I suppose since there is a remote possiblity of my having readership, I should probably post *something* to prevent people from assuming that I've some how died. Currently, I'm in "ok" health. There's something of a problem, but that will be ranted in it's own little post. The marriage is sound and we both seem to still be quite happy with each other, though I think that fling with the computer is more serious then I expected initially.
A little over a week ago, the school year ended for the middle school that I was a teacher's aid at. I was given the little mum that apparently I was the only one to keep alive in the room and lots of good wishes for the summer. As it stands right now, I am expected to be back in the fall, they just have to decide what student I will be placed with. The principal of the school all but promised that I'd be there in the fall. At about the end of the summer, I'll find out what room/student I'm assigned to. I expect it to be the same child.
He was a sweet kid, when he felt like it. His biggest problem isn't the ADD or his reading/visual disorder. It's a self-dicipline matter. He kept throwing tantrums and his mother would keep treating him to things like watching tv all day and ice cream when he was thrown out of school for the week. It made me .... upset. While I respect that it is not my child, nor is it my place to tell the woman how to raise her child, I have to admit it made me more then a little angry. Capitulating to children isn't exactly a healthy thing.
It doesn't encourage them to take responcibility for their actions and it tells them that they can manipulate adults to get what they want. It lays down the foundation for them to grow into irresponcible adults that attempt to bully, lie, cheat, and fast talk their way thru life. Unless the child in question is going to grow up to be a politician, those life skills aren't exactly going to serve them well. Even more so, when the parent is enabling said child to avoid doing school work that is within their abilities and hindering their intellectual growth and development of vital skills for entering the workforce.
[pauses to take deep breath, hold and exhale to the count of 3.... 2..... 1]
To put that lightly, I'm a little upset with that. It made me angry. Almost as angry as learning that a child had been sexually assaulted on the school bus on their way to school by older children. Almost as angry as learning that a child would intentionally not do their homework and get into trouble so they would have somewhere to be after school, instead of home alone. Those two things made me livid, the first... it just made me quite angry. Some how, and I still don't know how, I managed to remain calm, genial, and plesant. Right up until 5 min after I was home and I then proceeded to rave about that.
So... the school year is ended. I'm now looking for work and doing some work on my fantasy novel. Editing is an interesting experience. Especially when you discover that you have about half of the word-count that you need and your story could use more details. Normally, I'm taking material out when I edit, not adding more to it. Needless to say, my deadline of sending the manuscript out to publishers for review by the beginning of this month did not get met. The story, however, has improved dramatically and will be sent to my beta readers in the near future. Additional ranting/updates follow this one, but are focused more on the individual topics.
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