Author: Sharron Burnett

I’m what might be called a hybrid American. From my paternal grandmother, Minnie Bell Smith, I am able to claim that I am a descendant of people who fought for independence in the Revolutionary War. In fact, I have solid information that one of my ancestors, Thomas Smith, was a captain from the colony of Virginia. Later in our history my great grandfather, John William Seth Smith, served as a lieutenant in the Union Army during the Civil War. I have my bonafides from that branch of my family but my mother’s family makes me part of the great immigration story of the early twentieth century. That is when both my maternal grandfather, Pavel Uhrik, and my grandmother, Maria Bartokovik, sailed to the United States from Slovakia, landing in the Port of Galveston, Texas. 

The American story cannot be told without both the colonists from Europe and the later immigrants from around the world. For many among us the Native Americans and slaves brought unwillingly from Africa also play a key role in who we have eventually become as a nation. Our strength lies in our glorious variety. Ours is indeed a beautiful tapestry of many colors interwoven in the hopes and dreams of generations. 

I sometimes complain about the difficulties that have challenged me in life, but all in all mine has been a quiet journey filled with love and support from my family and the friends I have enjoyed along the way. I was lucky to have some incredible role models in the women who were most responsible for guiding me from infancy to adult life. I found great wisdom and support from the men who lovingly watched over me. I have learned through my experiences as a teacher that not everyone is as fortunate as I have been to be always surrounded by people who truly cared about my wellbeing. 

When people ask me if I am better off today than I once was I have to admit that I am quite content to have lead a good life. My mother worked hard to provide stability to me and my brothers after our father died and she did so with aplomb. We were adults before we realized the miracles she performed in providing us with a safe home in a loving and generous atmosphere. She might have made a fortune showing people how to make ends meet on a small income. She was resourceful and ever optimistic so that we never had to worry. She taught me how to be grateful for whatever good fortune I have and also how to share with others who have less than I have. I watched her share her talents and her joy with abandon.

I learned the value of every person from the people who influenced my life. Later I would learn from my students and their parents, who were often categorized with labels like immigrants, under served, low income, low achieving. I found that when all is said and done everyone has hopes and dreams and longings to rise above the difficulties that life throws at all of us. I thought of my mother urging me to meet my pupils where they were, not where I thought they should be. She cautioned me to learn as much from them as they would hopefully learn from me. Because I accepted Mama’s wisdom they filled my heart with love and great hope for the future of our world. 

I do not see my responsibilities as beginning and ending with my own family, my own neighborhood, my own country. All of the wonderful people who have brought me to this point have shown me how to view differences as something wonderful, not fearful. I have become a far better person than I might otherwise have been each time I joyfully embrace different cultures, lifestyles philosophies. My view is that of a citizen of the world just as my high school English teacher encouraged me to be. It is a wonderful vantage point that leads to great comfort, not anxiety. 

I am happy to be the way I am. I am glad that my children and grandchildren are following in the pathways that those who came before us showed us how to do. We take forks in the road. We risk questioning the way things have always been done. We listen and watch and learn. It is a great gift to widen our horizons and to understand the loveliness of seeing the incredible value of all of humanity, not just a one size fits all description. 

I sometimes worry when I encounter narrow minded people. I do not trust those who would turn us against one another. i dislike laws that seem intent on forcing us all to be just alike. I worry about my nation whenever its leaders cast doubt on the value of immigrants or ask us to believe that certain ways of life are better than other alternatives. I have learned that such isolated ways of living almost always lead to greater difficulties when embracing each other just as we are is always the best way forward. 

I am content with what I have and willing to share with those who have less. It is up to each of us to lift up those who struggle with sacrifices like the ones my mother so happily made without complaint. She understood so clearly how little we actually need to be happy and the importance of being generous whenever we are able. Love is always the answer and thanks to all of the people who cared for me I have much of that to give. 

It started with an innocent accident that left me with a bruised bone and a hematoma that forced me to wear a medical boot to all of my usual Christmas activities. I felt foolish for having disregarded common sense that led me to banging my leg against a table with such force that walking was almost impossible without the assistance of some ibuprofen and the shield of the horrific looking boot. 

I eventually got past that incident only to find that my always perfect blood pressure had become high. I had not even noticed the change because I only have my pressure checked when I visit my doctor or dentist. Nonetheless I soon found myself keeping a twice a day diary that demonstrated plainly that the higher numbers were not a fluke. That lead to a weeks long attempt to lower the diastolic and systolic readings with various medications that were accompanied initially by some icky side effects. Slowly but surely the numbers came down but not as miraculously or quickly as I would have hoped, and definitely not as low as they had once been when I prided myself in being a perfect specimen of health. 

One thing seemed to lead to another when a routine eye exam revealed that I had cataracts that would have to eventually be removed. I remembered that it had only been a year before when my primary care physician had boasted that I did not look or act like a woman in her seventies. I wondered how a few months could bring about such change without warning. Before long other issues popped up like suspicious mammograms and a clicking noise in my mouth whenever I ate. 

I soon found that my social life revolved around all of the medical appointments that I had along with those of my father-n-law who now lives with us and my husband who has heart disease. I began to think that I should rent an apartment in the Smith Tower of Methodist Hospital so I would not have to keep driving to the same place over and over again. I feel like a failure just for beginning to look and act more like my age. My sense of pride was challenged in ways that I never expected. I held myself responsible for simply beginning to show the natural signs of aging. 

I hated all of the visits to the medical center where I sat in rooms filled with old people who seemed so unlike me. I pushed myself to keep working as hard as ever in order to prove that I was not some weakling like everyone else. My false pride jerked me down with an unbearable spasm in my lower back and days when my knees screamed that I should be more than ready to consider replacements. It was all so distressing even as I watched my contemporaries enduring far worse illnesses with such grace. I decided that my pity party had to stop. I realized that I had been fortunate to get as far along as I am before beginning to experience a slight degeneration of my health. I saw that I was being ridiculous in refusing to accept the small changes that were coming my way. I reluctantly admitted that it was okay to cool my engines a bit and ask for help now and again. 

I have always modeled myself after my grandfather who was a very wise man. He lived to a ripe old age mostly because he understood when it was time to accept change at each stage of his life. He was never a crotchety old man who insisted on doing things just as he had always done. He knew when to stop driving his car, when to ask for help, when to sell his home and live with in a group home, when to adjust his way of life. I suppose that was his key to reaching the grand old age of one hundred eight without being a burden or a problem for anyone else. He grew old gracefully and with humility and gratitude rather than pride. He kept his mind and his body strong at a slow but steady pace. He found joy in simple moments and worked around the slowing of his energy and the ailments that mounted up over time. 

I suppose that I was a fool to think that I might outsmart father time. I’m simply settling into the aging process that will change the way I look and act as the years go by. I’m witnessing my friends endure far more serious problems than my own with stoic smiles on their faces. There is indeed a season for everything. I’m certainly not done yet but I’m won’t keep up with my grandchildren who are at the peak of vim and vigor and that is okay. It’s time for me to adjust the way Grandpa did so beautifully. That twitch in my back can be erased with a leisurely walk around the neighborhood where I will find joy in just witnessing life at every stage. I still have miles to go but perhaps it will take me a bit longer to get there than it once did. It’s time to act my age.    

I often listen to PBS radio on my way to and from the mathematics classes that I teach. I enjoy the interesting programming, particularly The Engines of Ingenuity a short feature from the Engineering Department of the University of Houston. There is no predicting what the brief spot will be about, but it is always quite interesting. 

A recent edition found a most unique way of discussing the old question of nature versus nurture, the debate regarding whether a person’s DNA or the opportunities provided by parents have the most influence on the eventual outcome of how learned and successful an individual will ultimately become. Of course there are many studies and much evidence that that two operating in tandem are the most powerful predictors of how well a person will develop. Having good genes is certainly a plus, but combining those genes with parents who create an environment focusing on learning and observing the world heightens the possibilities for a child to grow into an intelligent and productive adult. 

I enjoyed a real life story on the program that spoke of George Boole, the son of a shoemaker who essentially taught himself mathematics and then contributed greatly to the study of Calculus as a mathematical innovator and professor. Many may know of George Boole as the inventor of Boolean Algebra which eventually became a foundation for the computer world of today. For his efforts Boole was given a gold medal and recognized as a brilliant theoriatician, but sadly his life was cut short when he contracted pneumonia and died a young man. 

Boole left a wife and four daughters and not a great deal of money for them to survive. It was the nineteenth century, a time when women were thought to be more comfortable maintaining a home rather than working. Mrs. Boole had to find a way to support her family while also encouraging her daughters to become highly educated women in an era where such things were uncommon. To accomplish her goal she worked as a librarian and invested heavily in education for the daughters rather than in savings accounts or things. At one point she even sold the gold medal that her husband George had won to pay tuition for her children. 

The young women went on not only to work in complex positions but also to attract highly intelligent men so that their own children left remarkable legacies to the world just as they and their father  and mother had done. Eventually one of the Boole grandsons, Geoffrey Taylor became an engineer and a major figure in wave theory and fluid dynamics. Few students of engineering earn a degree without studying Taylor’s ideas. Eventually he earned a gold medal for his pioneering work just as his grandfather, George Boole, had done.

I was touched by the story of the family of George Boole. I found an emotional connection with him and his wife. I too came from a family that placed a high priority on learning. Both my mother and my father urged me and my brothers to read and explore from very young ages. When my father died Mama continued to provide us with learning opportunities. She invested heavily in education, adhering to a ridiculously a strict budget that allowed her to stretch her meager income to include books and classes that would help us to develop our interests. She insisted that there was no limit to what we might achieve. She became a cheerleader and major force in helping us to understand that we had everything we needed to accomplish our dreams. 

My mother was quite proud that she herself served as a model for us by working during the day, taking college classes in the late afternoon, studying in the wee hours of the night and still maintaining a loving and healthy household. She often boasted that she came from a mother and father who had little more than grade school educations but she herself had a college degree. What made her even more proud was that my brothers and I all had master’s degrees and her grandchildren were all college educated with some earning PhDs and medical degrees. She left a legacy of encouragement and example rather than a fortune in money and things. She taught us to use our talents and our diplomas to make a difference in society. I became a teacher and school administrator with a master’s degree. My youngest brother had two advanced degrees and was a Chief in the Houston Fire Department. My other brother had two advanced degrees and wrote the computer program for the navigation of the shuttle to the International Space Station. 

The value of the legacy from our mother is incalculable. Se had a very difficult life in terms of tragedy, illness and lack of money but somehow she managed to leave the world owning her home and having zero debts while sending us to private schools and excellent universities. Her priority was always working to help us to achieve our potential. She was amazing in that regard and no doubt should have written that book that she always said she might do to help others to know how to inspire and challenge their children to be their best. I can’t think of a better inheritance that she might have left us. She was a woman who elevated nurture to its highest possible level. What a great woman she was!     

In the last years of my career as an educator I was privileged to work in one of the KIPP Public Charter Schools. My students were mostly Hispanic or Black and many of them came from low income families. They were sometimes referred to as underserved, one label among others that they did not like. In fact, they often reminded me and the other teachers that their parents were hard working, loving people intent on providing them with the best possible education and opportunities to succeed in life. I grew to respect them and their families enormously, witnessing the sacrifices that they made to rise on the educational and economic ladder. 

One of the students asked me to be the adult sponsor for a club whose sole purpose would be to raise funds to distribute to worthy causes that help the people of the world. She offered a convincing proposal for such an organization so we decided on a day and time for the first meeting. We sent out flyers to students inviting them to be part of the group and then held our breaths in anticipation of who might actually attend that first meeting. To my surprise and relief the classroom was packed with eager participants who listened intently to the ideas of the young woman who had created the new group. Before the end of the gathering she had planned a weekly after school bake sale with promises from many students of homemade goodies to offer. 

The first sale was an enormous success but I worried that the initial enthusiasm would wane as the school year moved forward. Instead more and more students wanted to take part in the club and the selection of cupcakes and cookies and only grew. Before long I had locked away a veritable treasure in the school vault that belonged to the club, so it was time to decide how to donate the proceeds from the bake sale and other events like car washes and such. 

There had been a terrible earthquake in Haiti that seemed to demand our attention from the get go. Our first choice was to send half of what we had earned, which was substantial, to the Red Cross fund that had been set up specifically for that horrific tragedy. With our first donation sealed the students’ enthusiasm grew in ambition. The energy behind the scenes was electric and the meetings involved lively discussions of who and how to help.

One of the most genuine and generous students suggested that we make dinners to distribute to the homeless people who gathered in certain spots of downtown Houston. He described a process that his mother had used to make chicken with rice for big crowds. He describe how we might place the meals in individual containers and them carry to the people who would no doubt enjoy some good home cooking. His idea was so detailed that we already knew how much it would cost, how long it would take to prepare, and where the best places to distribute it would be. 

I explained to the students that I had to get approval for such a venture by checking with the upper levels of administration since we would be officially representing the charter schools and delivering our food in a school owned vans. I did not tarry in attempting to garner all of the appropriate consents and soon found out that nobody can distribute food to homeless people in our city without an official permit acquired through a long process at City Hall. Inquiries soon convinced me that our group would never get such a document and therefore this was not something that we would be able to do no matter how wonderful it seemed to be. 

Of course the students were distraught to hear to news. Some of them went so far as to do research on their own to find a loophole. They soon enough learned that the roadblocks to such charitable work are enormous and we gave up on the idea with great sorrow.

This background story gets me to the heart of this essay. There are a magnitude of rules and laws that make it almost impossible to help homeless people without handing them cash and hoping that it gets used for all the right purposes. We can’t distribute food without jumping through legal hoops and now the Supreme Court says that if a city or town outlaws sleeping in public places, homeless individuals may be punished for doing so. The question becomes who is going to make sure that they have the resources they need to eat and be able to sleep at night?

Our homeless population is on the streets for a multitude of reasons. Some are indeed addicted to drugs or alcohol, but many suffer from mental illnesses that have been left untreated. There are families that have simply hit hard times. There are veterans suffering from multiple illnesses including PTSD. My grandson recently reminded me that we should not just view such people as losers or somehow deficient. But circumstance we might find ourselves or someone we know among them. 

My grandfather often spoke of the grinding inhumanity of poverty. He remembered seeing Coxey’s Army when he was a young boy. They were a congregations of poor souls who were starving, homeless and unable to enjoy the security of home and food that most of us take for granted. This was back in the nineteenth century and we still have people who struggle to find the most basic necessities of living more than a century later. 

Over time we’ve called such people bums or hoboes or Okies. We’ve read about them in The Grapes of Wrath. We often dehumanize them and view them as nuisances who scar the landscape of our cities. We see them as a problem but do so little to help solve the problem like my students attempted to do. We want to punish them rather than work to help them live a dignified life. We don’t want to spend money on them because we see them as helpless and hopeless individuals who will waste or efforts. 

It is our shame to be this way. My grandfather told me this years ago. My students saw this as well. It’s time that we find a humane way to deal with the people who have no place to go instead of creating laws that dehumanize them. They have many needs that we can provide on the way to helping them overcome the issues that have made them homeless in the first place. It’s long past time to really try. We can no longer just look the other way or tsk tsk when we see them. Surely we have enough to share our bounty and our love.

Stories of “what if” are legendary. Perhaps the most popular and touching is the Christmas classic It’s A Wonderful Life. Modern Day Versions include a current hit on Netflix called Dark Waters, a thriller about a man whose life mysteriously turns upside down and inside out in an instant. It is quite human to look backward and wonder about the might have beens that we did not experience because we chose a particular pathway or because unexpected challenges changed the direction of our lives. 

We all instinctively know that dwelling on our perceived mistakes or misdirections is not only unhealthy but totally useless. We can never go back and probably would not want to even if given a chance to do so. Our best bet is to learn from our past and more positively direct our lives into the future. Nonetheless it is all too easy to critique ourselves and our life choices in hindsight when it would be far better to ask how we might make adjustments in the now that might lead us to a future that is more to our liking. It really is never too late to make constructive changes in how we think and how we choose to live. 

There are so many things in life over which we have little or no control. At the same time we each have the capacity to determine how to react to the many tragedies and challenges that derail us. There are going to be moments that seem terribly unfair, horrors that other people don’t appear to have to endure. There is indeed an inequality in the world in which some individuals and groups seem to always get the short straw while others flit merrily along unaware of all the suffering around them. It can be daunting to keep moving forward when every step forward is followed by being pushed back down. Nonetheless we all know people who have made the best of horrific situations and somehow survived the arrows that incessantly whiz toward them. 

I have great compassion for those who are beaten down. In truth the cards really are stacked against some individuals. I can’t even imagine what kept enslaved people from giving up on life. I wonder what human determination kept them going from one day to the next. I marvel at those who endured the horrors of the Holocaust and went on the live productive and happy lives once they were freed. I don’t know if I would have be able to overcome the humiliation that some groups of people still endure to this very day. We humans have a dark tendency to compound the trials of people that we fear only because they are somehow different from ourselves. We fail to notice that they are much more like us than they are different from us. Every human wants to be loved and to feel safe. Such is a common theme of books, movies and songs. We each dream of a good life and we all fall victim to wondering if things would be better if only we might go back and change our histories and the ways that we humans view the world. 

Of course we know that time traveling backwards is impossible. We can’t save Abraham Lincoln from being assassinated. We can’t make sure that Adolf Hitler never rises to power. I can’t force my father to stay home instead of going for a ride that would end in his death. Such magical thinking does us little good but we can study the here and now and realize new pathways that will take us into the future. We can teach ourselves how to deal constructively with the challenges that will inevitably come our way. We don’t have to be mired in hopelessness. 

There were indeed people inside those concentration camps who mentally fought to maintain their sense of self and purpose. That is not to say that overcoming horrors is ever easy but our personal attitudes can help us if we are determined to survive even hellish situations. We all know someone who has done so. We admire those people greatly even as we wonder if we would have their strength in a similar situation. The human spirit can be a powerful force when we are determined to set things right. Our pasts can guide us, but it is in the present that we design our own futures. With hard work we might carve out a reasonable facsimile of the kind of life that we have always dreamed of enjoying. 

I become like a broken record when I speak of my mother but of all the people I have ever known she is the shining example of overcoming the slings and arrows of misfortune. Her life story reads like a sad tale and yet she rose above the constant streams of misfortune that best her. Born into a large immigrant family in the midst of the Great Depression she experienced prejudice and loss even as a child. She watched her mother being forcefully taken to a hospital after a mental breakdown. She had rocks and insults thrown at her as she walked to school. Her fiancé was killed in battle during World War II and she herself went through a time of great depression over losing him. She found love with my father but when she was only thirty he husband died suddenly leaving her with three children and little money. She somehow glued herself back together to earn a college degree and find a job as a teacher only to be brought down again by mental illness that would plague her for the remainder of her life. She would lose friends and be greatly misunderstood but through it all she maintained a generous and loving outlook on life, embracing people just as they were, loving them even when they chose not to love her. She died surrounded by people who revered her with assurances that hers had been a saintly life. 

There is nothing wrong with accumulating money and things and power as long as such persons also have stored the riches of generosity and compassion in their hearts as well. The present and the future should focus on how we might all get along better. It should develop all of our talents and skills in ways that are meaningful and open to new ideas and change for the betterment of all. In the end if we can say that we have truly loved with all of our hearts and worked to bring joy and comfort to others we will have been successful. Sometimes such a life seems tiny and unexceptional when in truth it really is the most wonderful kind of life of which we might dream.