How I came to Be

I am from the excruciating pain of failure.  From not living up to “my potential” again and again, and again.  From just getting by in high school.  From losing an academic scholarship my freshman year of college.  From a list of books that I was supposed to read, but never did.  From showing my teachers that I hated their class by not doing my homework, or paying attention.  From beginning my senior year with a double major and ending it with only one, because I slept through classes, or ditched classes to watch Animaniacs and didn’t get the grades.  The deep seeded knowledge that I had waved my potential and opportunities good bye.  I am from slacking.

I am from despair.  I am from the gutter.  From the bottle.  From DUIs and walking the line.  Probation.  I am from persistent self-doubt and frequent self-loathing.  .  From a life lived that was less than desirable.  I am from shame.

I am from alcoholism, my dirty little secret, my cross to bear.  A disease that makes me crazy.  That forces me to blackout and hurt the people around me and swear it was all their fault.  I am from Alcoholics Anonymous and winos and prostitutes and crack heads and felons.  From Mike, a drug and alcohol counselor who got sober, got hooked on pain killers, started shooting drugs and became an imbecile then finally died.  From Joe who had lived on the street without even a pair of clean underwear and now inspires thousands to embrace life.  I am from speaking bluntly.  No time for bullshit.  From watching friends die and others become reborn.  I am from powerlessness, insanity, and judgment.  I am from rigorous self-reflection, in AA they call it inventory.  From rigorous honesty.  From pushing past the blame to find the solution.  I am the solution.  I am from shame.  I am from redemption.
*  *  *
I am from ‘unwed-motherhood’.  From having to juggle my life around my family’s best interests.  From wanting the best for my child.  From wanting her to be able to retain her curiosity and wonder.  From watching her ask me to name the world and getting excited when she begins to learn it.  I am from a constantly growing resource of patience and awe.  I am from self-righteous Christians who tell me she’ll be a failure because I’m not married to her father that I live with “in sin”, haven’t gotten her christened and don’t go to church.  I am from love.  I am from anger.

I am from feminism.  From the glass ceiling.  From Roe vs. Wade and Gloria Steinam.  From an all women’s college where they taught me the women’s place in history.  From Corporate America, where I learned the reality of a women’s place.  Being a Secretary, regardless of my job function.  From sexual discrimination, watching my male counterparts get “better” work to do, because they can play the game.  From sexual harassment.  From “What would you say if I told you I wanted to turn you over my knee and spank you naked?” and “We want to get him on the gambling charges so we won’t pursue your allegations.” I am from being silenced, with a finger in front of my face or a hand wrapped around my neck.  I am from male domination.
*  *  *
I am from patriotism.  I am from the Bill of Rights and the protection it provides.  I am from Thomas Paine, and Jefferson.  From Emerson who said, “speak words as hard as cannonballs”, and Thoreau who did not wish to die without having lived and  I am from passion.

I am from Revolution.  From Tienneman Square, the end of Apartheid, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the dismantling of the hammer and sickle.  From Cry Freedom and Stand and Deliver.  From a decade of big change beginning with one tiny but strong voice.  I am from persistence.

I am from Pop Culture.  From the Violent Femmes and Pearl Jam and Nirvana.  From Tori Amos and Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill.  From watching the genius of my youth kill themselves with a needle.  From River Phoenix, Shannon Hoon, Kurt Cobain, and Eddie Vedder.  From strong women:  Cindi Lauper, she’s so unusual, and Madonna’s cycle reinvention and pushing the limits and Courtney Love.  From Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the movie and the series) and Charmed.  From Oliver Stone’s conspiracy theories and Quentin Tarentino’s Pulp Fiction.  I am from dangerous.

I am from Generation X.  Named and discounted before I reached 21.  I am from the slacker generation.  From Beavis and Buthead and MTV.  From Reality Bites, Winona Ryder, Ethan Hawke.  I am from resignation.
*  *  *
I am from radicals.  From Susan Minot who taught me the power of writing the unmentionable and from Larry Heinneman, who believes that you should say shit and fuck at least once a day – the profanity maintenance program.  I am from defying conventions in writing.  I am from a father who stood up to his government boss during the very beginning of the AIDS crisis and said, “The people have a right to know.”  And got stuck in the basement for fifteen years.  I am from a teacher mother who stuck to her progressive principles and pushed and pushed to be able to teach the way she knew most effective.  I am from power.

I am from strong teachers.  From a grandmother who taught High School, Home Economics.  An aunt who teaches the deaf.  An aunt who teaches the urban kids in Decatur, Illinois.  An aunt who teaches first grade in New England.  I am from Dr. Davis who told me the only true learning is self-directed and treated me like an equal, despite the fact I slept in his class.  From Dr. Abernathy who helped me tap into my writing potential.  From Dr. Terrell who told me to keep growing and to question everything.  From Cathy Hamilton who taught me about generational poverty and self-disclosure.  From Natalie Goldburg who taught me to write my life and find the truth.  From Robert Pinsky, who brought poetry to the deaf and blind and incarcerated and then shared their message with the world.  From Jago, and Allen, and Tovani, and Wilhelm and all the others who write their successes in the education journals for me to learn from.  I am from reading and research and experience.

I am from Tom, my boyfriend, my greatest teacher and inspiration.  From a man who hated school, barely graduated from high school but holds a highly skilled engineering job.  A man who is more intelligent than anyone I’ve met – and it’s all been self-taught and learned through experience.  He inspires me to read about those things I’m curious.  To not settle for getting by.  Pushes me to formulate arguments that are hole and flower free.  To be grounded in logic and reality.  To speak against what I believe to be wrong.  I am from Tenacious.
*  *  *
And then I took a risk and came to Graduate school.  I started taking classes and surprised myself by doing well.  Better than I’d ever done in my life.  I began to wake up.  I am from second chances.  I am from a 30 year coma.

I learned about the elements of strong teaching.  I learned about Friere.  Ah, Paulo Friere, with his authentic dialogue and education as a means to transform oppression.  I learned about the culture of social class.  I learned about the power of a constructivist education and how it affects motivation and learning.  About how it enhances democracy and social justice.  I learned what enables all students to learn and grow as students and human beings.  From research I have learned the best way to teach.  I am from Knowledge.

And then I took classes with other teachers.  And in my field experiences, worked with other teachers and learned what my new career choice is really like.  I learned about laziness.  I learned about pride, and arrogance, self-justification, rationalization and blame.  Blame the government, blame the administration, blame the parents, blame the students, blame the pay level and lack of time.  I am from disgust.

And then I learned about schools who decide students are never going to contribute positively to the report card, or society and get stuck in an alternative plan where they pass a grade by completing workbook packets, but never take any standardized tests.  I learned about schools that counsel kids to take a GED rather than graduate because they missed too much time trying to get help with their addictions.  I heard teachers predict that their students, the poor ones, the troubled ones, would probably end up in jail and based their instruction on that “knowledge”.  I understood oppression.  And it was being reinforced and enhanced in our schools.  Our places of equality and opportunity.  Our chance at a better life.  I am from oppression.  I am oppression.  I am from wanting to be different.

I am from righteous indignation.  I am rage.