"People don't buy what you do but why you do it," T. Jaeck of OEA

"People don't buy what you do but why you do it," T. Jaeck of OEA

I can't get this expression out of my head!
I sat in a training, yes learning some union stuff, whether you like them or not it is necessary. I cannot believe the decrease in Teacher pay and lack of input or control over the learning environment in schools that don't have unions, okay so let me step off that soap box.

Why do I do it?
Do what you ask? Attend community meetings on subjects that are affecting our families like, the Linden Police and City Council meeting in August of 2016, or the Community Open House on the Heroin Epidemic tomorrow night at Franklin Heights High School.

I gotta find hope to bring people up out of the hurt and hate! I need to educate today's youth to learn from other's mistakes and to know how to ask for help but by being resourceful.

I get up everyday to build relationships with others by offering a smile. I care about their mind, body and soul. I explain to my career center students that it takes a village to raise a child which means family members, friends, teachers, community members and that we are stronger by helping others find these connections and resources.


I have to fight for the right to get paid or maintain a middle class wage to do my job, to explain the uniqueness of teaching work conditions, to understand the impact local and federal government has on the teaching profession.

This is the burden I carry.
It keeps me up or awakens me some nights.
Some days I want to hand my burden to someone else, but in the end my faith pushes me through.

It is amazing how the right thing will come in my best made lesson plan, through my faith in the moment of connection and I feel like I can get the students excited about the learning. I can help them find hope and see their goals for their futures. I can see them as productive citizens, even through the whines of completing essay's and creating their own lessons. As they say, "Mrs. Mc, it's too much,"
I explain, "Yes it is but I am teaching you how to teach children and they deserve to have someone who accepts the "too much."

Okay, goodnight on that note of feeling hopeful!

Update...my life has taken me here!

Update... My life has taken me to a place I never wanted to go...my sister is on drugs. As a graduate of and educator to students in the inner city of Columbus, I have over 20 years experience listening to or trying to help friends, students and parents with drug addictions. In April of 2016, I walked in a jail to talk to my sister on a phone while looking at her beaten up, track marked, shaking body on a television screen. She said, please don't cry. The whole time saying to myself, I don't belong here, oh my God my sister is a drug addict.

I wanted her to know she was loved and that I could only bring myself to visit her the first time, that she has to learn from what got her here and prevent this. Drug addiction is not alcohol addiction, I explained to family members who tried to compare the two. Through my research of countless family stories of loss, a heroin drug addiction is something non comparable. My sister had the ADHD label from an early age and I am guilty of always saying, "Ugh, What are you doing, sit still, stop that." I didn't understand that she couldn't help it until I began my education career and we were young adults.

She continued to struggle as an adult with keeping focused. She was always needing to pay to get a new license because she had lost it. A couple years ago she came home from her out of town job working with race horses. She got on government insurance, battling pill addiction and was diagnosed bipolar. Now 3 years later, I am sitting here tonight, terrified by the memory of speaking to a police officer on a prostitute infested street corner at 7 pm asking if he had seen my sister. He politely explained, while looking at her picture on my phone, "Not today but a few days ago, I broke up a fight between her and someone else."

My sister had told me 3 months ago that she had done sexual acts for money. She was released from jail, pending an arraignment and was attending rehab every other day as planned by her attorney. For 2 months I could see my sister, the fidgety ADHD but good-hearted sister. However, she was still not ready to return. She was going to rehab but I felt that she was not fully embracing it. It is hard to trust the person after a hurt. I thought she could get help to be more independent, she really was homeless, moving back home in her thirties.

I just don't know what to do. My mom told the police officer that she is on probation so can he arrest her, please just arrest her. I am praying to God  to be with her and/or take her home. I cannot shake the images of the other nameless girls that I saw on that street corner. They are someones sister and daughter too. It is the walking dead, cold eyes and tattered bodies. I just can't believe I couldn't prevent my sister from being there! I know it is not my fault, but that fact does not help my hurt. I will worship through this like I did my divorce, my miscarriage and all other of my life's hardships... but how do you prepare to bury your sister or pray that she gets arrested!

I just never expected to be in this place. I pray over and over for my sister and other's who are out there following this evil and living hell on earth. They don't know the trespasses they have done and it will take time for us to trust them again but please be with us all as we struggle to get through this.
I pray...
"Our Father, Who art in heaven Hallowed be Thy Name; Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." 

Amen