Today I met with my sons Autism Specialist. It was a meeting long overdue but not because of his lack of effort. Honestly, it was depressing. He is a wonderful communicator and once I contacted him was very quick to respond. However, no matter what his effort is he is only one person! Connor came into high school from the junior high next door. WOW what a difference a bridge makes. Connor was on the A honor roll last year, recognized as a school leader and was a peer leader! He did not do this alone. He did it with the support of the school, his IEP team, and me his parent.
THis year he started school with no locker, no guidance counselor or special needs discussion and he is still doing ok! However, my son is autistic, very high functioning but autistic! SO, because of his grades he is in IB level classes! No one looked at his IEP, adjusted his schedule or even contacted me with this change. It was Connor and I who said, I love a challenge but I do not understand why I am in some of these classes...without an aide. SO at the highschool there are not enough aides! Funny how there are people looking for work, dedicated people and because the schools are going through "changes" my child and I am sure others like him are suffering. And they wonder why they have so many kids of color dropping out of high school and why Minnesota has the largest achievement gap in the country between white students and African American males?" My sons history class is 45 kids! High school kids. He says it is so loud in there he can hardly think.
Who is being held accountable for the failure of the public schools to serve children, the children most in need of guidance. I know I sound like Republican (god forbid) but while everyone is fighting each other, our kids are getting lost. I am going to start attending public school board meetings and join the parents group at school, even though I am a single parent, with a demanding job and a child with special needs because I am concerned about the future of this class, the class who will graduate this year and everything in between and before and after. My son cannot go to private school, even if I had the money...he is special needs. SO, wake up America, you are waisting another generation of young men and from what I can tell...we know we have problem but we are not willing or able to find a solution!
Monday, October 4, 2010
Saturday, August 28, 2010
From the parents and players on Connor's team
As I got to Connor's first big football scrimmage, I was reminded of my upbringing. We were out in Chisago Lake MN. And as I drove out there it brought back memories. All white, very homogeneous and very competitive. Not very friendly. That is where I grew up in Minnesota and it does not bring back good memories. I was always or almost always the only one and that is why my kids grew up in the city where being a child of color is not an anomoly but a way of life. Connor's team is white, black, latino and multiracial. The parents and the kids come from all walks of life. We are brown, black, white and in between! And we were good!!!
We were the only inner city team at the scrimmage. The fields were beautiful, the teams were 60 kids deep and we had only 22 on our freshman squad and not much more on JV or Varisity. While our kids were at first initimidated by all the parents, team jersey's, bags, stuff because we were out there and clearly looked like we did not belong...poor, multicultural and our bench was slim...And we won every game! We showed that what you have and how you present is not more important than the heart you have, how hungry you are and how good, black male leadership in the coaches can make all the difference in the world. After the games the coach talked to the kids and he thanked the parents for being there. He told the kids that no matter what you have, and how deep your team is, it does make up for having heart and playing as a family! There are only 11 players on the field at one time and all of them need to have heart! It was exactly what football, team sports and bonding should be. It is not about what you have in your material possession but what you have as a young man, who comes from little or nothing but holds his head high and moves ahead!
I also learned from the mothers on the team that when you love your sons that even though we do not come from "traditional family" backgrounds when we come, we love, we respect and are proud of our kids, we can make a difference. I also learned from the fathers on the team that you, yes all you men, matter as much if not more than all the love we mothrs can give and those kids with fathers present were so proud and confident, our kids need and deserve both! So a special shout out to the men and fathers in our community who showed up. Showing up is half the battle!!!
When inner city schools work, they prove that being truly multicultural can work, and we as parents show that even though our kids come from so many different backgrounds we can move together as one and succeed! You will be hard pressed to find more dedicated, open and loving parents and yes god damn it...we live in the city!!!I am proud to be part of something so big and yet so simple!
We were the only inner city team at the scrimmage. The fields were beautiful, the teams were 60 kids deep and we had only 22 on our freshman squad and not much more on JV or Varisity. While our kids were at first initimidated by all the parents, team jersey's, bags, stuff because we were out there and clearly looked like we did not belong...poor, multicultural and our bench was slim...And we won every game! We showed that what you have and how you present is not more important than the heart you have, how hungry you are and how good, black male leadership in the coaches can make all the difference in the world. After the games the coach talked to the kids and he thanked the parents for being there. He told the kids that no matter what you have, and how deep your team is, it does make up for having heart and playing as a family! There are only 11 players on the field at one time and all of them need to have heart! It was exactly what football, team sports and bonding should be. It is not about what you have in your material possession but what you have as a young man, who comes from little or nothing but holds his head high and moves ahead!
I also learned from the mothers on the team that when you love your sons that even though we do not come from "traditional family" backgrounds when we come, we love, we respect and are proud of our kids, we can make a difference. I also learned from the fathers on the team that you, yes all you men, matter as much if not more than all the love we mothrs can give and those kids with fathers present were so proud and confident, our kids need and deserve both! So a special shout out to the men and fathers in our community who showed up. Showing up is half the battle!!!
When inner city schools work, they prove that being truly multicultural can work, and we as parents show that even though our kids come from so many different backgrounds we can move together as one and succeed! You will be hard pressed to find more dedicated, open and loving parents and yes god damn it...we live in the city!!!I am proud to be part of something so big and yet so simple!
Thursday, August 19, 2010
You never know what you have until it is gone
I have not blogged for months. Of course it is not that I have not learned anything it is about whether what I have learned can help anyone. As we begin a new school year and I see my son Connor, who is autistic, go out for football having never played I again learn a valuable lesson. We who are "normal" are always looking for what is around the corner. Or someone to give us permission to be us, then we take that and run with it, whether it is the right thing to do or not. We do not let our inner selves drive what we know is right. We over think and/or make justifications because we so want approval. We want someone to validate who we are. But we need to go with what we feel and when those who say they love us, do not support us, then we need to let them go. Connor lets his heart and determination drive what he wants to do. He sets his mind based on how he feels and then he does not let what others think or do affect how he pursues his goals.
His brother and I have let our pasts dictate who we are in our future. And we try to believe that when those who love us hurt us, they did not really mean it. Connor looks at the world in black and white and he always goes with what he sees not what he hopes to see. When we are young that is the way we see the world. However, as we grow older we actually create filters from reality based on what we want to see. As lawyers we learn that there are no right or wrong answers only good arguments.
However, in real life, there are right and wrong answers. And hopefully you figure that out before that thing, or opportunity, or person is gone. You never know what you have until you lose it, hopefully you never have to experience true loss because you did not see what was standing right before you.
His brother and I have let our pasts dictate who we are in our future. And we try to believe that when those who love us hurt us, they did not really mean it. Connor looks at the world in black and white and he always goes with what he sees not what he hopes to see. When we are young that is the way we see the world. However, as we grow older we actually create filters from reality based on what we want to see. As lawyers we learn that there are no right or wrong answers only good arguments.
However, in real life, there are right and wrong answers. And hopefully you figure that out before that thing, or opportunity, or person is gone. You never know what you have until you lose it, hopefully you never have to experience true loss because you did not see what was standing right before you.
Saturday, April 17, 2010
about true friendship
Is someone your friend when they are only your friend on their terms? As I work through my own personal growth with an executive coach, I learned that I am the ultimate accomodator and what that means is that I try to please at all costs and more importantly I try to keep the peace. Thus, instead of speaking my mind or challenging things I know are not right, I just let things ride. My thought process is that there is no reason to not accomodate when it does not take anything away from me. But it does take something away from me sometimes, and I need to own that. I need to own that what it takes is sometimes not worth the price I have to pay.
A true friend does not let your disagreements define your friendship and they take your apologies and thank you's seriously. They respect you and those you love. Being a friend is hard work. IT takes sacrifice, having a thick skin and the will to take the time, not just when things are good but when things are no so good. It means intervention when someone is driving towards the edge a cliff. And rederecting that anger and fear even if that anger and fear get directed at you instead.
In life we are lucky if we have one true friend. And that true friend should be treasured, valued and given much love. And they should be told that they are valued even when you barely have the strength!
A true friend does not let your disagreements define your friendship and they take your apologies and thank you's seriously. They respect you and those you love. Being a friend is hard work. IT takes sacrifice, having a thick skin and the will to take the time, not just when things are good but when things are no so good. It means intervention when someone is driving towards the edge a cliff. And rederecting that anger and fear even if that anger and fear get directed at you instead.
In life we are lucky if we have one true friend. And that true friend should be treasured, valued and given much love. And they should be told that they are valued even when you barely have the strength!
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Accountability
I am sitting here watching survivor, the heroes vs the villians. I think it would be great if those in our lives were so easily categorized! Wouldn't it be great to have an outside voice determine which camp you fell into. Or do we already have that just no one talks about it. I have been reading a lot about personal accountability and working on my own accountability. I have also been working with an executive coach about my leadership style. I have been categorized as an accommodator. Of which I agree. I have been an accomodator my whole life. That is what this journey through my leadership style is teaching me. It is also teaching me to stand up and be counted...even when it feels uncomfortable.
I have had so much tragedy and pain in my life that I feel that some things are just not worth fighting for and titles and hierarchy do not impress me! But in a world where those things matter, where do I fit and stay within myself? In order to be a leader and be accountable to those who really matter I need to be accountable to myself and that is hard because I do not want to seem weak or uncaring but I first and foremost want to be safe.
I retreat from situations where I do not feel respected. I spent 13 years of marriage being part of something that was not valued and more importantly have spent everyday, since I left with only the clothes on my back, having the man I married threaten and degrade me as much as possible. Even to my own sons.
Through that experience I realized that safety and peace of mind is the most important thing to me. It had to be for my personal safety. How does that translate to my work when I am surrounded by people who value conflict and any sign of compromise is viewed as weakeness. With that said I know I don't want to have to fight all the time and I don't believe the ends justify the means. So what is the problem? I guess I need a paycheck as a single mom! I must be first accountable to my children and their future, as my father always told me, even when I left all I had built up in 13 years of marriage, was that if I do right by my children...I will always do right.
I have had so much tragedy and pain in my life that I feel that some things are just not worth fighting for and titles and hierarchy do not impress me! But in a world where those things matter, where do I fit and stay within myself? In order to be a leader and be accountable to those who really matter I need to be accountable to myself and that is hard because I do not want to seem weak or uncaring but I first and foremost want to be safe.
I retreat from situations where I do not feel respected. I spent 13 years of marriage being part of something that was not valued and more importantly have spent everyday, since I left with only the clothes on my back, having the man I married threaten and degrade me as much as possible. Even to my own sons.
Through that experience I realized that safety and peace of mind is the most important thing to me. It had to be for my personal safety. How does that translate to my work when I am surrounded by people who value conflict and any sign of compromise is viewed as weakeness. With that said I know I don't want to have to fight all the time and I don't believe the ends justify the means. So what is the problem? I guess I need a paycheck as a single mom! I must be first accountable to my children and their future, as my father always told me, even when I left all I had built up in 13 years of marriage, was that if I do right by my children...I will always do right.
Friday, January 1, 2010
From 2009
As I approach the end of the first day of 2010 I am struck by how much I have learned over the past year about myself and those around me. Every year brings an opportunity to grow and to change, and often times growth and change comes from pain and loss. I am reading a book on leadership called "Love Leadership" and I am reflecting on how I have grown this past year from loss of certain things I value and the reality that those loses bring.
I lost this year the childhood of my eldest son. He is now 18, but more importantly, he is a father. While Vanessa his daughter is a gift from God to him and to me, I lost the boy that was going college, meeting girls, exploring the world and wanting to live in Atlanta or New York. Because, that boy is gone forever, and the responsiblity of being a father, living on your own, supporting another two people, at such a young age robs him of the things most boys his age would have. While he is lost to me as a free spirited boy, he has come to me now as a man who is handling his situation with the grace and commitment I find from very few men in my life.
He, at 18, is the primary care giver to his daughter and unlike many men even in my generation, he is more involved in her life then half the fathers I know. Unfortunately in our society and most of the world in which I live and work, he does and other young men like him , do not get credit for what they do. Instead, society focused on labeling and categorizing and because they are focused on his mistakes and "lost" dreams, they, even his own father, has written him off as a lost cause. I refuse to write him and the young men of color our society off! If we are to be defined by who we are at 18 or 19 years of age, then many of us should have given up long ago. And if we have to live in box or category that society defines for us based on standards that we did not set and were not given a chance to set, then I would not be where I am right now and should have given up at birth. However, I have learned again this year that blessings come in the challenges we face and that beauty comes from the most unexpected places.
He, like every one of us, is a work in progress and I can only hope to be an oasis from the harsh reality he is bombarded with every single day. Have you been an oasis to someone in your life? Can you be that oasis in 2010?
I was reminded in 2009 that I must stick to the values and integrity that I hold dear. I must continue to believe in my life style and my values and that leadership can grow out of those too. My syle of leadership is not wrong or misguided it is actually a style that takes courage and work to maintain and will be most effective for me in the long run. My values, although foreign to the environment in which I work, is just that foreign, but not wrong! I am destined for great things and this is a path I must take to achieve them.
Lastly, I learned that I am the only one who will put me first in my career and in my personal life. I do not mean first for material things but first as far as taking care of me and relying on me. I must take my health and mental welfare and put it first, because without it I have nothing. I am blessed with people who rely on me to take care of them. I also realize that I cannot and should not allow myself to take second place in the lives of the men in my life. I am there for them and they need to be there for me, otherwise I am not living up the standard I set for myself! If I do not respect me, then no one will.
I know that am blessed to be where I am with those people in my life who love me for me. Those same people and accept the struggles I overcome as a positive or necessary aspect of life but understand that they do not define me. Those who choose to judge and base themselves on who they know, the title they carry or the amount of moeny they make, can lose it all and like right now in history...have no real place to go. Beauty comes from integrity. So, how beautiful are you based on this standard? How beautiful are those that you surround yourself with? And if this is not your standard, who defines the standard of beauty for you? Consider all this has we move into 2010.
I lost this year the childhood of my eldest son. He is now 18, but more importantly, he is a father. While Vanessa his daughter is a gift from God to him and to me, I lost the boy that was going college, meeting girls, exploring the world and wanting to live in Atlanta or New York. Because, that boy is gone forever, and the responsiblity of being a father, living on your own, supporting another two people, at such a young age robs him of the things most boys his age would have. While he is lost to me as a free spirited boy, he has come to me now as a man who is handling his situation with the grace and commitment I find from very few men in my life.
He, at 18, is the primary care giver to his daughter and unlike many men even in my generation, he is more involved in her life then half the fathers I know. Unfortunately in our society and most of the world in which I live and work, he does and other young men like him , do not get credit for what they do. Instead, society focused on labeling and categorizing and because they are focused on his mistakes and "lost" dreams, they, even his own father, has written him off as a lost cause. I refuse to write him and the young men of color our society off! If we are to be defined by who we are at 18 or 19 years of age, then many of us should have given up long ago. And if we have to live in box or category that society defines for us based on standards that we did not set and were not given a chance to set, then I would not be where I am right now and should have given up at birth. However, I have learned again this year that blessings come in the challenges we face and that beauty comes from the most unexpected places.
He, like every one of us, is a work in progress and I can only hope to be an oasis from the harsh reality he is bombarded with every single day. Have you been an oasis to someone in your life? Can you be that oasis in 2010?
I was reminded in 2009 that I must stick to the values and integrity that I hold dear. I must continue to believe in my life style and my values and that leadership can grow out of those too. My syle of leadership is not wrong or misguided it is actually a style that takes courage and work to maintain and will be most effective for me in the long run. My values, although foreign to the environment in which I work, is just that foreign, but not wrong! I am destined for great things and this is a path I must take to achieve them.
Lastly, I learned that I am the only one who will put me first in my career and in my personal life. I do not mean first for material things but first as far as taking care of me and relying on me. I must take my health and mental welfare and put it first, because without it I have nothing. I am blessed with people who rely on me to take care of them. I also realize that I cannot and should not allow myself to take second place in the lives of the men in my life. I am there for them and they need to be there for me, otherwise I am not living up the standard I set for myself! If I do not respect me, then no one will.
I know that am blessed to be where I am with those people in my life who love me for me. Those same people and accept the struggles I overcome as a positive or necessary aspect of life but understand that they do not define me. Those who choose to judge and base themselves on who they know, the title they carry or the amount of moeny they make, can lose it all and like right now in history...have no real place to go. Beauty comes from integrity. So, how beautiful are you based on this standard? How beautiful are those that you surround yourself with? And if this is not your standard, who defines the standard of beauty for you? Consider all this has we move into 2010.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Each holiday season...
As I sit in here in a very privileged position, every holiday season reminds me of how lucky I am and how much I have to offer! But it also reminds me how much I have been given and how it is only by the grace of some God some where that I'm here. As one of my post discussed, I was adopted by a wonderful African American family and given access to things that I would never had access to, like a great education, stable living environment, opportunities to travel and go to college and most importantly, the opporunity to be me, without the poverty and struggles my biological family dealt with. You see I was given up for adoption at birth, and I was the only one given up for adoption, and in 1965 when I was born, there were not a lot of African American families adopting children in Minnesota, particularly children who were bi-racial(a new term, I always considered myself black). The reason I know all of this is because my biological family found me several years ago, and I have many brothers and sisters who grew up here, in St. Paul with each other.
I also realized from a very young age that I was blessed to be with my parents, not because they were perfect or my childhood was different from the friends...it was because my childhood was similar to my friends and we were not "different" except for the color of our skin and the culture inside our home, which was different from our neighbors.
As I continue to grow every day with every interaction, I remember both the good and the pain. The pain of losing my sister, Lori, at age 40 two days before Christmas, 3years ago, when she was only 39. Then the pain of losing my best friend and advocate, my father, Perry, only 6 months later. He died of a broken heart. That year, and every holiday since then, is a reminder that nothing is promised to us tomorrow, not even our last breath, so we should live our lives today as if tomorrow is our last, so that we treat each person, and every community and those that we love with deference and respect no matter where they fit in the social hiearchy! Because I know that my biological mother, died at age 46 and my biological father, never learned to read and write, but they produced me, a lawyer, a mother, a daughter, a friend and a good citizen. So what could someone like me do if given a chance...
Please give something that keeps on giving this holiday season, a donation to a charity of your choice, your time at the homeless shelter or food for the food shelf. Because all people deserve dignity at this time of year, if not every time of year, but this time in particular, when it is so easy to get caught up in the "team of me" that we forget how I, can become we and how we can make a difference.
I also realized from a very young age that I was blessed to be with my parents, not because they were perfect or my childhood was different from the friends...it was because my childhood was similar to my friends and we were not "different" except for the color of our skin and the culture inside our home, which was different from our neighbors.
As I continue to grow every day with every interaction, I remember both the good and the pain. The pain of losing my sister, Lori, at age 40 two days before Christmas, 3years ago, when she was only 39. Then the pain of losing my best friend and advocate, my father, Perry, only 6 months later. He died of a broken heart. That year, and every holiday since then, is a reminder that nothing is promised to us tomorrow, not even our last breath, so we should live our lives today as if tomorrow is our last, so that we treat each person, and every community and those that we love with deference and respect no matter where they fit in the social hiearchy! Because I know that my biological mother, died at age 46 and my biological father, never learned to read and write, but they produced me, a lawyer, a mother, a daughter, a friend and a good citizen. So what could someone like me do if given a chance...
Please give something that keeps on giving this holiday season, a donation to a charity of your choice, your time at the homeless shelter or food for the food shelf. Because all people deserve dignity at this time of year, if not every time of year, but this time in particular, when it is so easy to get caught up in the "team of me" that we forget how I, can become we and how we can make a difference.
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