Happy Valentine's Day!

I’ve been pretty discouraged lately. The teachers frequently call parents to come and whoop their kids. So I saw plenty of parents in the hall yelling at their kid with a belt in their hand. I never saw any of them hit the child though, so I wasn’t able to do anything about it. It’s so frustrating standing by and seeing all of this. Tracy and I try talking to our bosses about this and are just brushed off and told “you’re in an urban school district. This is how it is.” Well what about trying to change things? What about not just making excuses? I’m seeing now that my bosses are just as much a part of this problem as everyone else. They just shake there heads and are content with saying “well that’s how it is” and letting that be that. Its so frustrating! I just want to be done and go back home. I did have a fun time at the end of this week making Valentine’s cards at my after school program. They will be given to kids in the hospital and to a nursing home. We had a ton of adorable stamps and fancy pens and stickers and markers. It was a lot of fun and a great way to unwind at the end of the day.



Friday was my 4th anniversary with Bobby. We celebrated by going out to dinner at a place called Cypress Inn. We shared a plate of fried crawfish tails which were super delicious and then for dinner I had a seafood linguini that had scallops, crawfish and shrimp in a lemon dill sauce. It was SO delicious. We had such a wonderful evening.

In other news, I am VERY excited for my trip home in March! Thanks to my wonderful sister who bought my plane ticket. <3

Some days just suck

I haven'e been very good about writing on here... Today really deserves an entry. The speech pathologist came into our room crying this afternoon because she had just witnessed something incredibly horrible. There was a boy sitting outside the front office. His mom had been called because he had called a girl a bitch. His mom came into the school and immediately punched the boy in the head. The boy's head hit the wall and he looked like he was going to go unconscious. The mother repeatedly punched the boy in the head while everyone in the office just stood and watched. The Speech teacher didn't know what to do. She wanted to intervene, but she didn't want to get punched. She ended up just busting into tears and walking away. She went to the principal to express her disgust with what had happened and the principal just said "Well, its a common occurence. You need to get thicker skin." I don't understand how someone can become so jaded when they see a child being so severely abused. It's like they aren't even human anymore. I don't even know how to process this and I didn't even actually see what happened. I can't imagine being in the shoes of the speech teacher. My Americorps bosses don't help either. We tell them these things that we see and they just shake their heads and say "well you're working in an urban school district. That's how it is". NO! That's not a valid excuse! Standing by and letting it happen because "that's how it is" is not why I came here and it doesn't help anything. It just keeps this cycle of abuse and ignorance be passed from generation to generation in a neverending circle. I'm so ready to be done with Americorps and to be done with Birmingham and to go home.

The Warming Station

So I know it’s been quit a while since I last wrote…. My trip home was AMAZING. I had so much fun seeing my family and friends (most of all Amara…) and the holidays were wonderful. Now back to reality…I had one fairly uneventful week at the school. Same old same old… This week, however, Alabama was hit with a huge snow and ice storm… Huge for Alabama standards at least… I was in Tuscaloosa visiting Bobby when it started. He quickly got me on the road headed for home to try and beat the worst of it. The drive that usually takes me 45 minutes took 2 hours. I saw 73 cars off the road on the freeway. There was a huge section of road that was pure ice (incidently, the places where the cars were off the roads were not the places that were the iciest… weird). It was kind of scary for a bit but I made it home in one piece. On Monday the schools were closed. I slept most of the day which felt amazing. Tuesday the schools were still closed and I watched way too much tv. On Wednesday schools were STILL closed, but I had to go into the district office for a couple of hours. For some reason Tracy and I thought it’d be a great idea to sign up to work at the Red Cross Warming Station downtown from Midnight to 7 am Thursday morning in addition to working at our schools from 7:30-4:30. I packed a bag and headed to Tracy’s to hang out. I just absolutely adore Tracy’s family. They are all just so kind and affectionate. I love spending time with them. We put together a bag of snacks and made a thermos of coffee and headed to the Boutwell Auditorium totally not knowing what to expect at all. We walked into a huge room lined with rows and rows of cots holding sleeping or resting homeless people. Tracy, Charlie (her brother) and I spotted Daniel, another Americorps member and sat at a table with him. After a while a young woman came up to us and sat at the table with us. She sat and just started talking and told us bits and pieces of her life story. From what I could put together she was 21 years old. Ran away from a family with abusive step brothers and a mother who she fought with all the time because she’s white and likes black men. She’s dating a really nice guy right now who won’t try and choke her like the last guy she dated. She has a son who is a year old and she thinks she could possibly be pregnant again. As she was talking a man walked up to us and simply said “I just wanted to say that I’m really lonely tonight. My mother died last week and we were really close. I miss her. That’s all” and walked away. He really got to this young woman and she started to cry and said that she feels bad that her relationship with her own mother has been so destroyed. It’s getting late so she decides to go to bed.




We all sat and just processed the conversation when another man walked up and said “do you like poems?” we told him yes and he pulled out a notebook and proceeded to read us a poem that he had written while he was in jail. It was a beautifully deep poem and he proceeded to read a few more, all of them were so incredibly deep and just made you contemplate your life and the world and the universe.



A little while later another guy came and sat down across from me at the table and challenged me to a game of checkers. We played a few games and he talked and I listened. Another guy came and sat down and started talking with Daniel so the first guy left. This guy proceeded to tell us basically the story of how he survives and who he sometimes stays with. He talked and talked and talked and talked and talked and then all of a sudden just was done talking and went to bed. “I think he really just needed to say all of that to someone” said Daniel. The first guy came back and told us a little bit about his situation and how he has a car that he lives out of and he had originally been displaced by Katrina and had never really gotten his feet under him since. He’s been looking hard for a job and just that afternoon his twin brother had gotten really drunk and had been hauled off by the police. He started to cry as he told us that he had really just needed to talk to someone tonight and that we had been there for him and he thanked us and went on his way.



All of these people just needed someone to listen to them. It was such a fulfilling evening. We went back to the Warming Station that evening for a few hours and met even more amazing people. I can’t wait to go back again!

Home

Well my time at home is almost at an end. I leave in 4 days. I have a lot of mixed feelings about leaving. On one hand I really really miss Bobby and I'm excited to see Tracy and tell her all about Amara, but on the other hand 2 weeks was not long enough to be home with my family. I'm going to miss all the baby love and the next time I see my family Amara will be a year old. She won't be a baby anymore! It's just so weird to think about how old she'll be the next time I see her. I think I'll really need to make it a priority to get internet at my place soon so that I can skype more often with my family. I didn't really realize just how much I had missed everyone until I came home and saw them all. I didn't realize how much I adore Amara and how much I've been missing and will continue to miss when I'm gone. Man, 8 months is a long time. It sort of stinks that Christmas didn't fall more in the middle of my time away from home. The amount of time I have left is twice as long as the amount of time that's already passed. At least I got some good rest in and I'm re energized.

Amara

I finally met my amazingly adorable niece!!!!!!!!! She's just so sweet and beautiful. I love all her little coos and faces and I'm just soaking up all her smiles and baby love. I'm so happy that I got to meet her and see her in her baby stage. I'm really sad that after this trip the next time I'll see her is when she's a year old.... Man that seems like such a long time!

I've really been enjoying being home. I love love LOVE hearing Lucy's little paws running around every morning. I love the snow (especially since it's not too cold!). I love the family love. It's been a really great trip. I think it's going to be really hard to leave again!

I think I've scarred Lucy for life. Whenever I get my coat on she gets super frantic and reaches up and wants me to pick her up and then she cries a little bit. Poor puppy... It's just like having a 3 year old... ha ha ha.... On Thursday I will be house/dog/cat sitting for Nate and Jenn for a couple of days. I'm looking forward to being able to relax and watch some good movies and eat junk food. I'm also really excited for Mickey's Diner with Dad and Eben and Jonno on Christmas morning!!!

Home Sweet Home

Well I made it back to Minnesota in one piece! I got in yesterday afternoon around 3:30. The cold is bearable so far and the snow is beautiful! I go to go to church and see some friends but the highlight of the day was finally meeting my niece Amara. It was so completely wonderful!!! Last night I slept on the couch with Lucy which was so nice. Although she did jump down and want to be let out at 1:30 am... and then while we were out there she wanted to play in the snow... So I put her in her kennel... Ha ha ha... But it was nice being woken up by her kissing my face. She's such a sweet puppy. I've missed her a lot... I can already tell that it's going to be hard to leave again. But I have a Bobby that I have to go back to Alabama for so I will cherish these Minnesota moments as much as possible.

Post Thanksgiving...

I had a lovely Thanksgiving! I went to Bobby's house and hung out with his family. His brothers have gotten a little more comfortable with me and their personalities are coming out a little more... Ha ha ha... Thanksgiving food in Alabama is mostly the same. The biggest difference is that the stuffing is made with cornbread so the texture is WAY different than I'm used to. It was good though. We had the usual turkey, sweet potatoes and rolls. We also had twice baked potatoes and homemade creamed corn and of course pie. We watched football and then skyped with my entire family which was super fun. It made me miss home, but at the same time I was happy to be able to celebrate with Bobby's family. On Sunday I was invited to celebrate Thanksgiving with Tracy's family. Oh my gosh. I love her family. They all made me feel so at home and I got so many hugs! My heart was just so full afterwards! The food was fantastic there as well. The stuffing had artichokes and cranberries in it and was to die for. Tracy's sister made this squash casserole with zucchini (I don't like squash OR zucchini) and it was so delicious! And we had coconut custard pie for dessert. So yummy.

December 9th will mark the 3 year anniversary of my friend Tiffany's death. I started getting nightmares of people that I love being killed in violent ways. I think it's because of the way that Tiffy was killed and it being that time of year. It's kind of hard going through it without my family/friends who knew her around me. My sister sent me a special package though so I'm excited to get that and see what sort of treasures she sent me :) I've been super bad at emails and everything, so if you've emailed me, sorry! I just haven't had time to get here to Starbucks to reply and I don't want to be here all night so I don't get all of them replied to. I do appreciate emails and FB messages. They remind me of home and make me feel like I'm being thought about :)