Day: November 16, 2016

I saw a calendar in the bookstore the other day that had a particularly real joke. It talked about how you could find a TV really worth watching… once you lowered your standards. I feel like lowering standards in order to accept behavior seems to be par for the course these days. This article on CNN reflects that painfully. In other words, we are at the point where we are accepting BS behaviors and straight up nonsense and standardizing it.

In other news I fear the dude from American Psycho just got White House clearance. Jared Kushner seems every part that guy in recent weeks and sees himself as a cross between Trump and JFK. He is neither. Based on what is being said about him, Kushner is likely the most dangerous man in America right now, because he has the President-Elects ear and confidence and an agenda that is based largely in petty revenge and personal gains.

Finally, a shout out to the Giants. My Giants have not been good, but lately they’ve discovered a way to come together and play like a top shelf team. The 1 pt win over Cincy signals the start of a slate of games that could push them past Dallas and into first place. I’m thinking big, but so are they.

 

Some Thoughts:

1. I adore romance. It makes me feel alive inside. More importantly, I love the look on my loved one’s face when I can do something small and romantic–something just enough to upturn one corner of her mouth.

Ever notice how teachers at the end of their career tend to be the best or the very worst of their breed? It becomes a polarizing factor dually giving rise to the notion that teachers should retire sooner or that at the end of the rotation a teacher doesn’t give a damn about the politics and is, finally, about the learning.

 

I wish I’d had more of those teachers in my time. I can name three off the top of my head, led by Herbert Greenhut, the best teacher I’ve ever met. He had a plan from day one and by day twelve it was clear to all of us that things weren’t going to be normal and our comfort zone, though gone, was being remade into something stellar.

 

I don’t invoke such a rise in my students. I want to. I feel like I spent too many years on the job trying to be a good teacher or an influential teacher or even matching some film-born idea of what a teacher ought to be (oh captain my captain). None of that is me. If I’ve learned one thing over the past few years its that trying to be someone other than yourself is a painful experience destined to end in failure. The most you can be is the best version of yourself wherever you go. I’ve moved back towards that in my personal and professional lives and it feels so good.

 

Some Thoughts:

 

1. Failed to upload this last night.