All It Takes Is A Little Love

When December of nineteen fifty-seven came I was a worried little girl. The death of my father earlier that year had changed so many different things. I worried that Christmas would not be the same. I feared that Santa might not know to come to our home. So many silly concerns invaded my childish brain, but then my mother began to follow our usual Christmas traditions one by one and everything seemed to be alright.

We lit our advent wreath and said prayers at night. We made dozens of cookies and stored them in tins in case any visitors might arrive at our home. On a cold wet Saturday we picked out a Christmas tree in a lot near where we lived. The next day we decorated it just as we always had. We went Christmas shopping for our grandparents and each other. We splurged for a nativity set that we showcased on a bookshelf. My mother sat at the dining table signing and addressing Christmas cards. Wrapped gifts began to appear under the tree and Mama played Christmas music on our Victrola. I began to relax. 

Soon people that we knew came to see us. We gave them the cookies we had made and little gifts that Mama had set aside for them. Cards came in big batches every single day. We went driving around to see the Christmas lights and went to mass on Christmas Eve. Then we met with my aunts and uncles and cousins at my grandmother’s home. On Christmas morning when my brothers and I awoke we rushed into the living room. There under the tree were gifts for each of us. Santa had come and all seemed right with the world. 

I suppose that I have continued to celebrate a very traditional Christmas throughout all of the rest of my life. I sometimes think that it has a psychological effect on me. Knowing that there is something that changes little over time has been quite soothing to my sometimes anxious tendencies. Because of that I try to keep the customs of my childhood going no matter what is happening. 

I begin by rewatching all of my favorite Christmas movies once Thanksgiving has come and gone. Later I play Christmas music for several hours each day. I get into the spirit and think of all the years past and the people who helped and inspired me to reach the place where I am today. I know that my life has been filled with the good fortune of being surrounded by wonderful people and my thoughts go to them as I prepare for all of the Christmas customs that I want to repeat as long as I am able.

Each year I sit down just as my mother did and address almost a hundred Christmas cards to friends and relatives. As time has gone by fewer and fewer people seem to be continuing this custom that was at one time so prevalent. With each passing year I get fewer and fewer cards in return for the ones that I have sent, but nonetheless I want people to know that I am thinking of them in the season. I feel the love that I have for them when I write down their names and addresses. In that moment I think of the times we have shared and hope that my little card tells them how much they mean to me. 

I usually make dozens and dozens of cookies, but this year I will be purchasing them since I have been commanded to stay off of my injured ankle for the duration of the month. Luckily I had already decorated my home when the accident occurred so the trees and the lights are twinkling just as they always fo. The nativity that my mother purchased so many years ago is standing proudly on a table. Some pieces are missing and Baby Jesus has lost an arm but it is still as beautiful as ever to me. 

I meet with the Revere ladies, Adriana, Angie and Romanita for lunch at our favorite Italian restaurant each year. We laugh and love and feel so happy to see each other. Later in the month I meet Judy, the last of the St. Frances Cabrini Church ladies, at Peppers Restaurant. We talk for hours and always plan to meet again in the summer but that has yet to happen. Maybe twenty twenty-four will finally be the year when we get together more than once. 

The most recent tradition has been a neighborhood breakfast held at Patrick and Michelle’s house across the street. Everyone comes dressed in pajamas and we feast on donuts, coffee and hot chocolate. We all bring donations for the Ronald McDonald House which Patrick delivers in our name. I have fun getting more and more creative with my pjs each year and then talking with my fabulous neighbors. 

I used to have a big sit down dinner on Christmas day. I took out my Christmas china and polished my silver then set the table with a freshly cleaned and ironed tablecloth. The presentation was quite beautiful but I won’t be doing that this year either. Instead I have purchased some lovely disposable dishes and I will have trays of finger foods from the grocery store rather than all of my tasty recipes. The heart of the tradition is in having my brothers and their families with me on Christmas Day. What we eat and how the table looks is secondary to being with them. 

The highlight will be Christmas Eve when we gather at my niece’s home and feast on Reuben sandwiches. Afterwards we exchange gifts and have a money drawing like we used to do at my grandmother’s home when we were children. It is always a love fest that feels like what Christmas should be all about. 

I hope I never have to give up my traditions. I might have to hand off some of the things I do to the younger members of my family, but it means so much to me to celebrate the birth of Jesus with the people who are so important to me. Somehow the love that was born in the stable at Christmas time rises to a peak on December 25. The magic always comes. 

I never knew my maternal grandfather who died from a cerebral hemorrhage before I was born. I have had to fill in the blanks in my knowledge of him from the few comments that my mother and her siblings made about him. Only two of my many cousins were old enough to have had a relationship with him and of the two only one was willing to describe him for me. He spoke of Friday afternoon visits with Grandpa Ulrich at a time when he was just a young boy. He remembered talking with our grandfather about his large collection of books. In fact, he described Grandpa coming home from work each Friday with a mesh bag that contained a loaf of rye bread from the local Weingarten’s grocery store and a new book that was his weekly splurge. 

My cousin explained that our grandfather was collecting all sorts of books but that his main interest was in agriculture because he was planning to move to a farm once he retired. I would later learn that my grandfather had already purchased some land in a small town just to the south of Houston, Texas. There he hoped to spend his golden years raising crops and animals and reading his books. My cousin related that our grandfather was a very bright man who had been studying multiple topics for years. He enjoyed sharing what he had learned with his eager young grandson. 

My mother spoke of her father with a kind of reverence but also a bit of hesitation. She loved him and questioned him at one and the same time. She was never as emotionally close to him as she was with her mother. Her memories are of a hardworking and proud man who never missed a single day of work. She described how he would leave their house each morning wearing a suit which he would replace with a uniform at the Houston Meat Packing Company where he labored all day in the butchering area. The work was unforgivingly back breaking and as he grew older his legs would ache so much that he wrapped them in ace bandages for relief. He endured the pain nonetheless because his job allowed him to bring home scraps of meat that kept the family fed during the worst of the Great Depression. 

My grandfather was an immigrant who came to the United States from the Slovakian area of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He arrived at the Port of Galveston in 1912, barely escaping World War I. He worked on a local farm and lived in a rented room near the present day stadium for the Houston Astros. He was a frugal man who secured passage for my grandmother a year later. Together they combined forces to save for land of their own and then to build a tiny house that grandpa would pay a contractor to construct one room at a time, paying cash all the way. When the home was completed my grandfather was the owner of his tiny castle which never ceased to make him proud. He would often remind his children that few people in the world ever rose to the level of being masters of their own fates.

He and my grandmother grew vegetables in the backyard. He purchased a cow and brokered with someone to allow the cow to graze in a pasture within walking distance of his home. My mother would often speak of taking the cow back and forth from her home to the field in the shadow of downtown Houston. It was an onerous task for her, especially as she became older. Her father would remind her that owning a cow was a grand thing and that she should walk with her head held high. That was often the essence of her description of her father, an industrious man who provided well for his family, but also made his own way, unwilling to accept favors or admit that the family of ten souls was ever struggling during the most difficult times. 

A rift opened between my mother and her father when he and two of her siblings testified before a judge that my grandmother was mentally ill and needed to be hospitalized. My mother was only about five years old at the time and she saw this action as a punishment for my grandmother. Her older siblings would explain that the stress of birthing ten children, watching two of them die in infancy, and caring for such a large brood had broken her and left her quite ill. Nonetheless my mother would maintain for all of her life that nothing had been wrong with my grandmother and that her father’s actions had been hateful. 

I suppose that none of us will ever really know what went on in the tiny house that we would visit with our parents. By the time we came along and developed memories of any kind our grandfather had been long dead and our grandmother spoke no English so it was impossible for us to garner any information from her. The rest of my mother’s siblings said little about their father. Only the books remained gathering dust in the bookcases that lined the walls of the dining room. They spoke volumes to me. They were witnesses to my grandfather’s intelligence and curiosity. They spoke of his dreams.

Now and again my mother would proudly describe how much her father loved the United States of America. He was grateful for the opportunities here and would encourage her and her siblings to take full advantage of education and freedom. He became a citizen of the United States only a few years after he had stepped from the steamer that brought him to Galveston. He faithfully read the newspaper and listened to President Roosevelt’s fireside chats, He followed the events unfolding in Europe. 

My mother said that there were only two times that she remembered seeing her father cry. One was when Germany invaded Czechoslovakia. The other was after World War II when the Russians made Czechoslovakia part of the Soviet Union, placing an iron curtain on the freedoms of the people there. His brain hemorrhage occurred shortly thereafter and my mother always seemed to believe that seeing the place of his birth being dominated once again had been too painful for him. 

I have found myself watching the fate of Slovakia and thinking of my grandfather. I wish that life had been kinder to him, but I also know that he thought of himself as being a lucky man. He was determined to make the best of his life and he was able to do it here in the United States. Today as his homeland leans far to the right I wonder if he would disapprove of their desire to become more insular. Would he see history repeating itself? Would he worry that Slovakia will cave if Russia continues a drive to restore the former Soviet Union, to dominate Slovakia once again? I simply don’t know, but I care about the tiny country and its people because I suspect that individuals who share my DNA and his are living there. I am happy that my grandfather came to America and provided his children with freedom and opportunity. I understand from his story how important it is to safeguard those privileges well. I watch the pulse of the world carefully and hope that I don’t have to cry in his name for any country or people who lose their basic human rights. Sadly, I am worried because so many of the signs do not bode well. I will be vigilant and hope for the best.      

I like to take those silly quizzes that crop up on social media from time to time. Recently I completed one in which I had to name sixty comedians. I got a fairly good score of fifty three correct out of sixty. A few were unfamiliar to me, but I silently cackled as I saw the monikers of the fifty three that I knew so well. I suppose that I cut my teeth on comedians when my father was still alive. Some men back in the day loved the cowboy shows on television. Others were enthralled with the detective and police stories. My father invariably chose comedy over any other type of program. To this day I can still call up an image of him laughing with glee over the jokes and pratfalls of his favorite funny men. 

I suppose that I naturally followed in his footsteps even after he died. Just as I became an avid reader under his influence, so too did I love to laugh at the many funny characters who plied their trade in humor. I still enjoy a good comedy more than anything else, but there don’t seem to be as many of them as there once were when I was younger. There was a time when there would be several opportunities to laugh on any given night as funny sitcoms were a staple on television. Somehow it feels more difficult to find such programs than it once was. 

It would be impossible for me to list all of the performers and shows and movies that made me jolly to the point of happy tears. Laughter has been so much a part of my life that hardly a day has passed when I did not enjoy a good joke. Some of my favorite students were the class clowns who briefly interrupted my serious presentations of mathematical concepts with a bit of levity. The truly gifted humorists seem to know exactly when the time was right to break the tension of mastering quadratic equations. 

My father learned jokes and was masterful in telling them, but my brother, Pat. one upped our dad by having a natural born ability to actually create humor on the spot. I often think of how much our father would have enjoyed the frivolity that Pat brings to family gatherings with his wit. Now it seems that his young grandson, Lex, has developed the same talents. With him I think that laughter will continue down the family line for years to come. 

I am nothing more than a die hard appreciator of humor. I’m one of those people who can mangle a good joke like it had been mauled. I get lost in the telling and deliver the punchline all wrong almost every single time. I gave up long ago attempting to entertain with my jocularity. I can tell a touching story and even write about something that is quite hilarious, but I have zero skill in the oral presentation of humor. 

My brother is so skilled that he has saved me a few times by jumping into my failing efforts as though we had preplanned a skit in which I would be the air head and he the sophisticated humorist. I never minded his interruptions with witty thoughts that saved me from laying an egg. I willingly fell into the role of the dim-witted sidekick to save face. Eventually I just stopped trying to be a comedic entertainer and simply enjoy the work of the real artists of humor. 

Thursday nights were my favorite in a time long ago. That’s when I would settle down in front of the television with my papers to grade while I watched Seinfeld followed by Friends. I laughed so hard, particularly with Seinfeld, that I felt all the tensions of being a teacher just melt away. It became a weekly ritual that was as effective in getting me to relax as a slew of therapy sessions might have been. On those nights I fully understood why humor is so important in our human journey. Laughing is as important to our good health as crying. Those who give us this gift are the Shakespeares of mirth.

Sometimes as William Wordsworth said, “the world is too much with us.” Right now so much is happening across the globe and in our own backyards that we feel weary and maybe even a bit hopeless from time to time. We would all do well to pause now and again for a good laugh. It is not disrespectful to insect humor into the dreary days of our lives. In fact, it can be refreshing as long as the digs are not mean spirited and intended to hurt someone. 

Some of my favorite people have made me laugh in difficult times. There was always a fellow teacher who helped us to relax with well chosen humor when tensions were high during the school year. I have known people who brought smiles to everyone’s faces even at funerals with a funny story about the deceased. Somehow their joyful tales cut through the grief and remind us of the really good times that we enjoyed with the departed. We were able to smile as the memories became a blessing. 

We certainly have serious issues to tackle, but a bit of laughter will not interfere with our ability to develop solutions. In fact laughing together may be the first important step in working together. Like infants who smile and chuckle so naturally, we are all made to be joyful and to turn our lips into an upward curve. Go out and find something funny today. Inject a bit of laughter into your day. It is good medicine that costs nothing and brings us healing moments that we all need.  

There is a teacher shortage all over the United States. The question becomes, “What should we do to attract and keep great educators?” As someone who worked as a teacher for decades, hired and mentored teachers, served as Dean of Faculty and interacted with my daughters’ teachers as a parent, I have many ideas. First and foremost we as a nation need to begin to show our teachers the respect that the vast majority of them have earned. It is time that we no longer consider choosing education for a career as a fallback move. We should be proud of individuals in our families and neighborhoods who decide to devote their intellects and talents to building the educational foundation of the nation just as we are of doctors, engineers, business persons, professional athletes and movie stars. 

Right now we still joke that teachers are people who can’t do anything else. We pay individuals a pittance for their efforts when they do choose the educational profession. In fact, there are people working on assembly lines who earn more than a teacher ever will. We ask our teachers to work long hours, take work home, and enroll in continuing education classes that take place on weekends and after school all while wondering if the day will come when they will become victims of a mass shooting. When teachers earn graduate degrees they may get an additional five hundred or one hundred dollar boost in their salaries. 

Insinuating that teachers need a script to teach is demeaning and yet it is happening right here in Houston. Telling them to use stop watches to time themselves reeks of counting how long it takes for them to make something in a sweatshop. Teachers need time to really know and understand their students and the needs of their students. They should have smaller classes to do this, not bigger groups. We should trust their judgement unless there are indications that they may require some assistance or advice. We would do well to find out what supplies they need so that they don’t have to use their own money or sponsor fundraisers just to create exciting lessons. 

More importantly than anything our teachers should be part of the groups that find solutions for problems in our schools. They know better than anyone what is going right and what is going wrong. Our job should be to listen to them and to try some of their ideas rather than bringing in so called experts with canned methodologies that may or may not suit specific situations or students. Teachers should be our primary source of determining what will stop the flow of educators out of the profession. We have to allow them to honestly state the reasons that so many have grown so unhappy. 

Our school leaders must work collaboratively with teachers rather than grading them. A good start for teacher/principal conversations should be “How do you feel about the lesson you just gave?” “Is there anything I might have done to help you make it better?” “What do you need?” “What would you change about your classroom/our school?”Once real non-judgemental dialog takes place change and improvement is more likely. Nobody wants to fail. Coaching does not have to be brutal or abusive. 

I suspect that there are politicians whose goal is to downgrade public schools as an excuse for creating vouchers that can be used in private schools. What few parents realize is that even with a check from the state, most private schools will still be out of reach for the average family. At twenty thousand dollars plus, the state allotment would not even cover half of the cost. Furthermore students would have to pass entrance requirements and sometimes find their own transportation to school. I tend to believe that pushing privates schools also a way for some, not all, parents to shield their children from students of other races, ethnicities, and income levels. That was certainly the case when the United States enforced integration laws in places like Mississippi. The result was a spate of quickly built private schools that became havens for whites who did not want their children to have to integrate. Overnight the public schools became majority black schools while all white private schools became a popular choice for those who wanted their children to continue living in a bubble. 

We should treasure and nurture our public school system and the teachers who staff them. It’s time that the facts about teaching become crystal clear to everyone. Teachers do not work from nine to three. It is more like seven to four with lots of additional homework for the evening and weekends. Teachers do not get three months vacation. Teachers have to pass certification exams that most adults would have great difficulty mastering. Teachers have very little free time during the school day and none inside the classroom. They are on their feet moving from student to student, assuming responsibility for classroom management, instruction, planning, counseling, nursing minor injuries, monitoring, grading and so much more. The average teacher literally works more hours per year than most professionals and yet our society tends to treat them as babysitters instead of honoring them for all that they have done for the children of this nation.

It’s time to start holding discussions with teachers and hearing them out then acting on what they have to say. If we let the brain drain continue we will find ourselves in a last minute crisis. We owe it to our educators to trust that they will advise us wisely. In the beginning there may be some grumbling, but once they believe that we are sincere in wanting to elevate them to the role that they deserve, they will give us their best. Teachers are altruistic by nature, but even saints grumble now and then. We would do well to save our schools by starting with saving our teachers. We don’t want to one day have to ask, “Where have all the teachers gone?”

I am an advocate for public education. I think it is the bulwark against ignorance in our society. That being said, I was a product of Catholic school education where I spent twelve years learning both academically and religiously. When it came time for college I wanted to be part of a large public institution to offset what I had experienced during my development as a child. I found the balance to be rather remarkable in moulding me as a person. I became an adult formed by different perspectives that ultimately made me more aware of both our universal and individual human characteristics. 

When I had children of my own the cost of a private school education like I experienced had become financially unreachable. I supplemented my daughters’ public school education with regular attendance at Sunday mass and continuing Christian education classes. This provided them with enough knowledge from differing arenas to make their own decisions about how to view and live in the world. 

Emmanuel Kant famously argued that each of us sees the world from our own perspectives. Reality for a human is affected by what we think we see, which for most people is relatively limited. Education has the power to open our eyes to different perspectives, to widen our view of the world and its people. It should be the goal of schools to present ideas and skills and knowledge to the young people who come to them that make them more aware, but that is not always how it works. Each of us is limited by our particular backgrounds and points of view that either purposely or unwittingly color how we teach the young. For that reason one the best things schools might do is demonstrate to our children how to think critically and even how to think about their own thinking. 

Of late I have been teaching a group of youngsters who are homeschooled. I began with the eldest sons of two sisters. From there my reach expanded to include other members of the family as well as to friends who were in search of a math teacher. I have learned that homeschooling is far more complex than I had once imagined. The students rarely sit at home learning only from a mom or dad. Instead they attend classes in small groups called coops that are akin to private school without the high tuition and days long attendance. There is a great deal of flexibility and choice in homeschooling that can even include online classes offered by community classes and universities. What homeschooling is not about is just allowing kids to sit around the house all day doing little or nothing. It can take a great deal of work for parents of homeschoolers to keep up with the schedules. 

The two boys with whom I began were ready to begin classes at San Jacinto Junior College by the time they were sixteen years old. Within two years they had earned associates’ degrees. One of them is now working towards certification as an electrician and the other has been attending flight school in the hopes of becoming a pilot. They are thriving.  

Another of my students will complete his associate’s degree this semester and will begin classes at the University of Houston in January. He began taking online classes at Alvin Junior College before he was sixteen years old. He had attended a homeschool pod focused on a classical education in his younger years. I was his mathematics teacher from the time he was doing fifth grade work. He too has flourished in the home school environment but his parents have worked hard for years in their efforts to drive him from one class or group to another. It was hard work that has served their son well. 

From working in public schools and watching my daughters and grandchildren in public schools I have been mostly impressed by the level of excellence that I have witnessed. As with any large organization there is room for improvement, but overall our nation’s public schools are steadily working hard to educate an incredibly diverse population. Most young people today graduate with knowledge and abilities that few of our ancestors possessed. They have differing skills based on their individual interests and abilities but they are indeed ready to take the next steps in becoming adults. 

Differing ways of educating the young have differing results. Some children become superstars in public schools while others flounder for various reasons including difficulties at home, learning disabilities, and the level of effort they are willing to give to the process of learning. The same is true of those who attend private school or learn in a homeschool environment. It takes more than just good teachers or interested parents to get the most out of an educational experience. Our individual traits affect our learning perhaps more than any other variable. Grit and a growth mindset enable students to maintain determined efforts even in the face of challenges. The best thing we can do for our young learners is to encourage them to work hard and be willing to be unafraid to admit their difficulties. Honest efforts lead to success in the educational journey wherever it takes place. 

I am still a huge proponent of public education. I believe that for the vast majority of people it produces the best and most consistent results. I have now worked in the public, private, and homeschool sectors of the educational community. Overall the most consistently excellent, democratic and affordable learning takes place in our nation’s public schools. Not all private schools offer a quality program taught by qualified teachers. The best private schools of the lot are often beyond the means of even middle class families. Homeschooling can be exceptional with enough effort from the parents but without a high level of focused attention it can literally turn into a long play day for the kids. Everyone should think carefully about the many sacrifices that parents must make during the learning years of their children. For good results everyone has a job to do. It really does take a village to make it all work regardless of where the learning takes place.