A Long And Winding Road....

Can i tell you a pretty cool story?

My son Josiah, who is about to graduate from his last year of high school, has been taught at home by his Mom every since he was about three years old... we have never been interested in making statements about the state of the public school system in our country or anything like that. My mother was a public school teacher in New York City for well over twenty years! i loved the schools that i attended growing up and as a matter of fact, i have friends to this day that i attended school with!

We actually started teaching Josiah at home because Ruthie had originally intended to become a public school teacher... She's a very talented and creative writer and for several years she regularly contributed curriculum to several large children's curriculum publishers. So for her, teaching our children at home was, in many ways, the fulfillment of a dream.

Several years into teaching first Josiah, then our next oldest son Jonah, our daughter Hannah and now Levi, we observed that Josiah was having some difficulty reading. After some assessments we were able to do on our own, we determined that Josiah seemed to have slight dyslexia... Dyslexia is a learning disability that causes the brain to process information differently and often manifest itself in that individuals may have difficulty with written language in particular with reading and writing... and as you can imagine it can be extremely frustrating to both the student and his teachers.... now magnify that by about a bizillion times in a homeschooling setting!

Josiah and his mom however persevered and even to this day continue to do the hard work of not allowing this disability to keep either one of them in check! Now add to this the fact that a foregone conclusion is that one day when you're done with high school the obvious "next step" would be college... for Josiah (and maybe even his mom) knots in the stomach accompanied that thought! The key would be taking the ACT test... Josiah studied extra hard... even though he had taken other standardized test in school this one was different... he took the test, half believing that double digits would be a miracle...

Fast forward to the past two weeks... Josiah received his test score from the ACT which when submitted to the college he wanted to attend.... along with his current academic record and other funds made available... qualified him to receive scholarship funds which will underwrite his college tuition by at least 50% for the next four years!
i'd say between Josiah and his Mom they should both be very, very proud!
i am... of both of them.

Never Forget....

i have to admit, it always catches me a bit off guard... as i sit here this morning at Starbucks and listen to the reading of the names... i get very emotional... it's not embarrassing it really hurts... a lot.

All i remember is eating a bowl of cereal rather quickly trying to get out of the door for the start of what was a cool, bright, sunny, fall-ish day. By the end of that day almost 200 people would come together in the worship center of where i served in ministry, trying to make sense of what had occurred that morning as i finished a bowl of corn flakes....

Even now, as i hear these names read aloud all i can think of is, in fact, the terror of the day. Maybe that is a sign of weakness or whatever but that day caused me and countless millions to weep tears that still sting our cheeks to this day.

Many people and pundits talked then and still today (seven years later) of how for that brief moment we (the US) had the sympathy of the world and how we ultimately squandered that by prosecuting questionable military actions around the world, blah, blah, blah.... all i know is that looking at the television screen that morning September 11th, 2001, the only thing that mattered was finding out if my mother, brother and sister- in-law who lived and worked in New York City at the time were alright. i didn't want sympathy, i wanted answers.

To be blunt, i am still a bit angry as well, for as upset as i get every single time i think about 9/11, i believe it would do us good as a nation to see the images of the World Trade Center engulfed in smoke and flames, with greater frequency than simply on the "anniversary" date... perhaps we would with greater consistency remember that evil is very real and very deadly.

Things We Never Get To Do...

Short post today... well my brother and his wife and daughter arrived here yesterday! We are planning on taking a trip into the Chicago this morning and into the early afternoon. It should be a great time!

We are going to head down to Navy Pier and check out the sites in and around the area... it's kind of funny the things you DON'T do when you live in or near large cities like Chicago or New York...

i grew up in New York City and as far as i can remember..

• never went to the Empire State building
• never went to the Statue of Liberty
• never crossed the Brooklyn Bridge
• never went to the World Trade Centers
• never saw a Broadway musical or play
• never went down to the Financial district

but since we moved away and i have started my own family... about every time we get a chance to go back... we DO go to one of these places and enjoy the city....

Where ever you are today get out and enjoy it... you'll be pleasantly surprised, i guarantee it!

Have a great weekend!

For all the things that i did that i shouldn't have done when i was a kid, got caught for and was rightly punished for.... there was this one time i got caught doing something and was going to be punished for it.... only i really didn't do it and only one person believed me... my mom.

And for almost forty years the memory of that days' events is as fresh as ever.

As a kid i attended...(you'll love this..) the Academy of St. Peter Claver in Jamaica, New York. i don't remember a whole lot about that experience except that Milo used to wet his pants at least once a day, Wendy was a naughty girl who picked her noise all day long, my kindergarten Mrs. Hendricks, is still my favorite teacher of all time and like i said my mom believed me one time when no one else did.

Here is the deal, Grover was an older boy who i used to have to hang around with because his mother and my mother were friends and after school while my single parent mom was still at work, Grover's mother Mrs. Fanell, would keep an eye on me until my mom picked me up. i loved when my mom picked me up because the truth is, the only person meaner than Grover... was his mother.

Anyway, Grover and i both were students at St. Peter Claver and one winter morning before school began Grover promised to beat me to a pulp if i didn't go to a little store around the corner from the school with him. Grover knew it was against the rules but did it anyway. Not only that but he proceeded to steal candy while there... i saw him do it. Grover then told me if i told anyone he'd beat me to within an inch of my life (if you haven't figured it out yet... i was pretty sacred of Grover... actually i was pretty scared of everything). Soon enough along with the stolen candy, we went to school.
It didn't take long before i was called down to the principals' office and told that soon my mother would be along to take me home for the day. When i asked why, i was told that the owner of that same small store around the corner had come in and described two little boys who had been in his store earlier that same morning and stolen candy. Uh-oh.... Yes, i had been in the store i confessed (which was against the rules) but as far as stealing candy (definitely against the rules as well)... i didn't know anything about that.... of course Grover was right there the entire time... all he had to do was look at me and i clammed up.

Soon my Mom, who i think at the time was teaching public school for the city of New York (and still does to this day), showed up and wanted to know what had happened. When it was all explained to her, she looked at me and asked... Bobby (that's what i used to be called before i grew older and became much more sophisticated)... Bobby, she asked, did you steal candy from the candy store? i knew this was beyond serious, as the principal, the store owner and Grover looked on... my answer was "No mommy, i didn't steal any candy".

The store owner couldn't believe it! He had seen me in the store, he had seen little hands take candy without paying for it, of course i had stolen it, the principal (who knew that Grover was a bad kid and a bad influence on other kids) couldn't believe it either... why in the world was my mother asking me if i had stolen any candy?!?
But for my mother the issue was settled, she was not about to force a confession out of me... and i will never forget what she said that day in that little principals' office... even as other adults looked on and expressed disbelief in my truthfulness, my mother said... If he says he didn't steal it, I believe him... he never lies to me.

Now my friends, that is the kind of thing that makes you never ever want to lie to your Mom again! Did i never shade or stretch the truth the rest of the time i was at home... no, i did a fair amount of fibbing in my time but having a Mom who believed me and in me at a time when no one else did... well let's just say the experience stays with me to this day.

For that and so many other things i say thank you so very much Mom and Happy Mother's Day!