The Schools Our Communities Deserve

After a long day at school, I make my way to a local middle school where our district superintendent approved a co-location (more than one school shares one school site) without consulting with the school community. This new "pilot school" has financial backing from Green Dot, and will serve a select group of 6-12 graders (read "local white students") taking space on an already successful middle school campus and competing for the same students.

Needless to say, the local parents, teachers, and community are enraged, but the district really doesn't care. Unfortunately, this has become the norm. This is how large district administrators "deal" with their schools. Decisions are made and changes occur. Deal with it. Here is a charter school and you need to share your school site. Work it out. Here are the Common Core Standards and this is how you will be evaluated and evaluate. Make it work. We are closing your school. Deal with it. It's a tough time to serve in our public schools.

But despite the mess coming from district leadership and the ed deform movement attacking public education and its teachers at the district, state, and federal levels, good things continue to happen. Students read and perform Midsummer Night's Dream. They write essays about Fredrick Douglass' thinking about slavery and the complexities of pluralism. They debate the historical legacy of President Andrew Jackson: hero or villain and that's just in the last few weeks at my school. 

I continue to work for the public schools our communities deserve alongside teachers, our union, and parents who are committed to do the same. But we are up against a well-funded enemy (The Gates Foundation, The Waltons of Walmart) and it requires some digging to understand what is really happening in public education today.

If you want to support your local schools, here are a couple of resources you might want to check out. And the one thing I ask that you do, is don't believe the hype. Schools haven't changed as much as people would like to say they have (for good or bad) but if they are going to continue to exist, we need your help. We need everyone's help.

American Education professor Diane Ravitch's blog provides great links and analysis of ed policy teachers and their impact on our schools, teachers, students, and their families.

The Network for Public Education advocates for a strong public education system because it is essential to democracy.

Running from the Dark

Tonight I go for a run. Even though it’s already dark. Even though I’m tired. I have to.

The dark started seeping in around the holidays. Now it’s February. It’s been a few months. It hasn’t been persistent, but it has been enough for me to notice.

So I change my clothes, and after the baby is safely to bed, I lace up my shoes and head out into the night.

I’ve been running from the dark since I was a kid. I told my mom, “Why do I always have to be the happy one? Maybe sometimes I’m just not happy.”

I’ve been running from the dark ever since the summer when my brother didn’t sleep. He started hearing voices and talked too fast and ended up in the hospital.

I’ve been running from the dark ever since the winter my sister didn’t sleep. She started hearing voices and talked too fast and ended up in the hospital.

They both made it. They made their way out of the dark. I’m still running.

I’m about a mile in. It’s a cool night and the first half of this run is uphill. The second half will be easier.

In college, the dark seeped in with the rain. It was the rainiest year on record in the Pacific Northwest. I blamed the rain. So, after college I moved to Los Angeles. I thought the sunshine might help. But the monotony of blue skies got to me. I started to see a therapist and I kept running.

I’m halfway through my run, but I’m behind. I need to pick up the pace. It’s getting late.

After my daughter was born I paid very close attention to the darkness. I wasn’t sleeping. I worried about the whole post-partum bit. I could see the darkness around the edges, when the exhaustion felt like too much and when I was up alone in the middle of night. I kept moving though, and as soon as I could, I started to run.

It’s mostly downhill for this last half-mile. The palm trees are silhouettes against the night sky. The moon is hidden behind the clouds.

When I tore my Achilles tendon, I couldn’t walk or run for months. That’s how I know things are bad because it’s darker now then it was a year ago. Nothing has changed except how I feel, and I can run again.

I stop at a light, a few blocks from home. In just a few seconds, I’ll be home. When I get there the lights will be on and I'll head inside where it’s bright.

A morning inspired by Pete Seeger

On this morning of Obama’s State of the Union address, I hear that Pete Seeger has died. I immediately hear a banjo in my mind.



I think of Bruce Springsteen. I remember Pete leading the country, along with Bruce, at the Lincoln Memorial at President Obama’s inaugural concert. I was so proud of our country, so filled with optimism about the direction this anti-war, progressive president might take our country.

Six years and a full election cycle later I’m proud of our president’s Health Care initiative, but I’m mostly disappointed. I imagine Mr. Seeger is too for President Obama’s drone strikes, continued militarism, corporate bailouts, and privatization of our public schools.

Twitter asks what I hope to hear from our President tonight. I’ve learned from five previous State of the Union speeches that high hopes will lead to great disappointment. It’s not like it was during Bush when every sentence brought offense. No, with this POTUS I have to listen carefully because it is the subtext I need to decipher, particularly in the education section of his speech. He will surely address accountability in our schools which really means disempowering our unions and rewarding teachers based on test scores. He might say we must not teach to the test, but he will likely emphasize just how these crucial these tests are.

So, before I head to work in my union red this morning, I listen to Pete Seeger, and I’m reminded why I write, why I’m a union activist, why I teach in a pubic school, and why I’m compelled stand up for what I believe, even when it gets lonely. 

Building Your Writing Community

I am lucky enough to spend the holiday weekend with dear friends I met in my MFA program at Antioch University over a decade ago. We fly, then drive from cities and small towns, wind down long, steep roads and gather in a house overlooking the Coast to celebrate a milestone birthday. But as we reconnect, it's obvious there is so much more to recognize: sobriety, a couple of books, a baby, a marriage, a law degree, an engagement, a successful blog launch and subsequent book proposal request, and our friendship.

Ten years after meeting my writing family, despite all the time we've spent apart and even though we live in different cities and write different genres from different perspectives, we still strive to tell our stories. In our conversations we weave narratives. We introduce new characters, construct settings, pile on conflicts, and seek out resolution. We gaze out at the Pacific for hours, each of us searching for the story that will set us free.

But we are writers. We will never truly be loose of the stories we are compelled to tell. That is why it is so critical that we stick together.

Writers have to find other writers, because this can be isolating business.

I soak in three days with my writing family and then I make the long trip home, thousands of miles from this creative community. I arrive at my coffee shop the next morning. I check-in with another writing friend, my local-writing-family, and then, with the momentum of writers everywhere sitting pen in hand or before a glowing screen, I put down the words.

They are what keep us going,
keep me going,
keep going.

Another Poetry Post: Amiri Baraka

We lost American poet Amiri Baraka this week, and if I'd still been posting a poem a week, I would have found one of his poems to honor him. If I learned anything from my year of poems, it's that there are so many poets to appreciate, I should not pass on an opportunity to explore one. So, here is a bio from the New York Times which begins to explore some of the complexity that is Amiri Baraka and here is a poem (or a preface) which leaves me breathless.

From Poet Seers' bio of Amiri Baraka

Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note
By Amiri Baraka

Lately, I've become accustomed to the way
The ground opens up and envelopes me
Each time I go out to walk the dog.
Or the broad edged silly music the wind
Makes when I run for a bus...

Things have come to that.

And now, each night I count the stars.
And each night I get the same number.
And when they will not come to be counted,
I count the holes they leave.

Nobody sings anymore.

And then last night I tiptoed up
To my daughter's room and heard her
Talking to someone, and when I opened
The door, there was no one there...
Only she on her knees, peeking into

Her own clasped hands

2013 Year in Review

This picture has nothing to do with this post. It's just a funny shot of
Kiara reading Goodnight Bush and making a face about Dick Cheney.

Well, 2013 has been my most prolific year as a blogger with this being my 51st post. The 52 poems project definitely kept me going. I loved returning to a few of my favorite poets: Robert Frost, Pablo Neruda, and Lucille Clifton, but I also discovered how much I love other poets like Seamus Heaney, Richard Blanco, and Naomi Shihab Nye. My poetry posts were not so widely read, though. I don't know how much these stats really tell me. I mean, as of now, my Dukes of Hazzard excerpt is my all-time most read which just shows the power of the label in a search engine. Apparently more people search for 80s tv shows than for poems about forgetting and remembering life.

Still, these were the three posts which got the most hits in 2013. Thanks for reading along and here's to another year of reading, writing, blogging, and living.

Scout!

The third most visited post was titled Conception after a poem in Reflections of Motherhood. I decided to share this after we decided to try to grow our family again. No luck yet, but we're still hopeful!

The next most-read post was about the new year's wishes my students made and some wishes of my own. It surprises me that this was so widely read, but I'm glad for it and I do plan on writing more about my teaching and the state of public education this coming year.

But for 2013, the posts which resonated most was Love that Dog about our family's decision to re-home our dog. I still tear up reading it and still miss Scout. It was tough not hanging her stocking this holiday season and if anyone is in need of a dog stocking, let me know.

See you in 2014!

52 Poems: Weeks 51 and 52 The End

These are the last poems I'll be posting for a while. 52 poems ends up being quite a lot, so thanks for coming along with me on this year's poetry detour. It reminded me how much words matter. Hopefully, they reminded you of that too.

2013 has been a year filled with teaching, writing, reading, and poetry, but it's also been about a little girl who is growing in a world far away from where I grew up and far away from my immediate family. Here are a couple of poems from my Reflections on Motherhood collection about little Kiara Harper's journey. They were inspired by poems I posted in week 14 of this poem-a-week project, Pablo Neruda's "You Will Remember." and in week 16, Billy Collins' "Forgetfulness." 




Urban Girl
after Pablo Neruda’s “You Will Remember”

You will remember sirens and bright night skies,
the beach and warm winters,
voices in a chorus of languages
and traffic flowing instead of silent water.

You will remember snow as a vacation
an escape to a mountain
rather than a driveway or walk to shovel
or a day off from school.

You will remember family
after a plane ride or a long drive
and the Oregon relatives whose love
stretches from a thousand miles away.


Pictures with Grandpa
after Billy Collins’ “Forgetfulness”

I watch you with your grandpa
and I’m so glad you know him,
that his booming voice
is familiar to your tiny ears,
that his bright white smile
brings out your giggle.

I snap pictures to capture the moments

so when he slips away,
when he can no longer remember your name,
I can show him pictures
of that first Christmas and first birthday
to help jostle loose a memory
of how much he loves you.

And when he is gone
I will show you these photographs
so you will know,
in a time before you can remember
your grandpa loved you
and you loved him too.

52 Poems: Weeks 49 and 50 A Gift of Words

Right before winter break, I always share a couple of my favorite winter poems with my students. As this 52 poems project nears its end, I thought I'd share them here. I've posted "Good Hours" in the past, but here it is again, along with another Robert Frost favorite, "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening" which always sounds like it should be the title of a Pearl Jam song. Enjoy.

Good Hours
By Robert Frost

I had for my winter evening walk—

Rie Munoz

No one at all with whom to talk,
But I had the cottages in a row
Up to their shining eyes in snow.

And I thought I had the folk within:
I had the sound of a violin;
I had a glimpse through curtain laces
Of youthful forms and youthful faces.

I had such company outward bound.
I went till there were no cottages found.
I turned and repented, but coming back
I saw no window but that was black.

Over the snow my creaking feet
Disturbed the slumbering village street
Like profanation, by your leave,
At ten o'clock of a winter eve.

Rie Munoz's Evergreen Bowl

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
By Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Through Eyes Like Mine v. Overdue Apologies

So, a couple of times in the past few weeks people have told me they didn't know I had a second book. What? How is this possible? It came out almost two years ago. Apparently, I didn't do a very good job getting the word out about Overdue Apologies, the middle school memoir follow-up to Through Eyes Like Mine.

Well, the early reviews are in, and it seems that the adults prefer Through Eyes Like Mine, and the young adult readers like Overdue Apologies more. My students have given me great feedback, even though I'm a little bit torn about my students reading my books. I don't mind when they read Through Eyes Like Mine, but this year I made the mistake of telling them they shouldn't read Overdue Apologies. So, of course, this made them want to read it. It's been good for me, though. I've had the chance to get more feedback and it's always funny to hear them critique my middle school choices.

"Ms. Nakada, I was mad when you broke up with Robert."

"What ever happened to Robin, or Casey, or Bianca?"

Then, one of my students wrote in a reading journal that she cried as she read the last chapter. She loves her middle school friends and hates to think they will someday drift apart.

She made me consider that it might not be so bad for my middle school students read my middle school memoir. Even though I did some things I'm not proud of, maybe reading my book will help them make better decisions than I did.

So, if you have a reader on your holiday list, here are a couple of books for your consideration.

Through Eyes Like Mine

Overdue Apologies

52 Poems: Weeks 47 and 48 Pablo Neruda on Keeping Quiet

With the year winding down and headlines reminding me of all that is wrong in the world, I need a poet to remind me to keep quiet. 

Footsteps

after Pablo Neruda’s “Keeping Quiet”

Now that you are walking

I can hear your footsteps

Pitter patter in the world.

I want to keep quiet,

to silence the noise of the world,

the shots fired on a winter morning,

the distant blast of bombs exploding

at the end of a marathon.

I watch you bravely take first steps

into this world 
of peace and violence,

truth and lies,
and remember to count
to twelve, and keep still.

Keeping Quiet

by Pablo Neruda

Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still.

For once on the face of the earth,
let's not speak in any language;
let's stop for one second,
and not move our arms so much.

It would be an exotic moment
without rush, without engines;
we would all be together
in a sudden strangeness.

Fisherman in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would look at his hurt hands.

Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victories with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about;
I want no truck with death.

If we were not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with death.
Perhaps the earth can teach us
as when everything seems dead
and later proves to be alive.
 
Now I'll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.