's the one that sticks with me, and the one on my mind this morning.    

        Cutting programs in schools for special needs children, under a regime waving a Christian Nationalist flag, is horrifying. The same regime is cutting free lunch for kids, medicare and medicaid and education. Everything American society put in place to support "the least of you" is being ripped apart.

        Occasionally I toddle down rabbit holes. Sometimes it's accidental, I follow a thread that should have all like minded people responding. Other times bots or just rotten humans stab their evil thoughts into the thread. I was not on a thread regarding special needs education, specifically, when I saw the post. Bots and rotten people struggle with a throughline. 

        The one I stumbled on yelled that "Special needs kids have their own special school to go to. They shouldn't disrupt the learning of other students." That's paraphrased. It's not a new thought. And I'm here to confess that 26 years ago, it was my thought.

        First, I want to point out that those "special schools" are few and far between. Only a handful are fully funded public schools with specialized staff. Others are for profit. Which means parents have to pay. In 1975 they passed the law stating that sped students must be allowed in public schools, however they were separated out in their own center classrooms and not integrated into the general ed population. By 1990 the IDEA act made them more visible and here we are. Do the research, it's really disheartening. Just being deaf or blind could land you in an asylum. 

        Like all government programs inflicted on public schools (notice I won't talk about NCLB), they were forced without financial support or teacher training. Awesome. So it went poorly, largely because people are horrible. Parents don't want their kids "left behind" because the teacher has to accomodate special needs...but your kid is already behind and -technically your kid is special needs-because you do not read to them at night or support their education. Instead, your kid is a bully. Your kid acts out and at 14 is reading at a third grade level. This means extra time with the teacher is needed, even though you did not ask for additional services. But your kid is taking time away from "regular" kids. And here we are.

        Instead of getting in your own way, Belial, take a breath. Look at your own life. At some point somebody---your mom, dad, an Aunt or Uncle, a church friend, a teacher--fed you when you were hungry. They showed you kindess when you needed a hand. If you were truly abused one hundred percent of your life, you would not be mad about sped kids in your class because you know how it feels to be "othered". 

        We aren't born cruel. We learn to fear the other. The face of the other depends on who raised us. It can be black folks. It can be Catholics, Jews, Muslims. It can be immigrants.

        It can be kids in wheelchairs.

        All of these others are victims of unfounded hatred because they are perceived to steal from us. Steal our jobs, use up valuable resources.

        OK, I just wrote myself into a dark hole. Hold on, I need to find my way out.

        I think I'm equating kids who refuse to learn and are therefore behind with sped kids, because they both need additional attention and support. The difference is the first type of kid is disruptive and rude and doesn't want to learn. The second kid desperately wants to learn and to be included. They both require extra attention in school, but the sped kid is the one you're mad about.

        You're not mad that Josh flips his table at the end of every class, refuses to sit down or stop talking, holding an entire class hostage. Your defense is that he's fine at home, the teacher is failing at classroom management. But the same teacher has kids with IEP's who need additional support but are not deliberately disruptive, and that's when you get involved. Seriously?

        Removing funding for support is not stopping imaginary fraud. 

        The funding is not siphoned off of the gen ed kids, it's separate. It's funded that way on purpose. Because people like you, Belial, exist. 

        I love the argument that the USA is great because there are no accomodations in any other country for special needs students. At the same time, the same people pounding their chests with pride are advocating for the dismantling of the public school system and defunding special needs support.

        You aren't getting any of that money, friend. You're being played. And rather than see it for what it is, which means accepting you've been duped, you double down. You don't even have kids in a public school, but you doubled down. They're going to dismantle public education, slap higher price tags on private schools that they control and pump out non critically thinking Bible babblers who equate cruelty with patriotism. But hey---those special needs kids aren't getting "special" treatment any more, so you win.

        And what you did for the least of you, you did for Jesus. Which is support cruelty.

        Clearly that was his message, right?

        That was the point of all his parables: Be Cruel Constantly. Fuck Humanity. Hate Everyone Who Looks, Believes Or Acts differently than you. Blessed be he who detains, murders, defunds and deports. 

        Scene.

        

60 Years Are Too Many: Dinner Revelations

     28 June 2026

        I went to dinner at the home of my high school lang arts teacher last night.

       How I got there is the first part of the story.

       I don't leave my house, generally, unless I'm being paid. That means I leave to go to work. I like my house. I like sitting in the living room and reading. I like sitting here in the dining room and writing, even if it's garbage. I spend my time outside of my house teaching and mitigating social relationships between preschoolers, for which I am paid.

        I deliberately keep my friend circle small. My friends from high school recently moved back from Texas, and they are relentlessly positive, active people who leave their house. I respect that, and that's not who I am. I have to be bullied out.

        They received an invite to the Starkey home for dinner, and somehow Jim and I were also invited. Jim begged off, as he was not one of their students, and is even more awkward than I am. He's not rude, he's just awkward and age has made us both homebodies. The choice caused some friction, but we've been together for 100 years, and we got over it. Also, the A/C died yesterday and he actually did have to stay home to talk to the A/C people. It's currently 78 degrees in my house. Sleeping last night was a bit rough, but it's a first world problem so keep it in perspective. They can't make a house call until Tuesday. Yay.

        I agreed to attend, even though I tried desperately to prove that I had not been invited in the first place. This is a me issue, compounded by being left out of social gatherings in my youth. I literally argued with Mike that I was not invited, so why was I going? And what time? And where to they even live, I have no address---if I was invited I'd have an address, ipso facto: not invited.

        Clearly, the fact that it was a friend from high school attending a dinner hosted by my high school teacher exacerbated my already severe social anxiety issues. Issues that I am not interested in working through, because that would mean I have to leave my house and talk to people and not get paid to do so.

        I have no idea how to hold a conversastion. I know how to teach and build community and a collaborative theatre. That is not having a conversation.

        I feel like I used to know how, because I could talk with people posessed of different viewpoints than my own, and we would both be reasonable. 

        Society decided we don't do that any more, and since I like being alone, anyway, I became OK with that. 

        However, these are like minded people. We all share the similar histories and philosphies.

        I got over myself and decided to just go. It would be good to see the Starkeys and spend time with them and Mike and Melinda, and I likely wouldn't have to worry about my conversational shortcomings as they are all pro level conversationalists.

        So part two of the story; I attended and all my fears were unfounded. I was welcomed. I enjoyed listening to their stories about their kids, about teaching---I learned she taught for 44 years. This seems impossible, I know, but when she retired from teaching high school after 33 years, she then "taught" as a TIR mentor at Metro for 11 years.

        And she's still the kindest human I know. Not angry. How does the relentless BS not make someone bitter and angry? The system was screwed when she was teaching, yet she still believes one person with a heart can make a difference. 

        While she talked my mind wandered a bit, as it does...

         I have been dismantling the BS at Littleton, piece by piece. I can track when it started, I accept my role in my own demise but that's not at the core. The core is I lost my heart. I stopped believing I was making any positive difference at all. I left there completely angry and hateful and panicked over paying my mortgage. Again--you've seen this thread in my life: money dictates my every move.

        Working at Hinkley was of course, an entirely different set of district and building BS issues, but I held on. And even though they didn't give me my years, I still made $10k more than I had at Littleton. I worked through Covid. I forced myself into what mattered, what was right for the kids and held on as long as I could. I argue it transformed me in many ways. If money was truly what I loved, I would have stayed. So I got that going for me.

        Now I'm rebuilding a department in what may be a fool's errand, but I'm doing it with my full heart, and $8k less a year because DPS did not give me my years.

        K. Starkey knew I cared, even when I'd given up hope. I was perplexed by her relentless love until it broke through last night. 

        She was my teacher.

        It's that simple.

        Good teachers see you. They see your heart.

        I have former students who I will never forget, and I hold in my heart even as we are no longer in contact. I saw their hearts. I know they will always do the right thing.

        The right thing is never the easy thing.

        The right thing cannot be done if you have no heart.

        That was a pretty big takeaway. Yes, I used that word, be grateful I didn't tell you we're going to unpack my thesis together, jigsawing small group work and then writing our findings on sticky notes to be placed on pieces of butcher paper stuck to the library walls, each with a word at the top like "Deliverables", "Learning Objectives" and "Student Facing Color Schemes".

          Ok, that was for teachers.They get it. Hi guys! Thanks for reading. Love you.

          Am I on part 3? "Actually listening". When Kathy talked about mentoring a teacher in Aurora who had been called out for teaching a "full book"--The Red Pony--her heartbreak was palpable. She was shocked that any district would punish a teacher for assigning a book--a book they were reading in class. 

        I taught in Aurora and am well aware of that strategy---they use Study Sync which pulls excerpts from novels, and lang arts teachers are to use those. Not full novels.

        Gratefully, I am not a lang arts teacher, and I have proudly forced freshmen to read The Odd Couple, Romeo and Juliet and The Crucible for many years. My mid level kids read The Misanthrope and A Servant of Two Masters and The Glass Menagerie. I honestly haven't taught Hamlet in a minute, but I hope to get to him with my upper level kids next year.

        Here's my experience: they read. They listen and follow along because we read in class and I can see you with my eyeballs and I know if you're following along. My kid with a sixth grade reading level held on through Theatre 2 this year and performed in the Odd Couple! Granted, my behaviors are not as severe as the core classes, so it's "easier" for me to force the reading issue. If you don't want to read, I don't make you---but you must follow along. And I learned that many of the kids who do not want to read are actually very good readers once they're pushed into doing it. They just don't want to.

        So my limited research suggests that Aurora has stopped reading novels because the kids don't want to.

        They're using "teach to the test" as an excuse, because the kids clearly only read a few paragraphs for the SAT. But aren't you teaching them to cheat, and cheating them yourself? 

        Of course you are, because people who like to read don't always know it immediately, and if they read they might discover the world around them and become curious about other cultures and history and we can't have that.

        There's a lot to unpack there that is not relevent right now, so we'll table that discussion for the next facultry meeting.

        Where was I?

        Dinner. Was lovely. I'm glad I went. I'm glad my friends gave me a ride. I enjoyed talking with them about the horrors of math en route to the Starkey homestead. I am unsure how I even have them as friends, as my conversation skills amount to occasional explosions of internal thoughts that should not be spoken outloud, let alone spoken outloud around people who are listening. They seem unfazed.

        So thank you Mike and Melinda. Thank you Kathy and Jim for your gracious hospitality and engaging stories and stunning artwork. 

        Scene.