The big picture...

Today I learned a lot about why so much of the world is in its sorry shape, in so many places...

Why so much greed...or laziness and momentary living...why so much fatalism...and why so many problems persist in places like public schools like the ones I've talked about...or private businesses, which get so many headlines...and noone really does anything about them...

The biggest reason...

Is that there are just not nearly enough people who take responsibility for the big problems...and prefer to keep their minds on the smaller problems, instead...to avoid the bigger problems as much as anything, I suspect...

Most problems are somebody else's responsibility as far as most people are concerned...or unsolvable...or doomed...or incapable of escaping the cynical cycles in which such problems persist...

And the reason for all of this...

Is because most people either never take on the challenges of life...

Or because they give up...

Luckily...there are many who don't...

As Margaret Mead said...it's a small group of people, compared to the overall population of the living...but luckily...once those few demonstrate that something can be done...most people follow, I think...eventually...

What most people called selling out...

Is really just people who give up...

It's kind of sad...a little lame...and foolish all around, since the problems people give up generally affect everyone, whether we give up on them or not...

Most problems require thought at a level that most people do not want to give to them...because they're so goddamn focussed on the little picture...that they just can't/won't get their heads wrapped around the big picture...

Today was not the first day that I heard a teacher describe some kids as "doomed"...but most people get lost in this kind of cynicism, I think...because it seems easier in the moment...than believing...that something not only can be done...that something must be done...or else problems persist...

I was telling Carson last Saturday...the reason why I take the most idealistic path...

Is because it's the only way out...

Because all of the other paths are futile...

And the reason is because cynical paths are not about solutions, at all...

They are about making excuses for not giving enough of a shit...or for giving up...

And I'm not interested in making excuses or supporting excuses for not giving a shit...or for giving up...

I'm interesting in getting problems solved...

Most people aren't interested, enough...because it means caring enough...and so many people are just afraid that if they really care...then they might get disappointed...

Which they might...

But...as I have written for my kids on my chalkboard...they is no paths to success...except ones paved with plenty of failure...

Not for people who are really interested in solving problems...and not just in moaning about them...

And as I look around my school...at teachers who take the biggest picture responsibility for kids...and those who are constantly laming out, languishing in the little picture...

I know that there is no way that I could wake up...and look at myself in the mirror, every morning...if I were one of those teachers always laming out of the big responsibilities...

Because in my heart...I would know that I really was just giving up...

Cynicism...which is so much of the bullshit that passes for political and otherwise wisdom in the world, now and since time eternal...

Is really just giving up...

It doesn't mean shit, really...

And I don't care where it comes from...

Left...right...politics...churches...schools...
businesses...the smaller-minded...or relatively bigger-minded folks...

Cynicism is just quitting...and it doesn't deserve to be taken seriously as anything else other than that...

Maybe that's what I've been going through, lately...this weekend, in particular...and the week before, as well...

I've been contemplating the logical conclusion to cynicism...which is quitting...

And I'm just not willing to do that...

Higher ground is found with higher ideals...and bigger ideas...

And that's the only place to go if you're clear...

That you're not quitting...and that you really give a shit, at all...

I'm clear...and I want others to get clearer, as well...

And I guess what gives me that clarity...

Is the freedom...to make whatever choice I want to make...without guilt...or any other sense of obligation, at all, really...

I have scholarships that obligate me to teach special education that I decided long ago I would walk away from and pay back once I found a more lucrative career if I was convinced that the cynicism would will out...

But it won't...

Because I have no plans on giving up...

And I'm learning that cynics generally follow bigger and better ideas...

Because bigger ideas and higher ideals are the only thing that can solve problems that others have given up on, in their cynicism...

Because cynicism offers no real solutions...

Just excuses for why it quits...

Cynicism or realism or whatever foolish name you want to give for giving up...is not strength...

It's quitting...

And quitters just pretend to have strength that they lack...

Because it's easier to doing the thinking...and the hard work...

To get stronger...and to tackle challenges that seem overwhelming...absent a stronger understanding of them...

And that's what I love about this work...

The opportunity to take on challenges...

That so many people have either given up on...or are on foolish paths to solve...because they just can't get their heads out of the small picture...and wrapped around the biggest picture...

It's the biggest problem in the world, today...

Too many people...with too small an outlook on the world...

And it is the biggest challenge of humanity...and education...right now, I think...

Getting more people focussed on the biggest picture...

And getting people with the smallest picture outlook focussed on a bigger picture than the one they carry around, right now, in the meantime...

Who would you rather be in 17th Century Europe?

A rich monarch...with plenty of money and power...but plenty of enemies, too...exploiting religious divisions for your own power base...and whom noone remembers...except to deride what you represented for your age...

Or Thomas Hobbes...imagining a world...where secular thought gave legitimacy to governance...rather than religious propaganda and civil war...

A rich plantation owner in 19th Century America?...or a rich industrialist in late 19th, early 20th century Great Britain?...

Or John Stuart Mill or Fredrick Douglas making the most persuasive cases for ending the ugly practice of slavery?...or John Dewey or Jane Addams constructively criticizing those arrangements and imagining better ones and working to support people to create better futures for one another, in the meantime?...

There's a reason why we remember people with the biggest picture outlooks...

Because everyone else is just too small-minded to give much attention, really, by the standards of their progeny...

The real question for people today is...

Would you rather work to impress your friends and family with your new purchases or power?...or your sure plans for retirement?...

Or would you rather impress your grandchildren...with your thought and courage...for the sake of future generations, as much as for your own?...

I'd rather work for my grandchildren...

But most of all...

I'd rather earn my own self-respect...

Doing the right thing...whether anyone else recognizes it or not...and learning from and teaching others along the way...

I've got some work to get done before tomorrow...

But I'm convinced, now, that there's no way that I can face any more tomorrows...

Without getting clear that I'm committed to making tomorrow a better day...meaning tomorrow morning...and the future, generally...

Because without that kind of clarity...

My life lacks the purpose...

That makes it so worthwhile...

Have a great week, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

Outlining the book...

Tim McGraw's Live Like You Were Dying, this morning, has me thinking that I better get on this book while I'm still guaranteed life to do it...

And talking with Carson completely inspired me to get to work on it because Carson talks like how I like to talk...about everything...and with everything connected, at some level, with everything else...or at least with potential...I hate stuffy intellectual conversations where I've topics off-limits to discuss important and not-so-important stuff...and Carson's brain works the same way...but also in ways that help me see my blindspots, better...and which highlight differences that offer me strengths that he has to appreciate and emulate...

The book I'm writing is going to be in two parts, at this point...

The first part is the namesake for the book, The Limits of Power...it's an empirical collection of case studies to make arguments about the limits of power, both in particular cases and generally...when the use of force is effective...when it is ineffective...and, as often as not, when it has limited, immediate effectiveness and long-term counterproductivity...

That last point is probably the most important, because it is the place where people miss the problems with the use of force, the most...they calculate for the short term...and end up with unintended and counterproductive long term consequences that, of course, noone wants to take responsibility for...blowback -- the CIA term for such unintended political consequences -- is one example of this problem in international policy circles...

But the truth is that it happens everywhere...in domestic and international policy...as well as in organizations and interpersonal situations...its more common than not, really...and those with smaller worldviews do it more often than those without...because they just don't know what's good for them in the big picture, is the truth...and it is the failure to account for this problem by people far too enamoured with the use of force and far too little thoughtful about its use that gets everyone in trouble...and for which noone seems to want to take responsibility (though they are quick to take credit for any short term advantages it might yield)...

So the first part of the book is a empirical review of evidence from case studies...my point will not at all be to prove my case...I'm genuinely exploring case studies...and those that contradict me, I will cite and buttress contrary cases so I'm taking on the strongest counter-arguments, rather than strawmen...if I'm wrong, I want to know it...and I want to make whatever case seems strongest to me, no matter what...

It doesn't make any sense, really, to want to buttress your own case for anything without considering how and why you might be wrong...because if you're wrong, you're wrong...truth is just thinking about reality, which doesn't give a shit whether you don't understand it or not...it just is...and my job is to deduce it better, given what I know and what more I can learn over the course of this book...

Drug laws...gun laws...economic and environmental regulation...regulations on speech...death penalty...military force...diplomacy...education policy...criminal sentencing...violent crime...anything and everything that I have even the slightest -- and by the end of the book, the deepest -- understanding and familiarity with, I will tackle...I want my best cases and I want my hardest cases...I want those cases that pose the strongest counterarguments to my general theses, up to this point, and I want to make those arguments as powerful and credible as possible...

I don't give two shits about being right if I'm wrong...doing so makes no goddamn sense if you really care about getting to better answers rather than getting to answers to reinforce your own biases and assumptions...

And I will make arguments, of course, as I consider the evidence...I am very keen on a Gordon Woods' approach of just outlining the arguments as a narrative, up front, and then making the case...I also appreciate Joe Nye's and Amartya Sen's and Stephen Jay Gould's approach of organizing arguments by relevance to support an overall case (and Gould's penchant for teaching about logic as he takes you through his case)...and I love Abraham Maslow's style in The Farther Reaches of Human Nature of just doing what I've tried to do with this blog which is just write as stream-of-consciousness as possible and to show his human side, as much as his thinking...but I'm not sure, yet, what the best way to write this will be...so I'm thinking about it openendedly...but this blogging experience has convinced me that perhaps a more organized means of presenting ideas would be more helpful for people in understanding them, better, than just this sometime stream-of-consciousness style on this blog...

The second part of the book will be a theoretical discussion of least possible necessary aggression as an alternative to our far too simplistic discussions about force and the use of power, thusfar...permutations...cases and examples...alternative scenarios...implications for all kinds of fields...

I have several books in me, really...I have at least one book on education and its role in cultural develoment, alone...I have a book on truth and reconciliation as a part and, at times, as a substitute for criminal procedure...the empirical record of its success and failings...and a discussion of how criminal, civil and other sanctions undermine more genuine healing for people involved...I have several books on international policy and understanding psychological variables that undergird attitudes in various international arenas which are the basis for international politics...

But the book on the limits to power and the reason why a more constructive and limited mindset about the use of power would accomplish many, many more of our international and domestic policy aims is the big one, right now...and the place where I want to spend my time, right now...

I need more people I can have these conversations with...we all do, is the truth...because many of the places where things are fucked up is where people don't have enough appreciation for the limits of capacity and how to generate important results rather than just demanding them or wishing for them without knowing what goes into creating them...

I have to say that no matter how much I'm doing in my career, though...as a teacher...as a writer...as a professor...as whatever...

I will always feel an emptiness as long as I don't have a family to share it with...

For some crazy reason, all of the insanity of this job makes me want to be a father all the more...finding the right woman to share that with is the trick, right now...someone who can challenge me, would be nice...and someone who cares about others comparable to me...I've not met that woman, I don't think...and certainly not a single one...

It's been a long time since I've had sex...and a lot longer since I've made love...

I watch lovemaking in movies, now, with the same longing as I used to watch porn with (OK...I guess they aren't really the same thing, actually...but you see where I'm going with this)...I miss sharing passion with someone...I miss loving someone that fully and longing for them that desperately...I've only really had it two times in my life...and even then, only really one time in my life where it was more like mature love...

And I have no plans on taking it for granted, this time, in the least...

I do need to find a woman who doesn't want to live her life scared...or with her life centered around money...I'm sure I'll plenty plenty of money in my lifetime...but I have no interest in having a relationship with someone who confuses this priority with the much more important priority of love totally for its own sake and totally independent of anything more base...

I want to make love with someone who I know loves me because...not because of money or prestige or anything else...just for love's sake...

I'm sure there's a woman out there like that, somewhere...

And the truth is that there is no book or research or class or any other work that ever could replace that in a person's life, sadly...if I outlive my spouse, that is a heartbreak I will have to live with until I meet someone new...if I meet someone new...maybe its not such a bad thing to belong to the gender that, on average, poops out, first...though I'd still rather live single than be dead alone...

I better get home before I fall asleep here in front of my computer...I was up late grading and buying fruit for my lesson on least common denominator, last night...

Have a great week, everyone...

Love,
Ben

Old friends...

I got a chance to catch up with an old friend from college this weekend:)...

He was my old roommate and debate coach...we had a falling out in college that was just kind of foolish, really...and it was really good catching up...

He has a daughter now...and a wife...and it was really great seeing him all grown up...

And talking about everything under the sun...including if he might be willing to help me with finally getting my first book/articles written...

I've tentatively decided on a title...The Limits of Power...with an empirical discussion, up front, about the use of power...and a theoretical discussion in the second part about the use of the least possible necessary aggression...

Talking with Carson finally presented the opportunity to have someone I trust -- because he's just so goddamned smart -- critique the ideas...

Seeing Carson's pictures of his little girl -- who he is clearly proud as punch of -- gave me food for thought that really matured me quite a bit yesterday and this morning...

I started thinking about meeting Brandi with her children...it's pretty humbling...that thought...I think...

Makes you wish there were so many things in your life that you could go back and change...even though you know you can't...

We all take each other for granted, so much, when we have each other in our presence...too often not realizing that the relationships we have now may not be relationships that are easily or as a practical matter so available in the future...

I'm hoping to spend more time with Carson...to keep fetting ideas...and just to catch up and meet his family...

Makes you really appreciate the moments you have...an experience like that...when you think about all the moments that are behind you...especially the moments you loved...

I've got to teach here in a moment...

Hope everyone has a great week:):)...

Love,
Ben

Why we should handle kids, and people, above all, with much love...

A girl, today, got suspended for suspicion of something serious...but which her main teacher and I believe, given her reaction, she likely did not do...

This is a girl that has been in a lot of trouble, in the past...and has earned some mistrust...

But her reaction reminded me why, as much as possible, I try to err on the side of trusting kids' word, even if I get burned, sometimes...

I had a boy, this morning, whom I followed to class after I watched him twirling around in the hallway, knowing that I was watching...he ducked away, in the process, and I wasn't able to find him...

And all of this takes me back to a time in my school career...

When I had done something wrong...

And when people had thought much worse of me than was the case...in ways I never would have imagined...

And how bad I felt at the time and later felt for what I'd done...how betrayed I felt that they would hold such grudges...over something I never thought would provoke the reaction that it did...

How much it left me feeling betrayed by people and an institution that I trusted, most...

And what a terrible and difficult lesson it was to learn about a world far too full of suspicion and fear and pain and hardship...

I hadn't realized just how unresolved a lot of that pain was for me until I heard that girl react to her suspension...just how much mistrust in school...and in the world...that one bad decision by teachers had engendered in me...

That reality...far more than poverty...weighs on my conscience when I work with the kids I see everyday...

A world far too harsh and punitive...for far too little real purpose...and definitely with far too little positive results to show for it...

And watching that kid...it reminded me just how important this trust is...teaching...

And just how clumsily we all play with that trust...

And how we are all worthy of forgiveness for that clumsiness...

Not only because there is really nothing else that will get us all through it...

But because we will all need forgiveness...by future generations...who look back with grave disappointment...as they always do...at how awful we treated one another...

Let's hope this student's story does not end up being one of those stories...

Most people grow weary and cynical and jaded about the world...because at one point in their lives...or maybe many points...their generosity was taken advantage of...

And while being taken advantage of certainly can be heartbreaking...especially when our hearts are open at just the time when someone abuses that openheartedness and our trust...

I would in a million years rather have my kids abuse my trust...take advantage of my generosity...and leave me feeling disappointed, while they learn about that trust...and how it works...than I would have them fearful of losing my love and trust and generosity and grace and forgiveness forever were I not to show it to them at all...or hold back...for fear that my love and compassion and forgiveness and openheartedness...

...are weakness...

Rather than the strength that they clearly are...

Have a great weekend, everyone...

Love,
Ben

When to take kids' bellyaching seriously...and when to ignore it...

It's probably the hardest part about teaching and being a parent...

When do you take their frustrations seriously?...meaning when and how do you best appreciate how differently they see the world without the benefit of maturity?...

And when do you ignore the bellyaching of kids who have never been seriously responsible for themselves or anything in their lives, up to this point?

It's been a good week, this week...but a tough week...

Two of my more academically ambitious students...have been behaving poorly all week...

And I finally put both of them in safe seats today (our middle school equivalent of a "time out")...and one of them in recovery (a separate classroom for a more extensive time out)...

Many of the kids clearly hate me, right now...and it's hard to tell with kids at this age whether you've earned it...or whether it's just bellyaching...

Because if you haven't earned it...it can be a pretty ingenious method of manipulation, I'm quite aware...

But if you have...it's just going to get worse until you see your mistake...

And I just don't see it, at this point...

I've been manipulated enough in my life from some pretty ingenious manipulators...more adults than kids, really...and I've manipulated enough in my life...both as an adult and as a kid...to know to not go down this path easily, anymore...

And there's a lot of stress at this time of the year...for everyone...teachers...and kids...that just sort of boils over on itself, too much of the time...

That it's something to think about over the weekend...

In any case...I'm definitely doing my best...and I think...I hope...that I'm doing a pretty good job...

And now I definitely see why many adults fall back on the awareness that their parents were imperfect, too...and they still turned out fine enough...

I wish my parents and teachers had done all sorts of things, better...

But they did the best they could...

And that's all any of us can do...

There are a million things...that adults could do for one another...that would make it easier to raise responsible children...if we'd be willing to be more supportive of our needs as people and as people responsible for children...rather than lost and ungrounded in a million responsibilities distant from the needs of our children and our families...and ourselves...

I've got some kids to inspire this afternoon...we've been reading and talking about Bill Bradley's Values of the Game, together...a really great book for inspiring all kinds of kids to live with more maturity and gravity and appreciation for what really counts in life...

Have a great weekend, everyone...

Love,
Ben

Freedom and learning...

There's a lot of important consequential reasons to prefer freedom and free societies and freer arrangements between people to more closed, repressive, controlling relationships between people...

But the most important one, I'm convinced...

Is the learning...

Whether we like to admit it or not...and we don't...so that's the reason why we need reminding:):):)...

We tend to learn best under freer conditions...

That doesn't mean anything goes...

It just means that freedom offers us the best conditions to explore and learn and transcend our limitations...and to learn which limitations to internalize...rather than living subservient to external controls from others...

Freedom is the only route to self-discipline...rather than repression...

And this week I've been learning why...

Special education is a lot like...the problems in Palestine...

Repressive means of dealing with some pretty hard cases combined with a lot of pity and self-pity for people involved when our efforts to create greater security fail, and noone wants to take responsibility...

Special education has two major categories...

People with clear and significant disabilities that limit their functioning...that can either be corrected (like with hearing aids)...or improving marginally with less expectation of normal functioning (as with many students with severe multiple disabilities, including clear cognitive disabilities like Downs' Syndrome)...

The second category is a lot of kids who could do all kinds of things...who have no real limitations present...often a lot of behavior problems and bad attitudes...and all kinds of excuses...from themselves...from family...from teachers...for why they aren't succeeding in school like their peers...

My strategy...that has been more successful, thusfar, and that I have much confidence will yield exponentially more successful results, in the long run, is to put success or failure squarely in the laps of students...no matter how far behind they are...while remediating and giving extra support on all kinds of skills...

Right now...two of my classes are doing a social scientific study into excellence...

We developed a list of excellent qualities, people, activities where excellence can be demonstrated, etc., that I will type up into a list that they will take to 3 teachers and 3 other adults in their lives to rank what qualities they think are most important to achieve excellence...in school...and in life...

The data we collect, we will examine with our newly acquired skills with percents, decimals, and fractions...

And do math work for the rest of the semester with self-generated data...

Then each student will do an interview with the adult in their lives who they respect the most...

And build a relationship with a significant adult in their lives...around what it takes...to achieve excellence...in school...and in life...

I'll do a lot of work where I don't think they'll realistically do the work...like developing some basic questions for their interview...

But...for the most part...this will be on them...and an individual and group effort...

And the whole point...is to get beyond the tried and failed efforts to remediate kids' skills on a small scale...

And to get all of them to start thinking bigger...for themselves...and around the biggest issues of humanity...

And to learn about the qualities that might get them and all of us there...

The kids in my 1st and 2nd hour classes have been real shits, lately...even my good students...

And we've spent a lot of time talking about the relationship between attitude, practice, hard work, and learning...and how their efforts will likely reflect in their grades...

And I'm learning to just let the kids hang on their grades...

Meaning...letting them earn them...good or bad...and to use their grades as a learning opportunity...to take responsibility for their learning and for their lives...

Teachers, as much as students, have been somewhat resistant to this idea...

Because everyone's gotten so used to expecting so little from these kids...

But I think we're all moving in the same direction...

And the kids are definitely learning more...I'm confident of that...

And as I tell each of them...as often as possible...

They are all capable of doing whatever they want to do with their lives...for Black History Month, we studied David Harold Blackwell, the most reknowned black mathematician...as just one example of the horizons they can scale, if they set their minds to it...

I just won't settle for pity as some kind of substitute for education for these kids...

No matter how much they bitch and complain along the way:):):)...

And for some odd reason...the whole experience...no matter how rotten it can be, sometimes...like being in love...makes me look forward to more of it...to being a father...and to working with kids for the rest of my life...

Schools...and adults...as with every generation...will need to learn how to better handle and deal with kids and other adults than they do now...

We treat each other...and kids...still far too harshly, generally...and have still far to unrealistic expectations for them...in ways that dampen many of their hopes and dreams, unnecessarily...

All so we do not have to face our own failures...as parents...and teachers...and adults who care about children...

And as people...

But I do look forward to guiding us in a better direction...in whatever capacities I end up doing that...

The sentencing of Tom Delay, this week...Mr. Delay's failure to take responsibility for his role in shady campaign finance fundraising...and all of our failure to recognize that such efforts perpetually fail (Jim Wright's prosecution seems to have had little effect, almost 20 years later, when Democrats controlled Congress)...

All demonstate to me the total insanity that so much of the country lives with, right now...how totally out of touch with reality so many people are...

There is almost no indication that anyone has learned any lessons from Mr. Delay's prosecution...except Democrats around how to get rid of a House leader who's been kind of dick, to be honest, for the last decade...

Republicans have defended Mr. Delay...and I've heard almost literally zero acknowledgement by anyone that anything needs to change in campaign fundraising...

And Democrats will no doubt go on to do many of the very things that they so aggressively pursued Mr. Delay for...using the issue, cynically, to score electorally, in the meantime...

And so many people...will go on...ignoring the clear and present reality...

That forcing our way through issues that don't require force does not work, long term...and many if not most issues are better handled through democratic discussion, inquiry, thought, debate, and otherwise engagement...

Listening to those same Republicans talk about ways to kick out 12 million illegal aliens in the United States (have any of them even considered the magnitude of sending away 12 million illegal immigrants?) just makes all the more clear to me just how far people will go...to avoid reality...as they develop ideas, generally poor ones, for how to improve it...

Freedom...and the responsibility that it better allows to develop...is the best way for a mature society to deal with most of its most serious issues...

And when aggression and force must be used...because no other alternatives exist...the least possible neccessary aggression and force is the most likely to accomplish our aims...

I have very little doubt about that, any more...I've just seen it work too many times...

And more importantly...I've just seen the alternatives fail to many times...a fact that I have no need nor interest in ignoring...

I've got a meeting to get to...

Have a great day, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

One of those days...

Today has been one of those days that I remember why I love teaching...

I spent a lot of time this weekend forgiving the strong-arming that I experienced from my administrators, recently, on something I was in good faith on...and forgiving the strong-arming that I experience, generally, in a whole host of situations...recognizing, especially after our tutoring situation at school, that many people do this in good faith, even if they also act far too cynically much of the time...

And forgiving it even when it is in bad faith since I have no interest in being miserable my whole life being angry about things that I can't control...

And doing something about the things I can...

So today I came into work...after very little sleep (Melissa and I got into this really stupid, really foolish fight, last night, and we were up half the night with it)...with this really wonderful sense of peace...and so much love and appreciation for my kids and my colleagues...

And today went amazing...

After the last half of last week having the kids acting worse than ever...

Today...the first day back from the weekend...the kids were really amazing in every class I taught or worked in, today...it was really quite the sight to behold, really...being quiet...working hard...taking school seriously...it was really an amazing day...

And then, I volunteered for the After School Program, today...and I got to spend some quality time with two of my more difficult kids...doing work with them...and asking them about their futures...and what they want to do with them...and giving them so many opportunities that they could access with their respective strengths of math and social studies...

And I found myself wanting to spend more time...with even my most difficult students...and thinking about being a father...and how much this job really has prepared me to be a pretty outstanding father, I hope...

Which was my most important goal when I turned 18 and left my family's home for college...

I think I'm over my bout of recent cynicism...two weekends of resentment and anger about the whole ordeal has helped me move past it and to embrace myself and the world for all of my and its faults...even the most ugly and vindictive and inhumane...there just is no perfection in the world, I've learning to accept better and better...

There is only better and better...

Last night's fight with Melissa did get to me reflect on how good a friend Melissa has been...how she's stuck by me through a lot of thick as well as thin...how she's listened to so much that I needed to share with someone -- live, not just written -- and experienced my ugliest moments as well as my better moments...and how I've done the same...how much I love her...and how I much I want the best for her, even if that doesn't mean a love connection for the two of us...

I heard a really interesting analysis of why so many many people defend the rule of law, today, that I thought was its most persuasive argument...

It's the argument that Thomas Jefferson made so many years ago...how we are a nation of laws rather than men...because the rule of law ensures that a world where the strong cannot oppress and exploit the weak...where might does not make right...

Unfortunately...despite that very decent sentiment...the reality of law is that it too is used by the strong to oppress and exploit the weak...codified child marriage in Iranian law comes to mind, here...as does the laws that allowed the Nazis to slowly decimate Jews in Germany and Eastern Europe...and the numerous laws that have oppressed and repressed and imposed the will of some group or some majority on individuals and minorities throughout the history of humanity and still today...

The guy who was making the argument...in a report on a smaller country taking on the U.S. around internet gambling...

Was right...that might should not make right...

But he was wrong...that laws make right...

They do not...unfortunately...and very often, they make wrong...

Too many laws and too often...are yet another way for might to swagger as right...

When the only thing that makes right...

...is right...

Period...

Law...or not...

Today was a day I wanted to share with Brandi...all of our dreams being realized in just one school day...and the hope and potential for more...and the world very much working in the right direction...even despite itself, much of the time...

Today was a day that made me proud to be a teacher...and reminded me how important this work is...even as my policy work waits in the wings...
even as there is other and perhaps more important work in the world...

Then again...perhaps there is no more important work in the world...

Perhaps we just need more people taking it more seriously...

That's my dream, at least...a world where more people take education...schools...thought...important action...more seriously...

And where more people feel more apart of those worlds...and where the world feels more comfortable with those who have not felt as comfortable with school and the world of serious endeavor, in the past...

A world where everyone is included...

Because...because it's good for all of us...to care about one another...no matter who we are...

That is the commitment of my life...

And I'm pretty damned clear that there's no work more important than that...

Have a great week, everyone:):)...

Florida and UCLA in the NCAA Finals...

We saw Crash again, last night, which I liked better this time, even if I'm clear as a bell that it was not in the least the Best Picture of 2005...so many better movies...and a movie that cynically exploits the issues of race and poverty and crime, in so many ways, with so much cynicism directed, irresponsibly, at the LAPD, in particular...not a bad movie...but definitely not the Best Picture...

Benny and Joon, on the other hand, is a really beautiful picture from the 90's that I hadn't seen until last night...whatever happened to Aiden Quinn?...and Mary Stuart Masterson?...beautiful movie...not the deepest story of humanity, necessarily...but a beautiful movie, nevertheless...

I hope whatever you spend your time doing this week enlightens and fulfills you as much as my day has enlightened and fulfilled me:):):)...

Have a great week, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

Cynicism...

I've been dealing with a nasty bout of cynicism today and I thought I'd blog about it...I have these three really great articles by Francis Fukuyama, Brent Scowcroft, and Amartya Sen that I have half-completed posts on...but I'm not feeing inspired at this moment to comment on brilliant thought...

I want to take a moment to reflect on recent bout of cynicism for the moment...

The most serious period of cynicism I ever went through was in grad school...there was a period when I was keeping up far too much with TV journalists and commentators and other half-ass policy thinkers who are full of cynicism and have plenty to share with the rest of the world...

It was bad...for both Brandi and I...

Cynicism is like a disease, I've decided...when you get lost in it...you bring down everyone else around you, as well...and it solves nothing...it accomplishes nothing...and then it congratulates itself that it predicted that nothing could be done, anyway...it's a pretty courageous stand, let me tell ya...

Anyway...

The world is not changing as quickly as I would like it...even though the most recent demonstrations around illegal immigration and the fundamental principle involved -- where the law or people should be taken more seriously -- is one that very much signals a recognition of some underlying principles around the law and reality for people...which is that people only follow laws and rules, generally, and specific laws and rules (thankfully) that they understand and agree with (I very much doubt any of us would want Germans complying with laws to turn in Jews during the Holocaust or laws mandating death to Muslims who convert to Christianity in Afghanistan...most people just don't really think about these things very much, is the truth)...and that they otherwise resist, fight, and ignore laws or rules that they don't understand or agree with...and no amount of enforcement will make that go away...and nor should we expect anything different...

Maybe it's watching the hysteria about Barry Bonds every day in the newspapers...watching journalists who couldn't get 400 hits in a season if they wanted to commenting on Barry Bond's ability and his steroids use as if they really could if they could just get the steroids that Barry had (we bullshit ourselves so much, I swear to God)...the truth is Barry Bonds is one of the greatest hitters in baseball history and little league also-rans are biting at his heels because they demand a pure game that we could certainly have better if we would approach the issue reasonably and less cynically, but which we will never, ever, ever get by trying to boot one of the games greatest hitters from the game and from the Hall of Fame...

But what I know is responsible for my funk, today, is that we keep taking the cynicism so seriously when it doesn't deserve to be taken seriously...including my own...

Cynicism is not realism...cynicism is a romantic image of a perfect and pure world that is confronted with a less pure and perfect reality and lingers endlessly in perpetual disappointment about the world, as a consequence...

Cynicism is responsible for nothing...when asked why ideas are not working to solve problems, cynicism only has to respond "Nothing ever was going to work"...

And cynicism parades around like an answer for something when coming up with ideas and making them reality takes so much more time and energy...that don't always create solutions as quickly as we'd like...

And that's what I'm feeling, right now...

The world is definitely getting better...Melissa and I watched The Squid and the Whale, last night, which I highly recommend and reminded me of just how much better we, people, have gotten, generally, at recognizing and dealing with reality rather than leaving up emotional defenses to avoid it...

And politics is yet one more place in life where we are learning to do that, more...the current effort to basically legalize illegal immigration is one example of that kind of progress when people look at reality, first, rather than just at their expectations...

I'm frustrated, today, because I'm upset that the world is taking so long to catch up...because I don't like being threatened...by bosses...by friends...by anyone...to accomplish goals that, if worthy, I would help much more readily with if I was persuaded of their worthiness and which I am thoroughly uninspired by when I am forced to do them...and which, if unworthy...are not worthy of anyone's compliance, nevertheless active collaboration that is better promoted by discussion and persuasion than by force...

I'm upset...because as I watch the media go after Barry Bonds...and as I listen to pothead friends hypocritically advocate going after Bonds...sometimes after a recent hit off the pipe...

I think..."Are we just going to forever pretend that our cynicism has no consequence?...that having no solution or having a solution that clearly will not work...or having a solution that will only make things worse...that this kind of bullshit really isn't the problem that it is?"...

Are people just going to keep pretending that the drug war has worked when it clearly hasn't if you have any familiarity with the drug culture, at all?...

Are we just going to keep pretending that we'll somehow vindicate those efforts as we fruitlessly go after steroids use in baseball?...

Are we just going to keep pretending that if we just create the right rules, develop the right policy, mete out the right punishment, that we will somehow make problems go away that require -- require -- active collaboration and cooperation from the people involved, whether we fuckin' like it or not?...

Are we just going to keep pretending that this works when it so clearly doesn't to anyone looking without ideological blinders on?...

I'm trying to get some inspiration, today...but I have paperwork to do that I just have no interest at all in doing because I've been strong-armed on it...

I'm scared that I'm becoming an adult in all the ways that I've always hated about so many older people...

That I'm getting kind of resigned to a world where we are just too foolish and resigned to be honest about our failures...

Investigating steroids will not make them go away in baseball any more than investigating drugs makes them go away in a "drug-free" workplace or in the culture, at large ("drug-free" workplaces, in my experience, have everything with promoting the images of companies that do not want to face the much more disappointing realities that people find plenty of ways around drug testing)...

And putting pressure on Iran to abandon their nuclear ambitions has clearly led them to pursue them more, as they sense a threat to their sovereignty and strategic self-interest (will America step in an protect us if Iraq attacks us again, Iranians must be asking themselves...and of course the answer to that question is no...even as I think it is a very good idea to persuade Iran to not develop a nuclear program and just up the ante of antagonisms in the region that need diplomatic and political resolutions rather than military conflict that will resolve nothing...Brent Scowcroft has a very good article on this problem in the most recent edition of the National Interest that I very much appreciated, even as I disagree with Brent that "the right" rules-regime will finally accomplish the goal of dissuading Iran from adopting a nuclear program)...

But...the saving grace...

Is that we can only avoid reality on this for so long...avoiding it perpetually would have us in a state similar to Palestine or North Korea or Cuba or Syria which we are far too free and thoughtful to allow to happen...

Democracies, thankfully, foster enough openness and freedom that we can eventually overcome denial about festering problems in a way that closed societies do not...

The big saving grace for humanity, right now...

Is that despite all its stupidity...and laziness...and cowardliness...and decadence...and excuse-making...and its failure to take responsibility for problems...

All of these experiences, generally, become learning experiences for us...

As we learn from our failures...our weaknesses...or shortcomings...our faults...

As much as from our successes and our strengths...

This shortcoming...our failure to forgive...our failure to give up our romantic disappointment with a world that doesn't live up to our expectations, always...

And my failure, in particular...to accept that the road to a better life...is paved with our failures as much as with our successes...mine and everyone's...

Is the most important and glaring of our failures, right now...

But we can't avoid it, forever...

Because it doesn't serve us...we don't function well, this way...it is, as Abraham Maslow might say, a neurotic and insecure stage in our individual and general development...

We can't function without forgiving it...each other...and ourselves...

I know I can't...and I'm crystal clear about that, at this point...

I need some time to walk and think...

I hope everyone has a good weekend...Florida and UCLA in the NCAA finals...should be an interesting game:):)....

Have a great day, everyone:):)...

Love,
Ben

I think I understand, better, now...

...why people romanticize their upbringings...

After after about 5 months as a teacher...and loving the shit out of a bunch of kids are, generally, quite the obnoxious and ungrateful bunch, I must say:):):)LOL:):):)...

I have to say that I understand better, now, why so many people romanticize their upbringings...meaning...why they are so enamoured of their parents' efforts to raise them, for better or for worse...

Because...for most decent adults...once you get clear about what a shithead you were to your parents when you were growing up...and especially if you raise or work with kids, yourself...

You begin to develop a lot of appreciation for how hard and unappreciated that work is...how awful you were, if you're honest (for most kids...and probably all kids, really) with your parents...and what saints they seemed to be to put up with your obnoxious ass...

I know I have a lot more appreciation for the adults who raised me, now...my dad...my mom, for awhile...all my aunts and uncles and both sets of grandparents (though definitely more my Grandma and Grandpa Sutherland who basically helped raise us with my dad)...

And definitely my teachers:):):)...

Parents...teachers...grandparents...aunts...uncles...and other adults in our lives...are definitely not saints...or perfect...since such people don't exist...

But they do their damndest, generally, to raise us the best they know how...

And I have much more appreciation for people who do this difficult work of raising children, now, than I had before I became a teacher...

There is always room for improvement...and I'm quite convinced from the results here at Eisenhower that I've found ways to improve our efforts...

And there's plenty more room to improve from there...

Today was one of those days when I became clear just how much room there is for improvement...the kids behaved terribly today in 3 hours...2 of them in my room...we're going to have a talk tomorrow about what's going on...one teacher suggested that maybe it's easier to act bored and behave badly than to admit that you don't get it...and maybe having an honest conversation about that (because all the kids are probably overwhelmed at some level...though they could just be being shits, right now, too) might open things up, a bit...that's the hope, at least...

In the meantime...it is without a doubt in mind, anymore, clear to me that it is the controlling and punitive and overly-demanding nature of schools which most limit their potential...I have no doubts about that, any more...freeing schools up will not fix all their problems, overnight...but it will give them and the people who run them and the people who support and fund them much more freedom and flexibility to screw up, learn from mistakes, and...most importantly...take responsibility for what does and doesn't work...to leave behind mistakes...and to improve on what works better...it will bring the money, the important decisions, and the serious thinking necessary to promote school and student success closer to home and make decisions more relevant to day-to-day operations and leave the important choices and their consequences in the hands of those who are closer to the real action in schools...

I have no doubt, anymore, than distant solutions from Washington D.C., state school boards and regulators, and school district offices and local school boards will not solve the problems of any school, nevertheless public schools...no matter how much we fight that reality...

These people are just all too distant from what really goes on in schools to make the best decisions...

And we will need better dialogue and serious thought in schools as well as within school districts to not only make that happen, eventually...but to give existing schools -- public and private -- the opportunity to work through difficult issues in way that accounts for the various perspectives of those involved...

Last night it became crystal clear to me that there is no other way around this one...and we will eventually have to stumble upon it...because nothing else will work...

Assuming we really care if our efforts are effective are not...the jury's still out on that one and so many people...most people...get more invested in the preferred ideological blinders...rather than around taking responsibility for problems and solving them constructively...

We'll get there...we always eventually do...

We'll just fuck up a lot in the meantime:):):)...

Just like our kids:):):)...

Kind of appropriate, really, when you think about it:):):)...

Have a great week, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

This entry is for me...

This entry is for me...

I know that it makes Brandi uncomfortable for me to blog about her, but I blog about the most important thoughts I have, in the moment, and this is the one, at this moment...so for those who don't want to read about me writing about my ex-girlfriend, this is your time to avert your delicate eyes:):):)...

There is one most important thing that I miss about Brandi that is far too rare in most people...

I am so impressed with the progress we've made here at Eisenhower with people dreaming bigger and taking on stronger commitments -- just as people, more than as teachers -- than they might otherwise do...

But the one most frustrating thing that I deal with in my life day-in and day-out...is the lack of responsibility that most people feel...for things bigger than themselves...for people other than themselves...for ideals that might otherwise improve their lives, if they would just break out of the rut their lives have been in the last 50 years:):):) (I'm exaggerating, of course:):)...but you get the point:):)...

The most important thing I miss about Brandi...aside from her really pretty adorable personality...and her independent thinking and that she almost always had something substantive to say on just about any topic...

Was her sense of responsibility...for the world beyond her...and just generally...

I get so tired of listening to so many people...almost everywhere I've worked outside of school...

Spend so much useless energy...trying to get out of responsibilities that might otherwise serve them if they would take them on...

And I'm thinking about how much I took for granted with Brandi...that she was someone who was always saying, "I can...how do we get it done"...

Brandi was not someone who was looking for ways to get out of important responsibilities...she was not someone who was always bitching about stuff, generally, unless it was a legitimate bitch (although I suspect that she held stuff back from me...just watching her choices after we broke up)...the bureaucracy at KU, for instance, which was a headache and a half to deal with, was a constant source of frustration for Brandi...

And my skepticism of the ability for schools to change through dialogue was for good reason (I felt and feel that people who know the best what they're doing -- namely scholars -- need to be intimately involved with those discussions)...but it also left Brandi feeling unsupported and her efforts denigrated around work that it turns out is critically important to school reform and will not be able to happen without the efforts of people like Brandi...and me, now...in private or public schools or in almost any major or minor organization, really...

That work, fundamentally, is about people...and you just need people who understand people, better, to create the space for them to have difficult discussions that give them a voice and invite them to take thoughtful responsibility for the process and the results...

I think I understand that work better, now, than Brandi does...

But one thing that I really miss about Brandi is that...

Brandi was always the type of person to say, "How can I help?"...she was not someone always trying to balk at responsibility...which is what too many...most...people do...

And I miss having a friend who I could count on to take responsibility...and to have something substantive to say when it came to discussions about how to improve things...

And who I could have those conversations with...because I was talking to someone who, generally...cared...

Most people aren't like that...it's a damn shame...

And it makes you really appreciate people who are like that...

And Brandi is one of the better ones I've met in my life...

After meetings like the ones that I had today and have every day...

I just once want to be able to go to a bar with someone who when I say, "Most people waste so much time trying to weasel their way out of responsibility"...who when I say that, they would understand...

Maybe Brandi wouldn't understand that bitch, these days...I don't have any communication with her, at all, to know...

But I would like to find someone...a guy friend...a girlfriend...someone...to just sit and have that complaint and have them be someone who really understands what I mean...

And it would be even better if I could say...

"The pathetic thing is that it is politicians who are some of the worst at taking responsibility...and these people make all kinds of important decisions for all of the rest of us"...

...and I had someone around who knows what I mean...

Usually I just listen to silence when I say something like that, these days...

Because most people are kind of clueless is the truth...

But it would be nice to have someone around who understood...just once...

Because it isn't most teachers, that's for sure...

And it isn't most people in corporate America...or in non-profits...or anywhere, really...

Most people are kind of whiny...and are constantly trying to weasel their way out of responsibilities...particularly ones imposed upon them...I definitely complain about responsibilities imposed upon me that I'm in good faith on...and which imposition disrespects both my good faith and my sense of judgment and priorities which is stronger than most peoples' by far, I think...

But it sure would be nice to be able to go to a bar and share that thought with someone who really knows what I'm talking about...

I don't have anyone in my life like that, right now...

And it was nice for the brief time I had it...

Maybe I'm bullshitting myself...maybe Brandi was more quiet than I remember...and was just not as invested as I am...

But that's not the Brandi I remember...

I want to go take that beer break with someone...

But the truth is...there's noone to take it with...

Who really gives enough of a shit for me to really let my hair down...

Maybe I'll take it anyway...and finish up these IEP's back in Lawrence...

Have a great week, everyone...

Love,
Ben

Why I should have gotten my proverbial ass kicked in grad school...

(...even though it wouldn't have done a bit of good:):):)...)

We just got an email from a counselor about a kid we've been dealing with...

This kid isn't doing anything in class...and the parents are angry with the teachers because he's making bad grades, right now...

And the parents have been threatening some kind of punitive action from the district if we don't fix it...

When the only thing to fix...is that this kid needs to start doing his work...

And the whole thing...how much the teachers care, despite all their faults...how little the kid and the family have done and how much they've demanded...

And most of all...how hard it is for the parents to just face up to the fact that this kid is failing...and not even trying...just burns my ass...

And the whole thing has led to a new rethinking on my part of my experience in grad school...

I was a really brilliant student in grad school...I think most people would agree...

But I was also a young man...who made an awful lot of mistakes...in relationships with professors...as a person...and as a student...

I was not this kid...I tried with all my heart and soul, really...quite different than this kid, really...the truth was and is that my sights were far higher than any of my fellow grad students and many if not all of my professors...

But I was also a little shit, too...I was definitely no angel...and I fucked up a lot...

And when we're shitheads...we...like this kid...need people to be honest with us...and we need to be honest with ourselves...

Now...like this kid's family...an awful lot of people spend a lot of time avoiding being honest with ourselves...and letting others be honest with us...

And...a lot of times...we just don't know why or what we've fucked up...

But the one more important fuck up than any other in those situations...

Is bullying our way through issues, like this family is doing...so we can avoid our own shortcomings...

Which is what is so popular and yet so fruitless these days...

And the biggest shortcoming of all being avoiding a more honest conversation...

What is wrong with us, I wonder all the time...that we so desperately avoid being honest with ourselves and with each other?...what is it that we think that it serves?...

I'm guilty of it, too...I have the easier conversations, first, generally...and the harder conversations after the easier conversations have been expended...

But I don't avoid the hard conversations in the way that most people do...at least not generally, I don't think...I generally encourage them...even the hardest conversations...as much as I feel safe to...

There's many tough conversations that I've tried to have with people that I've not been able to have...

But one thing that I realized out of this situation at school...and just being responsible for kids, generally...

Is that though I wish that I, first and foremost, and my grad school professors, secondarily, had handled my situation in grad school better...

They had plenty of reason to be pissed at what a shithead I was being, at the time...something I wasn't able to say at the time...because it's easier to be honest with myself about it as I watch kids do it all the time...

My advisor was kind of a shithead, too...in a very different way...and I definitely was beyond tired of having him ride me all the time...

But I understand, better, now, the real limitations that he and I and all of us were facing...and that I and these teachers face today...

And I just don't have any bad feelings about the situation, anymore...

And the big lesson I'm learning about life...

The much bigger lesson to be learned for life...

Is that no matter how much the bad shit in life sucks...which it often does...

And no matter how much the struggle in life...

Really what matters...more than anything else...in the big picture...in life...and in my life, as much as for people, generally...

Is the learning...

Really...

Because all the other stuff people want in life...the money...the power...the sex...the drugs...the fancy vacations...the big houses...the fame...the popularity...

Whatever...

All the other stuff is just foolish if it comes at the expense of the learning...

I would, in a million years, rather have the toughest life...with groundedness and wisdom and the learning that make these possible...

Than an easier life...where I have all of those rewards -- the money, the power, the sex, the drugs, the fancy vacations, the big houses, the fame, the popularity -- with too little purpose...

Fairly or unfairly, this was my impression of Brandi's mother-in-law when I first met her...

And I just could hardly live with myself if I lived like that...

And I certainly would feel like quite the shithead when I met a woman better than me if I were to choose this path...

And know in my heart that having the self-respect that comes with being honest with yourself...and being with a woman that I really respect...

Is far more important than any reward I could ever get in life...

I don't understand, really, why people would live different than that...

Except...that like these parents...they are desperately avoiding an honest evaluation of themselves and others about who they are...

And what a sad life to live, really...

And what I know for sure, now, about the world...

Is that the only way it works through its problems...

Is if and when it decides to get honest with itself...no matter what the mitigating circumstances...

And it's the only way that we will grow...as individuals...and as a culture...

That we start getting more honest...with ourselves...and with each other...

And everything else is just bullshit...and will remain so...until we face the things we don't like to face...

Many if not most of the ways that we bullshit ourselves and one another have to do with how punishments and punitive means of dealing with problems just complicate them and lead to suppression of more honest assessments of life...

But in the biggest picture...as individuals...and as a culture...and for the lot of humanity...

Being honest with ourselves and others is the only and most important thing that really matters in life...

And those who don't believe this...are those who have just gotten too lost in their own excuses and their own less than honest and often blatantly dishonest self-concepts...and consequent relationship with and outlook on the world...

I've got IEP paperwork to finish up...

Have a good night, everyone...

Love,
Ben

Dreaming...

Do you know what one of the most taken for granted freedoms in America and the democratic world is?...

Dreaming...

Our capacity for the American dream...and for dreaming, generally...

The ability to imagine something better...for yourself...for the world...whatever...

And the freedom to realize that dream...and to make it happen...

I have many dreams...

A freer world...where free peoples taken freedom seriously...and support one another to choose better lives, freely...and, as much as possible, without coercion...

A world where people become better people...and treat each other better...because it's the right thing to do...and who have the freedom to treat each other however, within some limits, without persistent power battles...as they promote stronger consciences...for themselves...and for others...

There's a million elements to my vision of a better world...

But there's one dream, in particular, that I have...that I'd most like to see realized during my lifetime...

I'd like to meet a girl...who shares similar ideals...who shares an open appreciation of similar universal values...a girl who's honest...and sweet...and compassionate...and generous...and courageous...and mature...

Someone with a sense of perspective...and a great sense of humor...someone with a healthy libido...and whom I'm attracted to, primarily, because she's just so damned impressive as a human being...

Someone who I admire...and look up to...and who inspires me...and makes me want to be a better person...

At each point in my life I've had this with the person I've been with...though as I grow, my standards for what impresses me are raised as well...

I'd like to meet someone who can keep up intellectually...that's my secret dream that I feel almost embarrassed to admit because it's so rare to meet people of that kind of intelligence...

I guess I'm just feeling kind of uninspired, right now...because I can dream about that kind of person all I want...

But I have very little control, at all, over whether or not she shows up in my life...I meet many girls who seem interested...but I've yet to meet anyone, including the teacher at my school I was interested in but for whom my interest is waning the more I get to know her, who really fits the bill...who really seems like my soul-mate...

And maybe that will have the effect of making the heart grow fonder when I finally meet that girl...

In the meantime, though...

My life is fine...but it still feels uninspired...

Melissa and I have talked about cleaning up the apartment to invite some people over and then I'd have some people to feel inspired to cook for...

And I think I understand, now, why so many women feel so attached to their families...

Because once their husbands die...or if one or the other of them end their marriage...

Finding another soulmate is a really drawn-out process...at least it's been so for me...

I suppose I would likely find a close friend who would essentially be my significant other if my spouse were to die before I do...

But finding a soul-mate...finding someone that you really share that kind of deep and knowing love with...

Turns out to be a really rare thing, I'm learning, much to my misfortune...

That saddens me, immensely, I have to say...and it's nooone's fault, of course...it's just life...

But it's one of life's greater natural tragedies, I think...

Almost invariably the better moments in my life have been when I was in love...and I've been feeling more ready for it, in the last few weeks and, especially, in the last few days, than I have in quite a long time...

I guess I'm getting over Brandi, more authentically...and I've matured quite a bit, personally...

And I'm more consistently passing up opportunities to have casual sex...

Which allows me to freely choose...to relive a part of my young adulthood that I really loved and that I really love to relive...

Which is when I was a young high school and college student...

And I just wait to date people...and I would always look for love...

I didn't have any casual affairs, per se, when I was a kid...I lost my virginity to a friend rather than to a girlfriend...but it was a very loving, tender experience that I really value in retrospect far more than the casual encounters I've had since then...

And before Brandi...all of my most intimate encounters were loving...rather than merely sexual...

And I've missed that feeling...that I haven't had, completely, since Brandi and I were together...

I guess because of a broken heart...perhaps within and after Brandi's and my relationship...

But I miss being in love something fierce deep down in my soul...

I want to be passionate about someone again...I want to be passionate about life again...I want someone to support me in that passion...to nurture it...and to tell me every day and every night that it's worth it...that someone else thinks that it matters...that someone else cares like I do...or preferably more...

I miss that kind of love...truly, madly, deeply...

I haven't seen anything like it in several years...

But I also have faith...now based on experience...that generally things get better over the long haul...even as we might face setbacks in the short run...

It would be nice to talk with someone who really understood the world and people, better...who had wisdom to share with me...who understood my concerns...or who didn't and disagreed and made powerful arguments against my ideas in ways that I found persuasive (something that would be quite a feat, I must admit, since I've found nothing even close, up to this point, even among the most brilliant thinkers:):):)...

Someone who values freedom the way I do...and who values people that way, too...

Someone who I would watch with people and think, "How the hell can they all take so for granted what an incredible person they have amongst their midst?"...

That's the girl I want to marry...and to spend my life with...

But right now, she's just a dream...

I've not met that girl...Brandi was as close as I've come...as much, in great part, because we nurtured each other's dreams as because of anything that was Brandi alone...

I imagine it's just harder, at this point in my life, to find someone like that...because my standards have just been upped so much...

It's been a long time since I've felt free to dream like I've been dreaming lately...

I feel like C.S. Lewis...tapping into a tender, beautiful, imaginative part of himself to share with children and adults, alike, to help then transcend their own smaller, pettier priorities...to help them to aspire for something more beautiful and substantial...and dreaming of a relationship that might be worthy of his love...

I'm listening to this far too ugly and mindless debate about illegal immigration in the United States, right now...

And I just want to believe that we have something better to offer our children...than this ugliness and foolishness...

And now I understand why people would freely abandon their opportunity to pillage and plunder in the world for their own benefit...to paint a picture of a better world...

Because this world is just so uninspired...and uninspiring...

And inspiration is something that is too rare...and too deeply needed to abandon...

How could I possibly look at the world as it is and say to myself...

"This the world that I want for my children"...

"I want a world where we fight over the pettiest priorities...where noone takes responsibility, really...where everyone looks for someone to blame or pressure or sue or strongarm or threaten or otherwise demand that they get their way, whether it serves them or anyone else or not, for real...where hurting one another is done too lightly...and being thoughtful about how we use power is far too rare"...

"I want a world where people forever take freedom for granted...no matter how much it offers them opportunities not possible without it...where people, generally, never really appreciate, fully, the beauty of really powerful drama...or really insightful thought...or deep meaning in even their every day lives, so absorbed are they in the smallness of the world as it is...and so much do they perpetuate that smallness with their whining and bitching and moaning and demanding lives that they feel no responsibility to create"...

"I am satisfied with a world where people don't really ever fully appreciate a moving story or film or book or poem or artwork or play or other creative production...or a powerful connection with other human beings...or completely experience the moment of a beautiful sunset, or a rainy drive through the Pacific Northwest, or looking up into a California Redwood, or a mountain landscape against an ocean background, or snowshoeing through Estes Park, or any such similar natural wonders"...

"Because they're all just so complacent in their smallness...and in the smallness of the world"...

But I just couldn't possibly be satisfied with that world...with this world...in that way...

And I want someone, again, with whom I can dream of a better world...

It's been a long time since I've done that with someone...

And I've really only done it once in my life...

But I'm ready again...to do that with someone who's ready...when that will be I don't think I'll ever know...until I meet her, I suppose:):)...

I'd better get home, here, soon:):)...

I hope everyone is having a great beginning of the week...

Though my Shocks lost on Friday...I did realize, today, that what I think my colleagues -- especially my older colleagues -- so appreciate about me, right now...is my undaunted positive attitude...in the face of so many reasons...so many excuses...to be uninspired...

Somehow I still find inspiration...

What I want is someone to offer that kind of inspiration to me, as well...

Have a good week, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

Who I am...

I was realizing, today...after dealing with several different teachers, this week...

That I no longer, at all, identify myself politically, primarily...

I identify as a person who strives for excellence...and virtue...and thoughtfulness...

I grew up thinking of myself as a liberal...as someone who was compassionate and forgiving and smart and decent...

But I've learned in my short life that being compassionate and forgiving and smart and decent isn't at all a liberal quality exclusively...and that many liberals lack these important qualities, as a function of their own individual strengths and weaknesses...

I do use force less often than most teachers and think it should be used less often than most people in most situations...

But there are times when I use considerably more force than many teachers...and probably would than other people in many situations, depending on the situation...

The key terms in my ideas...least possible necessary aggression...

Are "possible" and "necessary"...

The big problem with the use of force, generally...is that people use far more force than is necessary...or is productive...or constructive...or useful...or fair...or decent...or compassionate with others...

But there are times when there really is no other more reasonable way to handle a situation than to use the least possible necessary force, and many times more force is needed to handle a situation than I would prefer...but it is needed...

And I've been learning...that contrary to my prejudices on the matter...conservative does not at all mean less compassionate, necessarily...and that liberal does not at all mean more compassionate...

Two of the best teachers I work with, right now, are conservatives...one is a liberal, I think...or a moderate...and the worst teacher I work with, right now, appears to be a liberal...

That is not always true...

The other best teacher in the building, period, right now, I think, is a liberal...and I'm someone who has identified as a liberal and a Democrat most of my life...though, to be fair...and the point of this post...is that I am much more an independent, these days...

I have many, many conservative views that I share and many, many liberal views that I disagree with, even as I often agree with the intentions of many policies advocated by those I disagree with on a policy level...

I oppose gun control, but I don't own a gun and I am very much in favor of responsible gun ownership...and my desire to see more responsible gun ownership has everything to do with why I favor gun rights, which I think are critical to more responsible gun ownership...

I oppose the drug war, even as I am not a drug user...I barely drink, anymore, except for very moderately and only smoke in the most stressful and/or painful situations...but I want drug use to happen responsibly...and I am quite convinced that the most responsible drug use and experimentation would happen with more freedom for people to do and experiment with drugs rather than with less...

I oppose campaign finance regulation, even as I seriously favor its intentions and very much believe that money must become unentangled from a more honest and credible democratic process...

I oppose most regulations of the economy even as share most of the intentions involved, including and especially around matters of the environment and wealth inequality...

I am committed to reforms around wealth equity including education reform and commitments to international aid and development...but believe that they would best occur with more decentralization, self-determination, autonomy, freedom, and commitment by the individual citizens of each country, freely, rather than with compulsion and coercion...

And yet I favor freedom for law enforcement and soldiers to handle matters of security with their best judgment about the use and need for force without serious legal interference except in the most extreme cases...

In short...I favor freedom...and its capacity to offer people better opportunities to have open and honest and serious debates and discussions and to develop serious and not-so-serious thought and conscience...

And the kind of freedom that most people in more free and democratic societies take for granted every day...and the opportunity it offers to develop all of the benefits of this and every free society that so many of their citizens forget are so freely available to them in ways that they are not to others in less free and democratic cultures...

It's ironic that free societies whose many values and benefits are made available by such freedom so take it for granted, right now...

And it is the most important reason, I think, for why I don't take it for granted, in the same political moment...

Because it is just so sad and scary how much most people do...

I am not a conservative...or a liberal...

I am a freedom-loving citizen of America and the world...

Who has accomplished the rare achievement...

Of developing original ideas...around the use of the use of least possible necessary force and aggression, with an eye toward assertive and thoughtful leadership, with implications for policy, psychology, economics, education, criminology, and a whole host of fields...

And though full of frustrations and heartbreak and shock at the lack of thought and courage in the world...I am, on balance, very much enjoying the opportunity to play those out in real life...in real schools...with real people...and complicated and challenging social situations...and to learn a whole hell of a lot, in the process...an education all on its own...

And what I'm most surprised by, now almost 3 and a half years into my life as an adult and not in school...

Is how much most people believe in classical virtues, in the abstract...and how little most people practice them, in reality...

How they practice them, more, in free societies...and given more freedom within those free societies...and when they are offered that freedom in less free societies...

And how they practice them less...honesty being the most important of them...in less free societies...and in less free situations within both more and less free societies...

But what I'm most pleased by...

Is finding out how much of the world...is shaped by the important debates and discussions and thinking and development of public and private conscience in those free societies...

For real...not just as an abstract notion of universities...

I am so tickled by the irony that I am the most idealistic and the most realistic of my colleagues:):):)...the most thoughtful and the most practical of my colleagues...

It's been so interesting to find out just how many people who take intelligence and education less seriously live their lives blinded by abstractions about the world and all kinds of mistakes of logic and perception...

Intelligence and education and character and decency and compassion and all the rest of the classic virtues really do matter...

And they don't have to be lived separate from our baser, crasser, more rough-edged selves...quite the contrary...we would all live healthier, smarter, better, more integrated lives with more freedom to just be ourselves -- good, bad, and ugly -- with ourselves and with one another:):):)...

The common denominator to what stunts our growth, individually and culturally, is repression...too much force with too little real purpose or constructive consequence...

And the common denominator to what supports and facilitates our growth is freedom...and the serious responsibilities that come with that freedom:):):)...

Have a great week, everyone:):)...

And go Shockers...my alma mater, Wichita State University, is in the sweet sixteen tomorrow night against George Mason, the alma mater of a good friend of mine, Joe Kennedy, from intercollegiate forensics...

The Shocks haven't been in the sweet sixteen since 1981, the glory days of Shocker basketball, when Antoine Carr and Cliff Levingston led one of the most successful teams in Shocker history...

Until this year, that is...both USA today columnists I read, today, favor WSU over George Mason, despite the fact that George Mason beat Wichita State at home earlier this year...

So you will likely find me in some sports bar, somewhere, Friday night, hopefully with good company (I'll be hanging out with the girl I've been interested in this Friday after school, I imagine)...

...watching my Shockers beat the shit out of George Mason, I hope:):):)...

...or celebrating a good year with hopefully a close game for a team that has much reason to be proud of itself:):):)...

So go Shocks:):):)...and have a good week and weekend, everyone:):)...

Love,
Ben

Learning about why it matters the kind of person you are...

I'm learning a really important lesson, today...

It's about loyalty...what inspires it...and why it matters...

My principal made a serious mistake, recently, that she's taking some licks for among the staff, today...

She wants to avoid flunking students and pissing off parents without giving every effort to make sure that they pass they're classes...

That's the good part of her thinking...

Here's the bad part...

She decided to issue an executive order to the staff that they had to use one hour of their planning time per week to tutor students in danger of failing their grade...not their classes, per se...but the entire grade for this year...

Now...caring about how well the students who are struggling the most do is not a bad idea, at all...it's not only a great idea...its the entire basis for my life and work, right now, in schools and in public education...

The mistake my principal made was in execution...she decided to order/force/whatever the hell you want to call it teachers who are already in good faith to do something that they just weren't quite on board with, yet...especially when most of them can think of 2 million other things that they could do, in good faith, with that hour of time...

And the staff grumbled about it the entire time, today...

For good reason...

They weren't included in the decision...

She should have made the more patient decision...of presenting a good idea...and getting staff on board...rather than twisting their arms on something that was a good idea, anyway...

Now...if she pulled this shit all the time...she wouldn't keep her job for very long...

In fact, Kansas City Kansas Public Schools just fired someone who made decisions like this more regularly...

And the reason why she can get away with it...

Is because people trust her, more, than they trust most bosses or principals or administrators...

And they trust her more...

Because she trusts them more, generally...

Not because she twists their arms...or forces them to do shit all the time...the only people who believe that this is the path to strong leadership at this point...are just either such sadistic control freaks that they just can't see straight anymore...people who don't force very often, and thus get away with it when they do...or dumbasses...most people who believe in this means of leadership falling into that third category, whether or not they fall in the first two or not:):):)...

And today I learned...that when I trust someone, more, personally...even when I think that they've done a dumbass thing...like twist arms when its not necessary or wise...

That I'll back them up...and just work at smoothing out the execution...

Even if it means being kind of on board with what I think was a mistakenly executed decision...

And that is how people get away with bullying their way through some tough issues, sometimes...

Because people trust them...

They trust their good faith...

And the reason why shit gets so fucked up in the long term...in the biggest picture...

Is because we never quite get figured out that this is only something that can be done occassionally...and that it should be done as infrequently as possible...

And that it often involves people forgiving what shitheads we were for forcing their hand, in the first place...

The problem is...

Most people don't forgive others like I do...

I want them to...

I expect them to...

I think it's their responsibility to...

But they often don't...

And that can become a serious problem down the road...

As the less mature in the adult world...persistently undermine the efforts of the more mature of the adult world...

Dr. Ogburn has taught me...that given the right person...and given my own much larger sense of the world, today...

That I can forgive this stuff pretty easily, anymore...

But not into perpetuity...

And if I can't forgive it that long...

I know damn well that most people won't...

And the sad, fucked up part of the whole mess...

Is that this kind of foolishness is fed by the very kinds of bitching and moaning and demanding and other kinds of less responsible bullshit of thos same less forgiving teachers and parents and all kinds of people who've just gotten used to demanding that something be done to improve education...or whatever random demand they have about the world, these days...

Rather than doing the tough, patient work to make that happen...

I think I understand why people just don't want to face up to their foolishness on this one, now...

It's because they just don't understand it...as little as they try, sometimes...

Though there are some people who are just kind of arrogant pricks who make others' life miserable...because they just don't give enough of a shit to do otherwise...

I'll cut Dr. Ogburn the slack she needs on this one, right now...

Because I know she's operating honestly...

And that is the only thing that lets us get away with this dumbass mentality around forcing our way, these days...

When people trust that we fuck this one up in good faith...

And even then...I guarantee...they will only do so for so long...

We will have to face facts on this one very soon...

Because we can only bullshit our way through it for so long...

Before the bullshit catches up with us...

By the way...

I think I handled my conversation with Dr. Ogburn about this very well...I am one diplomatic son-of-a-bitch, I have to say that...I very nicely made clear why the only thing that gives her the slack to throw her weight around on this issue or any other issue...

Is that people don't force the issue with her...or enforce the rules all that strictly:):):)...IEP's put some restrictions on how kids' spend their time...that Dr. Ogburn and I thought it was best to put aside...

So we could accomplish the purposes of the law...rather than the letter of the law...

Which is to support kids in learning more and better...

Kind of ironic, isn't it?...

Honest people will only be able to avoid contradictions like this one for so long...

And eventually they'll have to face them...

And I promise won't even tell people I told you so:):):) (ok, maybe I might say it a little under my breath:):):)...but only to remind people to doubt me at their own risk:):):)...

I'm a brilliant fuckin' sum-bitch is what I am:):):)...

Who is learning to suffer foolishness...even the high stakes foolishness...more gladly:):):)...

I guess it helps that I've had to suffer more of my own more gladly over the short course of my own lifetime:):):)...

And here's the real kicker...

If I'm as hopeful as I am...and I one hopeful sum-bitch, too...

And I still have been seeing the world as starkly as I've been seeing it, lately...like in the last 6 years or so...

That's a really, really, really, really, really, really, really...

Bad sign:):):)...

I see a lot of really good people...

Making a lot of really stupid decisions, right now...

In good faith...

Conservatives...liberals...even some radicals...although some members of all of these ranks are arrogant and often recalitrant pricks in my experience, as well...

And the biggest saving grace...

Is that there is no way that young people are watching this...

And thinking...

"We better live just like our parents do:):):)...the world they've created is too good to be true:):):)"...

Generally...they will think...

What a fucked up world our parents have created...

And what the fuck is this with forcing my hand all the fuckin' time...

Just like every generation of kids thinks...

The trick is...

Will they be able to give it up as adults...

And that really is the trick...

In the meantime...

It so limits our growth...

As individuals...

And as cultures...

The girls that I thought I handled too heavy-handedly before Spring Break appear to either have been in bad faith and thus not hold anything against me...or have forgiven me in the meantime...

There is a boy in my first hour class that I'm quite concerned that I have alienated with too tough of tactics...

And I'll have to work to reverse that in the next week or month or so...

And do you know the only thing that gets us all through this whole damned thing?...

That we settle for so little, for one...meaning our high expectations in the abstract are quickly forgone in the real world once we've fucked things up enough...

And two...that people forgive our stupid asses for being such pricks...and even that doesn't happen, much of the time...

Just ask Larry Englebrick...our former assistant superintendent...

And just ask my grandfather...whose eldest daughter...my mom...wouldn't talk to him till the day he died...and wouldn't go to his funeral when he was dead...

The truth is...that the only thing that's kept us all going this long...humanity, that is...

Is all the love and forgiveness and bigness of at least some of us...

To overcome the pettiness and ugliness and cowardliness of the rest of us...

And the great thing about dark times, right now, for that kind of love and forgiveness and the freedom that it naturally gravitates to...

Is that ugly times...call for love and forgiveness and courage and otherwise bigness and virtue...out of even the most petty among us...

The biggest amongst us are creating more freedom...while the most petty keep trying to control the rest of us more and more...

And right now is a quiet referendum on all that control...

And the answer to that referendum...slowly...patiently...but more assuredly...over time...

Is for more freedom...and less control...

And the reason it takes so goddamned long...

Is because there are more petty people among us...

Than big people...

And the petty just keep getting underneath the feet...

Of the big people...

And because even the big people...are having a hard time thinking through this thing...in a more comprehensive way...

Which is why I do my work:):):)...

I better get home and get some sleep so I can be fresh, tomorrow...

I've got an IEP on Friday...

But I've decided the main purpose of the IEP meeting, from now on...will be to eliminate, as much as possible, the ability of the IEP to bully anyone at all, anymore...and to have an informal and more substantive process...that is built around students' educations...and not around a foolish legalism...my real work with the IEP's, now...is to take the teeth out of them...and to have the process serve students...and teachers...rather than be used as a weapon for or against them, anymore...

I've got to get home:):):)...

Have a good week, everyone:):):)...

Love,
Ben

The pettiness of politics...school and otherwise...

A major district administrator got fired today, it appears...

He was not well liked, it seems...and may have been something of a prick to a lot of folks, from the hearsay I've been privy to, today...

The funny thing is...I spent most of the time listening to the conversations about this administrator wondering...

"What is it that most district administrators are needed for anyway?"...

Money is a reason I hear quite a bit...

Though money and the people who access it would better serve schools if they were closer to individual and autonomous schools and staff, I think, rather than having a monopoly over an entire district...

And I have to say that the money people...

Versus the people who do the real work in schools...and in most places...

Do seem to bring down some pretty hefty bounties for their troubles...more than most other people in schools, in business, in life...

Which is part of the reason...a good one, I think...that they aren't very well liked...

My dad is the money guy in his work...he's a corporate real estate developer...I like my dad...he's got a good heart...and he's got the qualities of money people that make me understand why people don't like money people very well...he doesn't tolerate disagreement or conflict very well...even though the stakes are high...so the need for open disagreement is greater, not less...and he's kind of greedy, these days...which is just kind of distasteful for those of us who do our work to do the right thing rather than to bring down the greatest rewards...it's kind of a petty way to live life...which is why it annoys those of us who live our lives around bigger priorities so much...but being bigger people...we tend to suck it up...and keep doing the right thing for the right reasons...because that's just what bigger people do...

I have a lot of problems with district administrators, state administrators and legislators, federal administrators and legislators, lawyers and regulators and all sorts of layers upon layers of administration and imposition that is generally very distant from the day-to-day operations of school...and which impose all kinds of priorities that are generally lesser than the important ones in schools...but which satisfy someone's pet concern or someone's concern about being sued...

There's so much that goes on in schools...as in life...that has very little to do, at all, with doing our best job...that have everything to do with petty and personal agendas and priorities...a million assessments for kids from a million different layers of bureaucracy...far too many to be useful...a million different behind-the-scenes fears by teachers and administrators that have to do with petty political concerns about whom will be offended by hearing or facing what reality...

It's a really interesting microcosm...school politics...of the problems of the society at large...

The sense of entitlement that so many people feel...the lack of responsibility that many people feel, including the people charged with those responsibilities -- I mean teachers and administrators, here -- for the consequences of decisions made...the fruitless and self-destructive blame games and burden-shifting...the petty personal politics...and the general lack of a sense of purpose in a field that is infused with ideals that carry great purpose...

And in special education, in particular...it is the seemingly endless and perfunctory bureaucracy and paperwork...that satisfies so little real concerns...and so many petty ones...

And all the ways that this collection of petty politics consistently undermines the more important purposes of education and schools...

The sad thing is how often much of this is self-undermining...parents who undermine their children by looking for foolish excuses for their failures...teachers and administrators looking for the same...and far too little realism and understanding by those involved with education of one another...for its own sake, as much as for improving situations...

And everyone...so totally lost in all this pettiness...

That they lose track of the really important purposes of schooling, too often...

The learning...the aspirations...the character building...the nurturing of intellect...and of a value on education for its own sake, independent of how it improves net worth or other less important purposes...

And amidst all of our pettiness and cynicism...

We have really arrogant expectation that our kids be better than we are...or are willing to be...in the face of such smallness...

And that they simultaneously...just adapt themselves to our smallness...

Rather than us...living up to our greatness...and leading them with our examples...

It makes me sad that so much of education in America gets lost in this nonsense...in private schools as well, I'm sure...and depending on the private school, more so, I'm quite sure...

And it reminds me that education...at its best...lives in the hearts and minds of those who take it seriously...more than in the bricks and mortar of school buildings that house its activity...

Why we choose to live our like this...not just teachers and administrators and parents and kids...

But all of us...school politics just being a microcosm of life politics...and by politics I mean all of the pettiness of our existences...

Why we'd all choose to live like this I have no idea...

I hate it...

And yet I don't know what to do about it, most days...

Maybe I'm just tired and need a good night's sleep...

But it would be nice to think that we could put aside our desire to avoid being responsible for bigger priorities...and put the pettiness aside...

I don't know why most people avoid the bigger priorities...or why I feel such a strong sense of responsibility to care for them...

I just know that no matter what we do...

Everyone has choices to make with their lives...

And that those choices affect all the rest of us...

And just feeling kind of disappointed with the human race, rather than cynical about it, today...

I know that we can get better...I just know that we also spend an enormous amount of time choosing otherwise...

I'm exhausted...I need a nap in a major way...

Have a good week, everyone...

Love,
Ben