My Lightbulb Moment

(This is an older blog that I am choosing to repost on blogger)

If I am going to ask my students to open up to me through their writing, then I must also be able to open up to them. Maybe it is time to share and ask for their trust in return.
Although I assumed that my students understand that I am here for them, they must also understand the nature of life.
Life is learning to cope with what you are dealt.
Life is a cycle or problem of manifestation.
Life is not easy for anyone.
Life is not fair.
Life is not written yet.
As a teenager, my journal was filled with all of the escapes from my life. Writing became my outlet. Reasons to become a teacher were the contents of each page.
By the time I was a teenager, I was shuffled and fostered into asserting independence. When the only family you have comes from a mailbox, you start to accept shoestring necklaces as Christmas presents. I had to change the cycle. I had to take control of my life.
Having a drug addict in your family means having a family of selfish destruction. There is no relationship destination, only a path of well torn down boundaries. I quickly found out, these boundaries are never as important in life as they are in adolescent years.
If life is a book, then the adolescent years are the blank pages - unwritten, and unscripted, waiting to be filled in with the what ifs, the possibilities.
However, my pages were rapidly filling up with the writing of my future. My possibilities were closing in front of me.
For students, these possibilities shall never end. Even when you try to cut them out and mutilate the pain, they will still exist.
I am a million things.
I am a teacher who cannot forget where she comes from.
I am the daughter of a homeless prostitute.
I am a child who was hopelessly abandoned.
I am a guide to help you write your own blank pages.
Therefore, I want classes to know that every single student is special to me. I see a little bit of myself in each of them. I will not let them become an abandoned child in life. When they hate me, it makes me happy. When they complain, I know it is because I am helping them. Someway, being mean and strict is me telling them that they are not alone. I am the someone who will be there, the someone who will care about them. I am the someone I wished I’d had.

so you found a girl who thinks really deep thoughts

Excuse me but can I be you for a while

My dog wont bite if you sit real still

I got the anti-christ in the kitchen yellin at me again

Yeah I can hear that

Been saved again by the garbage truck

I got something to say you know but nothing comes

Yes I know what you think of me- you never shut up

Yeah I can hear that

But what if Im a mermaid

In these jeans of his with her name still on it

Hey but I dont care cause sometimes, I said sometimes

I hear my voice and its been here

Silent all these years

So you found a girl who thinks really deep thoughts

Whats so amazing about really deep thoughts

Boy you best pray that I bleed real soon

Hows that thought for ya

My scream got lost in a paper cup

You think theres a heaven where some screams have gone

I got 25 bucks and a cracker, do you think its enough

To get us there

Cause what if Im a mermaid

In these jeans of his with her name still on it

Hey but I dont care cause sometimes, I said sometimes

I hear my voice and its been here

Silent all these years

Years go by will I still be waiting

For somebody else to understand

Years go by if Im stripped of my beauty

And the orange cloud raining in my head

Years go by will I choke on my tears

Till finally there is nothing left

One more casualty

You know were too easy easy easy

Well I love the way we communicate

Your eyes focus on my funny lip shade

Lets hear what you think of me now

but baby dont look up

The sky is falling

Your mother shows up in a nasty dress

Its your turn now to stand where I stand

Everybody lookin at you, here take a hold of my hand

Yeah I can hear them

But what if Im a mermaid

In these jeans of his with her name still on it

Hey but I dont care cause sometimes, I said sometimes

I hear my voice

I hear my voice

I hear my voice

And its been here

Silent all these years

Ive been here

Silent all these years