Out of time?

As mother's day approaches, I find myself sitting here reminiscing about mom.  This will mark the second mother's day since her death.  Besides thinking about mom, I find myself also thinking about my own mortality.  Both of my parents died in  their 60's and I am but 14 years from 60.  I know death is inevitable, but I am scared.  Will I outlive my siblings, or the other way around?  There are many things I still want to do, yet I am afraid I am running out of time.  Anxiety about the future fills my days and tortures my nights.  I am feeling that no matter what I do, I will not complete the things I want to complete in my life.

In therapy, I told my therapist about my feelings of insignificance.  Of how I felt smaller than a single grain of sand on a beach.  Some days, that feeling overwhelms me.  The mundane things like dishes or laundry lose all significance as they will continue forever whereas I will not.  I do not fear poverty nor do I aspire to become wealthy.  Life is too short to waste it working my fingers to the bone only to die never having enjoyed the simple things.

I am moving to Arizona soon.  My siblings do not understand why.  I moved to Maine to be with my mom at the end of her days.  After she passed, I feel like my life is paused.  I feel like this book is completed and I am walking around directionless, waiting for a signal or a push one way or another.  Arizona will be my new book.  I will begin to live again and find pleasure is existence, where I find only melancholy and sadness here.  I feel like I only have another 20 years of living left and I am not going to waste it trying to live up to someone Else's ideal of how life should be.  I will live as I want to live...free...

spelling disaster

I just got done looking at posts on Facebook and I am appalled.  I look at the people that wrote these posts and I wonder how and why they graduated.  Is this how kids are coming out of school?  Unable to read, unable to write cursive, unable to read cursive, and unable to spell anything...what happened?  I have a thought on why...no child left behind...I think that if a kid cannot get grades good enough to get to the next grade, they should not.  I remember when I was in high school.  I had a horrible time in my 9th grade English class.  It was not because I could not spell, read or write, but because I did not do my work.  So, I had to take it again and not move up to the 10th grade.  I learned to get my work done and on the second attempt, I passed with a B.  If I had been passed to the next grade, it would not likely have damaged my ability to read and write, but, it would not have been fair to the other kids that worked hard to get their work done and turned in on time.  It would have sent a message that it did not matter whether I learned anything or not, I would still get passed to the next grade.  I think this is wrong.  Parents are not willing (or able it seems) to help their kids with their work as they are just as likely to be illiterate as their kids.  It is an indictment to the United States education system that kids are allowed to graduate without having the basic skills of reading and writing.  I am not saying that other classes are not important, but that without a fundamental knowledge of reading and writing, the other subjects become meaningless.  I think it would be like being dropped in Japan, never having learned Japanese, and being expected to learn Japanese History written in Japanese.  It would literally be impossible to learn anything in that class.  When we allow our kids to get a free pass to graduation, we do them a disservice as well as causing issues with employment and the economy.  A kid that cannot read or write, has limited potential as a wage earner and will likely remain in the lower end of the scale.  That is not to say that all people that can read and write will ascend the ladder, but they at least have a better chance than the illiterate one.  A secondary effect of the "no child left behind" is the rise of secondary schools that have ridiculously lowered the standard for admittance.  It is not uncommon (I saw this personally) for students to fail entrance exams several times before gaining admittance.  Not only is it not fair to the student to expect them to compete with others academically, but it is unfair to the American taxpayer who has to foot the bill for all the high interest loans that pay for the privilege of going to that school, which in turn will likely get defaulted on because the "graduate" will not have learned anything relevant to their employment aspirations. 

I understand that there are special needs kids out there that require specialized instruction.  These kids can be taught basic life skills as well as reading and writing.  There is no reason for a country with the clout the USA has, to justify graduating kids that cannot read.  If their is a special need, then accommodate that need...but do not automatically let them graduate because it is time.  If they cannot read, they cannot graduate.  Period. 

Think of it this way...the kids we are allowing to graduate without basic academic skills are the same kids that will be taking care of us as we age...they are going to control the world...they are the ones that will decide whether to go to war or not...very scary thought is it not?

Last Chances

Tonight I watched a film that really made me stop and think about my life and where it is going.  It was about a woman dying of cancer and her two estranged kids.   In her last few days, she made simple cards from construction paper and pine cones with one simple wish for each one of them.  One of her wishes was for her daughter to "sing" and her son to "try".  It seems to me that in living life we forget to live.  We work so hard for things that we will never live long enough to enjoy.  Instead of taking a few minutes to take in the beauty of the world, we choose to adhere to imagined restraints.  We fail to notice, in the short time we exist, that there is more to life than stuff and money...beauty exists everywhere...if you take a minute to look at it...I have been carrying around my old life like a book that I finished reading 2 years ago.  As long as I keep that book in my hand, I cannot pick up a new one...letting go of a loved one is a very tough thing to do at any time...but to hold on to that dead person and fail to live is a travesty...Soon I will begin a new chapter in the life of Christopher...I am putting down the book that is finished and moving on to my future...whatever it may be...I know that mom would be proud of the man that I am and she will be there urging me on...showing me all the beauty in the world...Love always wins...even if it hurts...