Month: July 2020

Happy Birthday

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

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Fifty years ago on July 18, 1970, I was headed to St. Luke’s Hospital to have my first child. I had no idea whether my baby would be a boy or a girl because there were no ultrasounds back then. My husband and I had picked out male and female names just in case. We wanted to honor our incredible mothers if our child was female and combining their names into one gave us “Maryellen.” We never had to use our other choice because after eighteen hours of labor our beautiful daughter was born and my brother Pat changed his pledge to take a boy on his first fishing trip to accompanying our girl to her first dance.

Maryellen was a big baby at nine pounds seven ounces and the doctor had to pinch her shoulders together as she was emerging into this world. She began life with a broken clavicle which was the first of many challenges she would overcome. She was the delight of our lives and that of her grandparents and our world began to center around her.

Maryellen accompanied me to my first time voting for president of the United States when she was barely four months old. It was a cold November day and she was dressed in a sweet pink sweater with a little hood that an aunt had made for her. It was a doubly proud day for me as I cast my vote and smiled at all of the compliments that she received. She would always be my very good girl.

Maryellen was sick a great deal. She endured one ear infection after another and I spent so much time taking her to see her pediatrician. On many nights a sat awake with her as she raged with fever. She seemed to have allergic reactions to any foods I gave her. I worried incessantly about her health even as she grew but while she had once smiled and loved to sing she grew ever more silent. When she was one year old she still had not walked and some of my friends suggested that there must be something wrong. My anxieties only grew.

Maryellen did eventually walk. In fact her first steps were a run to reach a ball that rolled past her. Because she was always dancing around the house I took her to get lessons and she had an unexpected grace and talent for creative movement. She still got more ear infections than I was able to count and we became more and more frequent visitors to her pediatrician’s office but she always sprang back from her illnesses.

Soon it was time for kindergarten which turned out to be a painful time for both of us. I contracted hepatitis and was sick for over three months. My husband later developed a rare disease that required months of chemotherapy. In the midst of all this her teacher called me to a conference in which she intimated that Maryellen’s intellectual abilities were not as well developed as the other children. The woman used a single worksheet as proof of her theory. The exercise required the student to draw a connecting line between a household implement and either the mommy or the daddy. Maryellen had “failed” the test because she joined the lawnmower, the rake and the hammer to me. I remember laughing my head off because I was indeed the person who maintained the lawn and often repaired things around the house. Sadly the poor teacher would not agree with my arguments about stereotyping the sexes. Instead she insisted that there really was a right and wrong set of answers. Furthermore she informed me that Maryellen was also socially inept.

I grieved for my little girl but then came first grade and a most wonderful teacher who changed Maryellen’s life. This educator had been given suggestions for grouping students according to their abilities. Maryellen began in the section for those with learning disabilities but before long she was doing so well that the teacher moved her to the next group and then the next until she was keeping up with the supposedly brightest children in the class. The teacher also noticed that Maryellen’s eyes followed her like a hawk. She observed that Maryellen appeared to be reading lips and so she scheduled an emergency hearing test with the school nurse. The results were astonishing. Maryellen had an almost fifty percent hearing loss!

I made an appointment with a well respected specialist and Maryellen was soon having surgery to fix the problem. I’ll never forget her reaction as we were taking her home from the hospital and she heard clearly for the very first time. Her eyes widened and she looked around with a smile on her face as she asked, “What is all of that?”

The rest of the story is so wonderful. Maryellen became a top student in high school where she also excelled as a dancer and a leader. She went to the University of Texas at Austin and was accepted into their school of business. She earned a degree in four years along with making wonderful grades and experiencing many friendships and adventures. She met her future husband, Scott, there and once he graduated they were married and began to build a life and a family.

Maryellen now has four magnificent boys of her own. She works as an accountant but is first and foremost an incredible mom. Each of her sons is unique and she has helped them to develop their own talents. Mostly she has taught them how to be fine men with respect for all people. She has done this through one challenge after another always being the steadying force in her family.

Maryellen has always made me puff out with pride and she has lived up to the legacy of the grandmothers for whom she was named. They were strong women with gentle hearts and like them she is a warrior whose cause is to compassionately love and care for all people. She is her own person and with a quiet steeliness that champions the causes of equality and justice. She is exactly as I hoped she would be.

Happy Fiftieth Birthday, Maryellen. The world has always been more wonderful from the day you were born. Here’s to many more years of making a difference in people’s lives. 

Allow Them To Lead

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment
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I once attended a week long teacher training session during the summer. It’s purpose was mostly designed to plan for the upcoming school year, but also to acquaint us with new and exciting methodologies. As part of the the event we were given homework assignments to complete each evening. One of them involved answering a questionnaire that would then be analyzed to determine our talents, skills, dispositions. At the end of the week a psychologist gave us an overview of the results with great excitement because they had shown that the most frequent characteristic that we teachers shared was altruism. In fact, virtually ninety nine percent of the over one hundred educators in the room had scored higher in this category than any other.

Altruism is defined as “disinterested and selfless concern for the well being of others, behavior that benefits others’ well being at the expense of one’s own.” It is not particularly surprising that a room full of educators volunteering to attend five long days of learning during their vacation time would be unselfishly more concerned about other people than themselves. In truth anyone who lasts more than a few years in the teaching profession has a special kind of heart because the work is often grueling and the pay never quite compensates as fairly as it should. Nonetheless there are dedicated souls who return year after year to provide one of the most essential duties in our society. There is little of more importance for the future of our country than the education of the young.

Teachers overlook a great deal of criticism because of their very natures. It is quite rare for them to think of much more than their students. In fact they have a kind of obsessive concern for the young people in their care, sometimes even long after those pupils have grown into adults. For the greater part of a year they see a group of pupils day after day and feel a sense of responsibility toward each one of them. Their dedication is so all consuming that it is difficult to describe. They think of their pupils on the way to work and before they fall asleep at night. They are as anxious for the safety and success of their charges as a parent would be.

Teachers across America have missed their students since schools closed in March. So much was left unfinished, unsaid. They have grieved at the way things had to be. They have worried about their kids and in most instances worked harder than they would have if the school year had ended normally. They understand well how important it is both academically and psychologically for our nation’s youth to return to a semblance of learning and traditions. At the same time they worry about safety and have a sense that somehow the plans for reopening schools are too vague to insure that everyone will have a positive and healthy experience. Mostly they understand the complexities that have not been addressed and they wonder why they, the very experts who know the dynamics of classroom management, have rarely been consulted. 

Our nation’s teachers have many questions and concerns and even ideas that should be addressed sooner rather than later. Instead there is great uncertainty in the vague plans being set forth by education agencies and school districts. Meanwhile the president of our country insists that we must take care of our kids and their parents by opening schools regardless of whatever else may be happening and makes no mention of the teachers. Those altruistic individuals who are the heart and soul of every school in America are rightfully afraid and little is being done to quell their fears. They need answers for their justifiable anxieties that a “fly by the seat of their pants” approach will result in a disastrous mess.

It is going to take time and funding to make our schools places where everyone feels comfortable. Simply screening students and faculty with thermometers and probing questions as they enter buildings each day will take far more time than it sounds and may in the end be ineffective in keeping Covid 19 at bay. The design of classrooms, the numbers of students assigned to one teacher and the management of passing periods all have to be addressed. Cleaning of the building will have to be continuous throughout the school day and will no doubt require large maintenance crews. An on site nursing staff will be critical. As far as I am able to  ascertain schools simply do not have budgets large enough to create the necessary changes nor do they have a unified direction to keep everyone working toward common goals.

When the teachers express their doubts and their worries they are not attempting to get out of work or express support for one politician over another, but they are genuinely concerned about the young people for whom they will be responsible. They want and need to know how the needs of everyone will be met. They understand that the efforts will require the support and backing of the entire community or they will be doomed to failure from the start.

Businesses that opened slowly and with regard for the safety of patrons have done well. Those that ignored precautions are part of the blame for the uptick in Covid-19 cases. Why would we ask our schools to open at full capacity with only cosmetic changes? Why do the minimal guidelines feel as though they are the result of a rush to pass the buck of responsibility?

It’s time we called upon our teachers and asked them what they need to make schools places where everyone feels comfortable in returning. Their ideas may require great flexibility and an investment of time and money. Teach are the altruists who continually allow the world to fall on them. They will not take advantage. That is not what they are about. They will use their wits and their skills to create the safest possible environment. It’s time to allow them to lead.

School Bells Will Soon Be Ringing

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment
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Going back to school was always an exciting time for me. School was a shelter that kept me going even when times were tough. After my father died school gave me a sense of normalcy when my world felt so upside down. When my mother had mental breakdowns school provided me with a sense of purpose and control in a life that felt as though it was skidding off the rails.

Every July I would plan and anticipate the coming of the new adventure in the classroom. I bought clothes, shoes, supplies. When I was still a student I wondered who my teacher would be. When I became a teacher I wondered who my students would be. I thought of being together with my friends again. Everything about the time felt shiny and new. It was like starting with a blank slate, an opportunity to learn and change for the better.

Even after I retired from more than forty years in education I still went out in July to buy new pens and pencils and to freshen my supply of paper. I enjoyed back to school sales and somehow felt the same joy of anticipation that I had known since I was five years old. I eagerly read the posts from teachers with whom I had worked and I lived vicariously through their preparations. Eventually I had to admit that I missed working with students too much to just enjoy my new found freedom. I found tutoring jobs and taught mathematics to young people who were being homeschooled. I was still part of the educational world if only in a small way.

This year is so different. The usual teacher and student anticipation has become trepidation. The joy factor is absent as teachers consider the need for a new kind of supply closet, one filled with disinfectants, soap, hand sanitizers and extra masks. Their planning centers on how to keep students sufficiently distant from one another in a room so small that such a feat seems impossible. Teachers understand that the usual sights and sounds and smells will be very different from anything that they and their students have ever experienced. Understanding this fills them with a sense of gloom which late at night sometimes becomes a feeling of doom.

The world of school as we have come to know it will not include knots of friends playing together at recess. There will be no relaxing over lunch or trading of chips for a bag of cookies. Gatherings in the hallway will be prohibited. Teachers who have always been all things for all of the people they serve will have added responsibilities that will be exhausting both for the labor involved and the sense of responsibility incurred. They will be the ones continuously cleaning the desks and supplies. They will be the ones enforcing the safety rules. They will be the ones watching for signs of physical or mental trouble in their all too tiny classrooms where the virus has the potential to lurk in every corner.

Teachers understand better than anyone how different things will feel and be. Children will only see their friends from afar. The smiles and facial expressions that enliven relationships will be covered with masks. Only the eyes will tell a story and many of them will have difficulty focusing on learning when everything feels so wrong. No matter whether classes resume in person or remotely a deep sadness and sense of fear will hover over everything. School will not be a haven of routine but a haven of uncertainty. Being there or not being there will be equally difficult.

Teachers and their students are now part of a grand experiment and nobody can say with any assurance what exactly will happen. I can only predict that teachers will put every ounce of their dedication into to trying to make the most of an horrific situation. It is what they do. It would be nice if we would support and appreciate them as they grid themselves like soldiers going off to battle. They are quite naturally frightened because they know of the dangers they may face as they care for the most important treasures that our nation has.

Schools are getting threats of loss of funding if they don’t do things a certain way even as educators understand that one size fits all theories never work. People who have never ventured into a classroom to actually care for children all day long are creating policies that hinder the kind of flexibility that is a necessary part of teaching. There is much talk about what parents need and what students need but very little about what teachers need. There is even renewed criticism of the entire educational system because in truth it is impossible to structure learning in a way to please everyone. The outcry is leaving teachers wondering if anyone even cares about the incredible duties and dangers they are being asked to embrace without question.

The school bells will be ringing in a month or so. Many of them will be virtual. Others will be in person. It will not be the same. The routines will be different. The challenges will be many. We can only hope and pray that we are making the right choices. What we do matters greatly. We should hear what our teachers have to say. It is something we don’t tend to do very well. Perhaps now is the time we start. 

Becoming the Warrior I Have Wanted To Be

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment
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After more than fifty years I once again found a neighbor who had grown up across the street from me. Kathy and I used to play with our dolls on the driveway. She had one of the first Barbies and I had a pretty Madame Alexander doll called Suzette. We made furniture for our make believe ladies and created a fantasy world for them. Kathy was known as “Candy” back then and she seemed to know so much more about the world than I did.

Kathy’s father was an incredibly handsome man and her mother was a petite woman with a strong will and no fear. My father had died shortly before we moved across from Kathy. It was a great shock when Kathy’s father also died. Her mom and mine became quite close after that, often going out to together and joining an organization called Parents Without Partners. Once both of our families even traveled to Dallas together for a visit to the Six Flags amusement park.

Kathy’s family eventually moved away and I saw less and less of her until finally she and I had completely lost touch. Then came Facebook and when I spoke of my childhood pet, Buddy, she remembered how he used to climb our fence and wander around the neighborhood sporting his summertime haircut. After that I followed her posts and eventually suggested that we have lunch together. We met at a local Mexican restaurant and spent four hours catching up on the details of what life had been like for each of us. It was one of those amazing moments when it felt as though our last conversation had been only a day or so before.

Kathy is much like her mother and I am like mine. Both of them had to be strong women after the death of their husbands and both of them were extraordinarily compassionate, but Kathy’s mom was someone who never seemed to worry what anyone might think of her. She simply did whatever she felt was right whereas my mother was quieter and more circumspect, often worrying about the possibility of offending. In truth I secretly admired Kathy’s mom and often wished that I had the fortitude to be more like her. It seemed as though she would be willing to stand up to the devil himself and I thought that was quite grand.

When my mother and Kathy’s mother were spending so much time together my mom encountered a man that she had known from her youth. Naturally they recognized one another and began a friendship based on their common history. After a time they went on a date. At the end of that first evening my mother swore that she really did not like him and that she would gently end their relationship before it became too complex. Instead my mother’s heart was so big that she felt sorry for him and was not able to turn him down when he kept calling her. Before long they were spending more and more hours together and she had little time for Kathy’s mom. I suppose that is part of the reason why Kathy and I drifted apart.

Of late I have marveled at how much alike Kathy and I are. I suppose that the hardships of our youth after our fathers died both strengthened us and made us more understanding of anyone who struggles. We both assumed adult roles at very young ages when our peers were enjoying more traditional lives of fun and limited responsibility. At times we both found ourselves in the position of being more like parents to our younger siblings. Eventually we became the caretakers for our mothers both of whom died fairly young. We experienced a rather large share of tragedy but it did not harden us, instead it made us more aware of the suffering of others.

I have been admittedly saddened by the last few months with the pandemic continuing to sicken and take lives. I have watched with utmost compassion as Black Americans struggle to demonstrate that racism continues to stalk them in ways that we might not always notice. So much pain has bubbled to the surface of our society and instead of coming together we appear to be divided into camps. Much like my mom often did I have shed more than my share of tears over what I see happening. My usually optimistic personality has been challenges by the realities that I see. I have witnessed the sorrow of those who are having a very difficult time right now and it pains me.

I normally write uplifting blogs because I know that my readers will enjoy them. I tried that at the beginning of our national ordeal but somehow my happy words had a hollow ring and then I noticed Kathy being as honest as usual about what she saw happening in our country. She was  bold and unconcerned with other people’s opinions just as she and her mother had always been. I knew that it was time for me to quit wishing that I were more like them and take a leap of faith by actually following their lead. I realized that it was time for me to speak the truths in my heart because one of the things that has been bothering me the most is how so many people are attempting to look away from the facts that are creating the despair in our nation.

I have lost some of my most faithful readers and puzzled many of my long term friends and family members with my newfound determination to speak my mind. I can no longer sit meekly by cloaking my beliefs in happy and pleasing phrases that are designed to make everyone feel good. There is a poison in our society that returns again and again because our nation has not yet addressed the issues with truth and reconciliation. So many speak of freedoms and patriotism and then complain about making sacrifices so that everyone will enjoy the fullness of liberty. Systems and icons and words continue to hurt people among us and many in our country have an unwillingness to even try to understand and address matters that even our founding fathers attempted to ignore. There is a national tone deafness that is shamefully toxic. Kathy has been unafraid to point these things out. She has given me the courage to do the same.

There is a bit more to my story. It is about the man who for a time overtook my mother’s life. He was a boorish and brash individual, so unlike anyone I had ever known. He was hateful in almost every utterance that came from his mouth. He was a bitterly unsuccessful man who blamed his failures on others. He belonged to a racist organization and had convinced himself that all of the woes of society were derived from Black people attempting to be equal to whites. He mentally abused my mother until she eventually had a psychotic break. She was afraid of him but unable to get away from him. My uncles had to convince him to leave her alone. Even in his absence he stalked her mind. 

I suppose that I feel as though our country is now being led by a man so small that he is unwilling to take responsibility for his own actions. Instead like that pitiful man who broke my mother’s beautiful spirit our president is abusing the most vulnerable in our country.  I have heard the kind of language and rhetoric that our president uses before and I know that it is very dangerous. I feel compelled to speak out because I failed to do that for my mother even as I witnessed her being destroyed. Now I have become a warrior like Kathy and her mother. I refuse to sit back and allow our country to be destroyed. I will search for and speak the truth because I love America just as I loved my mom. 

With Liberty and Justice For All

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment
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I write this on July 4, 2020, a day when an uptick in cases of Covid-19 has resulted in the closing of beaches and parks. There is a mask mandate in my state and I received a text from my doctor suggesting strongly that I stay at home. It will be a different kind of holiday from the seventy two others through which I have lived and I find myself feeling quite pensive as I think about my country and its people. There is a great deal of division and unrest at work during this time. There are many questions about what constitutes patriotism and as I ponder such thoughts I think about a survey that asked non-Americans to describe what they like best about the United States.

It is interesting that those who are not citizens of my country often view our nation from different perspectives. They overwhelming speak of the bounty of our nation. They point to the massive houses in which we live and the amount of land that is still so open. They think that our food is undoubtedly the best in the world and they maintain that nobody creates entertainment as well as we do. More so than any other aspect of our country they find our diversity to be amazing and beautiful. They are in awe of our right to criticize our government and its leaders without fear.

Of late almost every issue within the United States has been highly politicized and certain groups claim the mantle of patriotism in the name of only certain kinds of approved behavior. It is all too often asserted that anything less than unflinching allegiance to a particular way of thinking about the United States and its history and traditions is an affront to those who have fought for the freedoms that we have. In truth a thoughtful analysis of the revolutionary ideals of the United States would point to a more generous attitude toward freedom of expression. The visitors to our country seem to understand better than some of those who are citizens that the most wonderful aspect of our country is its glorification of free speech and thought. The intent of our founders was to build a land in which patriotism meant honoring individual rights to disagree. This is indeed the very thing that countless individuals have fought to defend.

Our pledge speaks of liberty and justice for all and yet anyone with a modicum of observational skills must surely understand that our society is an imperfect rendition of that ideal. There are people living in our country who were once denied even the most basic of all freedoms. They were held as property, rated by monetary value, counted as  fractional humans. It is not unpatriotic to note these things. They are true and we have advanced enough to understand that they were wrong.

Our nation was severed in violence and bloodshed during a war that pitted state against state because some states worried that their economic future might be disrupted by the gradual elimination of slavery. Literally every article of secession listed anti-slavery policies as the reason for withdrawing from the union. The states rights for which they fought was the right to continue owning human beings. Their act was treason and resulted in the greatest loss of life in war this nation has ever known. In spite of the suffering that the traitors inflicted on the country our country chose reconciliation and healing when the war ended. It had finally righted the wrong of slavery that had so stained the fabric of liberty and justice. The nation attempted to become one again.

There have been many other struggles to maintain freedom since that time. Our imperfections have persisted alongside our desire to be a democratic republic with the compelling goal of providing liberty and justice to all. We battle again and again to preserve those ideals even as we must surely know that their distribution is not always even and fair. Still we do our best because we love this country even when we believe that it is moving in the wrong direction. We are not a monarchy that idolizes a single individual as the arbiter of our laws. We are a democratic republic that allows us to select individuals to represent us and a president to insure that all of our voices are heard. We note the wrong when they occur  not because we hate our country but because we love it. We do not leave or rent our nation in two because our fight is to help our country move toward closer and closer approximations of perfection.

Who is the greater patriot, the person with blind allegiance or the one who is willing to risk being denounced for alerting us to injustice? Which is more courageous, following rules even when they are clearly hurting people or doing something audacious to bring wrongs to light? Did our founding fathers intend for the citizens of this country to intimidate those who have differing points of view? Did they believe that we must all walk in lockstep? Is it possible that the person who quietly kneels during our national anthem is actually doing something great for our country rather than insulting it? Should we be tied to the status quo or do we need to confront issues that continue to plague us? Does making our country great again mean doing things in only one prescribed way that ignores the needs of those who are struggling to feel valued and respected? 

We have become a beautifully diverse nation of many cultures. People have always come here in search of freedom and acceptance. They have followed the rules, fought in the wars, worked to make lives for themselves and their families in spite of the reality that they have not always been treated as fairly as they hoped. At this watershed moment of our history perhaps it is time for each of us to realize that a mindless virus better understands that we are all the same. It discriminates less than we humans have so often done. If we are to truly be as patriotic as we sometimes claim we are then our love of country should lead us to the determination to ensure that liberty and justice are finally and truly the right of all. There can be no better sign of our greatness as a country than embracing all of our fellow citizens and righting the wrongs that are limiting their liberty. Only then will we all be free at last.