Clang Clang

New Mexico Representative David Chavez has introduced a bill which would require middle school kids (7th & 8th grade) to visit a real live jail. Of course the kids would not interact with those incarcerated there, but they would have the opportunity to understand what the inside of a prison is like. It's not a "scared straight" knock-off, but another tool to keep kids on the up-and-up and keep them in school. News story at http://www.koat.com/r/26880251/detail.html and other places on the Web.

The bill is getting mucho opposition. A HuffPost poll at the moment shows that about 52% of parents would not sign a permission slip for a field trip like that. On the other hand, I think it's a fabulous idea. Why? Not merely on general principle. In the fourth grade Son #1 had a field trip to the Suffolk County courthouse in Islip, as part of a study by the gifted/talented program. All parents who wanted to accompany the kids were allowed to do so, and quite a few of us went.

First we got to sit through about an hour of arraignments. The kids got to hear about drug and alcohol abuse, theft, assault, and various domestic issues. In one case, it was obvious that the parents of two small children were more interested in revenge against each other than the welfare of the youngsters. In another case, a very overweight prisoner, who was cuffed, had the misfortune of her elastic waistband failing to hold her pants up as she was walking back to the bench after her arraignment. She had to wait for a male court officer to walk to the other side of the courtroom (taking his sweet time doing so) to assist her with her pants. The kids already had a big idea that it is no fun to have to go through this. Besides the amusement of the pants situation (and they were NOT allowed to laugh, or make a sound) their compassion was stoked. When they got a private audience with the judge after the arraignments were over, quite a few of them asked whether those two small children were going to be okay. They seemed very relieved when the judge told them that the court would appoint a trustworthy guardian if the parents continued in the current mode.

The other part of the courthouse they got to see was the holding area. We all went into the control booth and met the officer in charge. He was on the job 21 years. He explained that, if not for drugs and alcohol, he would have been OUT of a job. He estimated that 75 to 90 percent of the business was in some way related to drugs and alcohol: abuse, possession, sale of illegal drugs, theft to get money to buy drugs/alcohol, violence associated with any of this, and so on.

He explained that, if you were dumb enough to get arrested and charged with a crime, you had to be held in a large cell before your arraignment...with all the other prisoners of your gender. If you got locked up on Friday night, you would have to stay the weekend to wait for a Monday arraignment. Depending on who was there and how many prisoners there were, it would be possible for teens to be held with career criminals. Sometimes prisoners staged fights that were designed to ambush officers who would go in to try to break it up...so the officers waited a long time before doing so, and prisoners might get pretty badly beaten before the fights were stopped.

The control booth has a good view of the entire holding area. In addition to the cells, we were able to see the "rest room" if you could call it that: a partition that shielded the middle part of the body (torso plus a bit more) with no door and no privacy. Men and women alike had to be subjected to this. Why? Prisoners sometimes say they need to use the bathroom so they can engage in some illegal activity. Don't like that? Don't do anything that might get you locked up. Lunch in jail was two slices of white bread, one slice of cheese, and one slice of bologna. Don't like that? Too bad.

The kids were literally talking about this experience over and over for weeks afterwards. Sometimes I still hear my son mention it, five years later. I know I've personally told the story at least a dozen times (now at least a baker's dozen). I can't imagine a single negative effect on anyone who went on the field trip, parent or child. I hope some NY legislator introduces a similar bill here before my younger two kids make it all the way through the school system.

Catching the Bus

This week has been a transitional time for my fourth grader, but especially for me! He goes to school for early activities four days a week as of January: one day for band, two for chorus, and one for recorder ensemble. Getting him to before school care by 7:30 on those early days was a real pain in the patootie, and then it was rush rush when he arrived because he had to eat breakfast and be on the early bus to his elementary school by 7:45. No one was happy.

However, he can get up a bit later if he takes the early bus directly from the house...two blocks away, arriving at 8:05. Eating breakfast at home is exciting for him because he gets waffles (which only happens some of the time at Care) and orange juice (which he doesn't drink at Care; maybe it's not Tropicana?). Four days a week I can make sure he's on the air before I go to work; for now we'll still go to Care on Tuesdays.

On Monday I walked down to the bus stop with him, and waited for the bus to show up and for him to get on it. On Wednesday I watched him go down the block before I headed off to work. Yesterday I left about five minutes before he had to get going. This morning I beat it as he was eating breakfast. It wasn't such a big deal if he forgot to lock the house because his dad is home recovering from surgery (although not awake yet) but as of some point he'll be the last one to leave. Hopefully the key thing will become a habit by then.

Waah!!! My baby is growing up!!!

Polo Lulu

This morning I saw the license plate POLOLULU as I was driving east on the Long Island Expressway. Reminded me of Honolulu. Having no idea what this could mean, I called up my friend Google. Some of the highlights of the search results:

A Practical Guide to Coaching Water Polo

Ads for Ralph Lauren's Polo line

Ads for water polo products at lulu.com

Facebook's page for someone named Lulu Polo, and also Lulu-et-Polo (they don't look local to here, though)

A YouTube video called "Lulu at polo ground"

Polo shirts by Baby Lulu clothing outfitters

Late breaking addition: a friend at work who used to live in Hawaii alerted me that there is a Pololulu Valley there. I searched for two words but didn't search for the one!

I guess the best result would be for someone who knows the owner of the plate to read my blog and solve the mystery...

War Paint

Both my older children have taken a shine to paint ball recently (not merely the video game version but the real live version). I was just telling someone the other day that I think I'd rather have one of my eyeballs slowly removed from its socket than be put into an active paintball arena. I don't want to have anything shot at me (not even Nerf darts) but especially anything that can hurt or that can splatter all over me (yeah I know I'm SUCH a girl!). I also don't want to shoot anything at anyone else...and even if I did, my hand-eye coordination is slim to none (and Slim just left town). I found that out when my youngest wanted to play laser tag with his brothers several years ago, and I had to accompany him because he was underage. Talk about pitiful!

I think I have a blanket objection to this on a different level because it's like combat. Suiting up in helmets and protective gear which is often camouflage...hoisting a heavy metal gun loaded with paintball ammo...the arena where the kids go to play is very military in fashion. I suppose it's good to get older kids over their "fear factor" in life by having this kind of training, but I'm not comfy cozy with it.

Middle child has been all over eBay, Craig's List, etc. looking for paint ball gear and equipment to add to his wish list for 13th birthday presents. Sigh, what's a mother to do when her babies grow up to be cowboys of sorts?

Defeatism

Wikipedia says defeatism is "acceptance of defeat without struggle." In other words, why bother?

The old cliche about no one ever achieving anything by giving up is right on the money. It is heartbreaking to those of us who care deeply about others who practice defeatism. For instance, one of my children would rather throw up his hands and yell that he doesn't want to practice because he was only learning an instrument for Mommy's enjoyment. Ouch. Much more time and effort expended than actually practicing, and no positive result at all. Quite the opposite. Yet I remember how excited he was on the first day he brought his instrument home in elementary school. He seems to have forgotten, and it's merely a chore now.

Why? Laziness? Absolutely. Wouldn't it be more fun to watch mindless TV or play an engaging video game? Slogging through notes on a staff can be real work. Why else? Fear? Definitely. Fear that one's best work will not be good enough, or as good as the other kid who's been playing the same amount of time. Why else? Comfort zone? Sure. Defeatism perpetuates itself. Even though it sucks to be stuck in a rut, that's a familiar feeling. Trying to jump out of the pit, or to spread wings to fly, is a risk. Couldn't things get worse?

Recently I saw someone else take the equivalent of a life preserver in a drowning situation and just refuse to grab on to it. Big consequences. But if one goes through the trouble of grabbing the life line, it's a struggle to survive and it's an uphill battle all the way. Giving up requires much less effort. I can't understand why some people don't try at all when there's absolutely everything to be gained. Too tired to fight any more? Too emotionally spent? Too well trained to think that past attempts have failed, so future attempts will too?

I guess it's impossible for some to see into the future and realize that pride of accomplishment, including looking back where you've been, is HUGE. There's nothing like the feeling of having hoisted yourself by your own bootstraps (yeah yeah I know I'm dating myself with that metaphor). I'm sad for those who don't begin.

"No Driving"

Heh heh, I'm not such a moron after all. Hospital release paperwork specifically says that Laughing Boy can't drive a car while he's recovering from the hand surgery (although there's no medical limit as to how much he can drive his family crazy). Also good for me: he has enough mobility in the fingers of that hand to test his blood glucose, administer his own insulin shots, and to do everything else he needs to do in the bathroom. If all he needs me to do for the moment is help him put on his socks, I'm fine with that.