Ju Rang

Used to be, I'd cry at the movies, cry at Hallmark commercials, and cry when I wasn't getting my way.

Room 212, you've changed all that.

Now, let me just say, I don't walk into my classroom, bawl all day, and then go home. My kids and I laugh a TON, and there are plenty of days, yesterday included, when I get so frustrated and irritated, I'm ready to quit my job and go be a cashier at Home Depot.

And yet? Oh, these babies. They do make me cry.

A couple of days ago, a young sophomore in my journalism class asked if he could stay after school to make a phone call. Towards the end of class, I had noticed Ju Rang analyzing several pages of a phone bill, and I'd wondered what the heck that was all about. Turns out, the bill was long over-due and he needed to speak with the folks at Verizon to find out why they were sending notices to his parents for a cancelled account.

Ju Rang's parents don't speak English. The folks at Verizon don't speak Korean.

When Ju Rang should have been outside kicking around a soccer ball, he spent over 30 minutes muddling through a phone bill. He never once lost his patience. (I confess, several times, I almost yanked the phone away from him and yelled into it, "He's told you! The account was cancelled! Stop harrassing this family!") Ju Rang was unceasingly polite, and when he finished his call, he invited me to his church and then went outside to find his best friend Elmer.

Now, Elmer, he's another story. This sweet kid is a dedicated swimmer in a sport that's not exactly conducive to families without a lot of financial resources. Yet there he is, six days a week, both before and after school, at an aquatic center he has to take a bus to in order to practice and compete. Matt and I watched him at meet couple of weeks ago, screaming, "Go Elmer!" as he swam the the first heat of the 200 breaststroke.

He lost. Elmer's parents were not there.

The next day, Elmer asked, "Miss? Will you and Mr. Forbes come watch me swim at sectionals?" Yes, Elmer, we will come watch you swim at sectionals. You got it.

I was late to pick up Matt the other day because Mariana needed to stay after school to catch up on her work. Well, that's what she said she was doing. In reality, she was watching YouTube videos on a laptop and giggling like a second-grader. I wasn't in a hurry to leave because I know her home is a shithole (her counselor's words, not mine). When I finally told her I needed to scoot, her face fell. But then she perked up and said, "I liked what we did in class today. It was kind of exciting. I'm going to do the assignment."

I don't cry in front of them. But when they leave, I pace around my classroom, sometimes throwing things, sometimes staring out the window, and often -- far too often -- getting really angry. I find myself thinking, over and over, "For heaven's sake, could someone please give these kids a break?"

I cry. And then I go home and heat up some veggie burgers for my sweet husband.

This is room 212.

Kennedy Quinn Dillon

On April 8, 2012 (four ... eight ... twelve ... doesn't that have nice symmetry?), Robyn and Brian's wee little girl was born. Since babies can't really share an anecdote about their trip through the birth canal or comment on how fuzzy we all look and sound, we are stuck talking about them in statistics. Weight, length, how long they sleep, how many ounces they take in, how many diapers they produce, what size clothes they wear.

Numbers. Blech. I'm a story girl myself.

She was too little. So little that she spent six out of her first seven days (argh, numbers again) in the hospital with tubes and incubators and very anxious parents. From way too far away, Matt and I checked our phones with the nervous twitchiness of over-caffeinated grandparents, gasping, "Oh! Here! Look!" every time my phone, set on full volume, dinged.

We got pictures of her sleeping in Brian's arms, sleeping in Chris's arms, sleeping in Robyn's lap, sleeping in her incubator, and sleeping in her preemie hospital gown, so big on her, it looked like a mumu. We read and re-read the updates about her progress. We held each other and prayed.

In spite of their numbing exhaustion, Robyn and Brian celebrated Kennedy's one week birthday with us on Skype. Robyn held her phone up to Kennedy's face so we could see her dark blue eyes. Once Kennedy accepted that the phone wasn't a meal option, she gazed at us. She yawned. She stared. She stuck out her tongue. She sucked her thumb. She fussed. She got bored and went looking for a snack.

Kennedy Quinn Dillon, here you are. Welcome, dear one. Welcome, welcome, welcome.

Now, please gain three pounds and stop scaring us.

I'll have mine rare, please

Matt and I have tootled around southern California almost every weekend since we moved here. To steal a friend's Facebook status, we live like someone just opened the gate. Now, to be honest, there have been times when we passed hours lolling on our little living room sofa shifting our weight from one cheek to the other. But mostly, we tootle.

I bring this up, not to brag, but to share our surprise. What's happening is that folks who have lived here for twenty years or more say things to us like, "Golly, I didn't know there were flower fields in Carslbad," or "Gee, you can take the MetroLink to San Juan Capistrano?" (They don't really talk like the cast from Leave it to Beaver. That's just me being me. But they do talk like they don't get out much.)

Matt was chatting with a nice lady named Linda who helps us deal with relocation caca. Mind you, this nice lady manages the relocations of hundreds and hundreds Disnoids a year. Whenever Matt speaks with her, he shares our latest discovery, the most recent of which is a fabulous little Mexican joint with potato tacos so spicy they'll set your hair on fire. Last time they talked, Linda said, "Matt, you are your wife are rare."

She didn't mean steak. Well, if she did that would be weird since we're vegetarians ... or even weirder if she thinks of bloody cow whenever she talks to Matt. Nope, she was complimenting him our get-out-and-go-ed-ness. I think that's nice.

Here's the thing. I've decided that even with the crime and pollution and smog and sirens and air so dry it makes my knuckles bleed, that this is a fine town. Yep, it has more than its fair share of egotistical maniacs, but it's bursting with creativity and vitality and beauty, too. What I love most about L.A. is that it is an utter celebration of all. No person or idea or belief or skin color is unwelcome. This is a city with its arms open wide.

Arms open wide is a lovely way to live.

Empty

So often, something happens in my classroom that I have no skills to deal with. I feel sick and uncertain and ill-equipped. I think it over, I talk with others -- but I'm still at a loss.

A couple of weeks ago, my students wrote a timed-essay. They understood the stakes, they knew how to perform the task, and they could interpret the prompt. Some of my kids just didn't want to write, and I understood that. Heavens, who wants to write an essay at eight o'clock in the morning when the sun is shining and spring is on the way? What I didn't understand, though, was the mechanism a couple of my kids used to avoid the work. I would have taken a nap, written a note, chewed gum. But not two of my kids in first period.

"Dayna" used her eraser to make a mound of white shavings. Then she took her student ID, which is shaped exactly like a credit card or driver's license, and used it to separate the shavings into neat little piles. "David," her elbow partner, thought this was far more interesting than writing his own essay, so he jumped in on the action. They were extremely quiet -- never laughed or talked, but the mischief on their faces was unmistakable.

What made my stomach turn is the drug reference. I've only seen Hollywood versions of cocaine cutting, but I'm pretty sure that's the task my students were mimicking. I pointed lots of stern looks in their direction and whispered admonitions to get back on task. Nothing. I reminded the kids of the importance of the test. The cocaine cutting continued. Finally, out came the threat to go explain to an administrator why they could not write an essay, which worked. The ID found its way into the backpack, and the pile of erasure shavings was swept onto the floor.

I wish I could say I handled the whole episode well, but I most definitely did not. I talked about it with my colleagues, and we stepped up our drug use talks in our iConnect classes. I thought about relaying the incident to administrators, but honestly, our mental health counselors are already over-tasked.  Plus, I felt sure I was over-reacting. Perhaps this was a little like seeing toddlers take their clothes off at the playground?

I've never used illegal substances, and I'm afraid of most of the legal ones. What I saw in class that day scared me in ways I don't fully understand.

The world is not as full of hope as I'd like.

SRLA

Today was the annual Los Angeles Marathon. That's right, boys and girls, 20,000 atheletes running from Dodger Stadium to the Santa Monica Pier.

Pretty much awesome.

But what's even awesomer is a program called Students Run Los Angeles (SRLA) that offers 3,000 scholarships to teenagers from underprivileged areas of the city. They get their entry fee waived and a superb pair of Nike running shoes, not to mention a poncho in case of rain, gel snacks, and the screaming support of the teachers and coaches from their school (that's where Matt and I came in).

We queued up at mile 10 and spent two hours squinting. We so desperately wanted to see the 50-ish Camino kids who have been training for this run since September. We had Gatoraide, we had pretzels, and we had lungs. Cocyx be damned, whenever I saw one of our munchins I began jumping up and down and yelling stuff like, "WOOHOO, NATALLY! GO, YOU!" and "DALIA! ROBERTO! YOU GUYS ROCK!"

Then back to squinting until we saw the next Camino-ite.

We missed church, which has considerably less jumping and screaming. But no fewer smiles from God, I feel sure. What better way to worship than to say to a young man or woman, "I have faith in you."

Great morning.

Levitated Mass

As we walk around this colossal town, we see odd things. And sometimes our only possible response is a shake of the head and a quietly murmured, "Only in L.A." Here's a recent example ...

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art, a world-class institution we are rather addicted to, recently spent $10 million to transport a big rock (ahem, sorry ... "megalith") from a quarry in Riverside to its backlot where some dude named Michael Heizer will watch a crane move it to just the right location over a walk-way, thus deeming him "the artist" and the rock "art."

See? Only in L.A.

For some odd reason I can't quite puzzle out, tens of thousands of people from the four counties the "megalith" rolled through came out at all hours of the night to catch a glimpse of the boulder. I say all hours of the night because massive road closures, tree removals, and traffic signal dismantlings made day-time travel a bad idea. Dozens of area newspapers, that capitalized way too often on the "rock 'n roll" theme in their headlines, reported on rock music festivals and food trucks eager to make a buck off the rock craze.

Every morning, Matt expectantly busted open the newspaper to trace the rock's whereabouts on its 10-day journey. To my everlasting surprise, even national news outlets got in on the hype. On my drive to school every morning, I listened to stories from stations running the gamut from the local Pasadena public radio station to Martketplace, The Morning Report and even both NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered.

So last weekend, Matt laid out a course for a trip down to LACMA so we could check out the rock for ourselves. We went early, hoping to avoid the crowds and peek at the big boy through the fence behind the museum.

I peeked. And criticized. And shook my self-righteous little head. The thing was wrapped in plastic, for heaven's sake (although my sweet husband informed me that, no indeed, what appears to be plastic is actually imported Egyptian cotton designed to protect the boulder from the elements, to which I sarcastically replied, "Aren't boulders sort of designed to be IN the elements?"). The "megalith" is about the size of one of those gas station kiosks that sell cigarettes and 2-liter bottles of Pepsi, whereas I'd been envisioning something more on the scale of a Walgreen's. Megalith indeed.

Because Matt is always happy and curious, he thought the boulder was pretty much awesome, not to mention the heavy artillery of large-scale trucks, trailers, and cranes surrounding it like a queen's retinue. I pointed out that someone in the marketing department would be getting a bonus since all the trucks, trailers, and cranes were all conveniently painted in the same colors as LACMA's trademark red and white. He grinned. Rather enthusiastically.

We were correct in that the crowds were light at 8:00 a.m. (this city sleeps until noon on the weekends), but the news crews were out in full force. A cameraman from Fox thought our noticeably opposite reactions were funny, so he pointed his camera in our direction and asked us to talk.

We did. I was funny. Matt was funnier. And as we strolled back to the bus stop, we shook our heads and muttered, "Only in L.A."

Because Matt is Matt ...

Two weeks from Sunday marks three years since the first day I saw Matt. He was wearing faded blue jeans and a starched white, button-down shirt with a speck of communion juice on the collar. We met at Panera for a cup of coffee, and when he excused himself to go to the men's room, I noticed two things: he walked like a mellow Tigger, and he patted his back pocket to make sure his wallet was still there.

I fell in love.

(So did he. I wasn't a mile away from our good-bye when my phone buzzed with a text message that said, "When can I see you again?")

He takes my breath away.

Matt is unrelentingly gentlemanly. He turns down the bed at night, and sets my slippers next to it. He puts toothpaste on my toothbrush. When the alarm goes off, he gets out of bed first.  While I sleep a few more minutes, he makes a pot of coffee and gets the tea kettle ready for my to-go mug. I can only convince him to let me carry my back-pack if it's chilly outside (he knows it warms me), and  I honestly can't remember when I last opened a car door or had to figure out directions from point A to point B.

The Tigger walk? I was dead-on. Matt's energy and playfulness astonish me. He loves to make rhyming words. He names plants -- not "daisy," mind you, but rather, "number three white," which is especially funny as he has an encylopedic knowledge of horticulture. Every time we walk past a dog, he asks, "What kind is that?" No matter what I reply, he laughs. Public transporation fascinates him, as do walking, biking, and swimming ... and maps, colored pencils, and high-end tools.  He can fall asleep sitting up. Mint chip ice cream makes him grin like a teenager.

Every night, when we sit down to dinner, Matt holds out his hands to me, and asks, "May I pray?"

I love this man. I love his military-short hair and his low snore and his Wallace-like smile.

Yesterday, we took a walk to 21 Choices, our favorite frozen yogurt joint (they have flavors like carmelized banana, so what's not to like?). On our way there, Matt saw a couple arguing. As the woman walked away from the man, he quite savagely abused her. It was so sudden and ugly, I thought Matt might be sick. When the man saw Matt, he sprinted away. Matt called out to the woman to ask if she was okay. And although she said, "I'm fine," it was clear she meant, "Get away from me."

We walked on. We ate our yogurt. We dipped into the Apple store to look at iPads. We discussed our plans for Scotland. We held hands. But ... Matt's mind was on the woman. He was quiet. He didn't ask me to name any dog breeds.

When we got near the place the woman had been yanked to the ground by her hair, Matt said, "She works there. She was wearing a uniform. I want to ... I want to give her our phone number. I want to tell her we'll help her, we'll testify, we'll ..." He got quiet again.

There are a thousand reasons not to get involved, I thought. She'll be angry we walked into her restaurant. She might be an addict. She won't want to press charges. She'll mutter an explicative and turn away. There are more complications than we could ever guess.

Yet here is front of me stood my guy. What are a thousand reasons stacked next to slump of his shoulders? I took his hand, and we walked in. Our exchange with the woman was brief and private. She may never call us or leave the man who is as different from my Matt as the east is from the west. But when Matt said, "Here is my number and you can call it in an hour or a week or a year or never ...," she looked up into Matt's face. Then she looked at me. And then she looked back up at Matt.

She took the piece of paper with Matt's phone number on it, and she nodded. She said thank-you.  And then she turned away.

But not before I saw a certain look in her eyes.  She knows, I thought. She knows what it feels like to have a man set her slippers next to her bed.

There is such hope in the world. And I love Matt Forbes.