Teachers and other Resources...

My children go to public school. I have two in the elementary level and two above. My partner is a teacher in the Catholic system so I think I'm pretty well invested and fairly well versed in the current teacher's situation.

It is interesting to me that so many parents are ill-informed about what teachers do and what teachers want and even about what is best for their children.

This looming strike is not about money but if it were, if these escalating job actions were solely based on teachers wanting an extreme amount of money, why wouldn't we want them to get it? Because they don't deserve it? Because our kids aren't worth it? Because we would rather our kids try learning from some pissed off, underpaid person?

For some of you, I know the answer is yes. I know that because you are the same people who have a child and choose the cheapest possible daycare for them. You consider the money but don't consider that the person you are paying can't afford to live on what you are paying them. Don't consider or care that they may not have any experience or have and certification in first aid or CPR. You're the same people who take your kids to the park and sit on your cell phones while they try to pump themselves on the swing. Me? I'm the person who always ends up pushing them.

I see this entire teacher's problem as a reflection of the provincial government's inability to handle its resources. They have the ability to fix this yet aren't at the table. How much are these negotiations costing us in time, in frustration? It's clearly NOT an election year. If it were, they (Ms. Wynne's puppets) would be at the table yes, yes, yessing to get this matter resolved. Before you ask me how I know this, ask yourself why you don't know that?

Public school isn't something I have always believed in. It isn't a service or resource I have always availed myself of. When my older two were younger, I home schooled. I had luxury and the privilege of being their teacher as well as their mother for eight fun and hard years which I treasure.

Now that my kids are in "the system" I value their teachers. I take the time to get to know the environment my kids are spending time in. Just yesterday I stayed to the END of the assembly at my daughter's school just so I could watch how teachers, students and parents interact. So I could see if/how they value their leaders. I recognize that teachers are one of the biggest allies I have in this life. Why? Because a) they want to see my children succeed and b) the hours they spend together gives these teachers immense influence and insight into who my child is when they are not in my care.

Sounds like rhetoric right? It's not. Just yesterday morning I wrote a note in my son's agenda asking for 5 minutes of his teacher's time. This is time she didn't have to give me, especially in light of the current work-to-rule conditions which their union has adopted...but she did. She met my son and I at the end of the day. THE END OF HER DAY.

Teachers are resources. The government is doing a poor job of managing their resources not just with the teachers but look also at what is happening with healthcare, with our doctors salaries and with Ontario Hydro.

For whatever reason, Kathleen Wynne and this Liberal government are having a difficult time getting a handle on its resources.

Consider this: let's assume you are an accountant and have an employer. Now, let's assume your employer made you unhappy....made you work longer than you wanted to or took away half of your lunch break or demanded that you meet with their disgruntled clients on your own time. You would have the option of joining a different firm, looking for a different employer or working for yourself. Your friends and family would be hammering you quit so you could stop complaining or be more available to them. Teachers don't have this option. The government is the only employer.

I can appreciate the frustration of my fellow parents but I think we're frustrated with the wrong people here. Why don't we demand the government get back to the table and spend their time negotiating instead of trying to instill fear in us?

Why do we want a leader who, rather than find a way to circumvent problems, is content to sit back and point out what we should be afraid of ? Liz Sandals, isn't it your job to make sure teachers are able to work? Isn't it your job to make sure the school environment is safe for our children? Aren't you responsible for managing these resources? Why don't you feel accountable?

These are our children...why would we want anything less than a positive experience for them at school? And when it's not positive? Who provides us with the insight into our children, their abilities and challenges? Who do we turn to? The government who has shown that they may or may not show up at the table? Or the teachers?

It's scary, the comments I see online about teachers, the lack of understanding and compassion, the straight out disrespect and dismissal.

In 20 days we will go to the polls and elect a federal government to lead us for the next four years...if you can't take the time to educate yourselves about the smaller issues surrounding our teachers and make informed comments, how can you educate yourselves about the larger issues concerning our nation and make an informed choice at the polls?

How Do I Love Thee

Anyone who knows me knows that I believe love is the single most important thing one human being can offer another.

At 45 (soon), I can honestly say that I have offered it freely, accepted it graciously (don't overthink it) as a daughter, sister, cousin, niece, aunt, mother, friend, lover, partner, wife and questioned it rarely - until now. I don't question it's existence, it's power or it's purpose. Let me explain...

The last few years, through divorce and other family issues (aren't there always issues?) I have learned that someone loving me isn't enough and shouldn't be enough to have them take up my most precious resource - time.

I have learned to stop allowing myself to get distracted by a profession of love. To look deeper and harder at how and why I am loved. To watch the behaviors and language and ask myself if the love being offered allows me to honor who I am and what I believe in.

Not all love is created equal. Not all love is healthy. Not all love is meant to last and most importantly, not all love is love, though it may have a lot of the same trademarks.

A lot of emotional needs masquerade themselves as love, the most prevalent of which I believe is fear; fear of being alone, fear of being abandoned, fear of failure, fear of unworthiness, fear of fear.

Like most people, my kids have been the easiest people for me to love. This may be because I understand them almost as well as I understand myself. It may also be because they are still relatively young. I know that my love for them is unconditional. It will exist long after I do.

Not everyone believes that conditional love is love, but I do. It's important for everyone to know their limits, to decide what they will and will not tolerate infesting their world. If I can answer the how's and why of the love others offer me, I can decide if I want to open their gift. Do they cheat, lie, dismiss, ignore and call it love? Do they want to control, manipulate and demean someone else?

Perhaps you sense pessimism or bitterness, I have neither. I am eternally optimistic and incredibly open to whatever gift of love the universe brings to me both conditionally and unconditionally. I have been well loved and am grateful for those who love me and those who I have loved in my short lifetime.

To me, love is so much more than a word or an emotion. It is a set of values, a code of conduct, a mountain with many plateaus many of which we will not reach with everyone who crosses our path. Love is an opportunity to both offer and accept the gifts of humanity, an opportunity which sometimes comes with a price of admission and other times is beautifully free.

Either way, I don't believe time spent loving is ever wasted. It connects us to the universe and her people more securely and more profoundly than anything else can. It teaches us who we are and who we are not and if we allow it, through love's joy and pain it helps us to grow.

Isn't it Ironic...

Listening to CBC this morning I was struck by what I see as an incredible irony.

A story about Toronto-based Dewson Street Junior Public School trying to raise $30,000 in 30 days to sponsor and resettle a displaced Syrian family was followed by a citation from The Daily Bread Food Bank Annual Report.

According to the report, food bank use is up 45% in Toronto suburbs and the length of time families are dependent on the food banks has increased from 12 months to 2 years.

So what is it, I wonder that spurs some people to action? Why is it that there are desperate families within the cradle of Toronto who are being passed over in favor of supporting refugees half a world away?

One could argue that annual Easter and Thanksgiving food drives have desensitized us to the needs of those around us, or that we are disillusioned into thinking that sending our kids to school with packages of pasta and jars of peanut butter tucked into their backpacks is making a bigger difference than it is. Or perhaps we believe that being poor and desperate in Toronto is nothing compared to the blatant and very real images of despair we see being prostituted by our media outlets and talked about by our politicians.  Some of the same polititions, I might add, who have a far greater ability to impact a larger number of lives than the population of Dewson Junior Public School.

One could argue that visibility breeds compassion, that the refugees are the current “hot topic.” That they occupy the nation's eye and therefore demand attention. While I agree that despair is always worthy, I wonder at the logic of bringing even one family to Toronto, a city in which, also according to CBC, the poor are being priced out of the housing market; also in which a refugee family is bound to be relegated to rely upon those same overtaxed food banks once the nation's eye falls upon a new "hot topic".

I am all for eradicating desperation from all the small and large hollows in which it lives and also all for activating compassion and global citizenship in our young. What I question is this...how visible will a new Syrian refugee family be, in the very suburb which is diligently working to sponsor it, once is has been here for a hot minute. When the citizens are finished patting themselves and each other on the back. When the family has become just like every other impoverished family in the GTA, where will the community's attention turn and how does this benefit anyone?

There are already people in Toronto living in despair, people without jobs and without adequate housing, clothing or food. Individuals sleeping on the streets and families working daily yet finding themselves falling behind the rate of inflation.

With winter looming, we will again hear stories of people who can't afford to heat their homes, others freezing to death on Toronto streets and also of Toronto shelters struggling under the weight of demand from the community they are attempting to service.

It's interesting to me the value we give to some lives over others. The value we see in possibly creating a newly desperate situation for Syrians by transplanting them into a City which may or may not have the ability to support it emotionally, financially and socially on a long term basis, while we ignore those among us who are equally desperate and equally deserving.

As I sit in my decidedly comfortable yet far from decadent kitchen, I sip my tea and ask the empty room, "Isn't it ironic?"

Time for Falling...

It's cheesy, I know, the title and yet it's fitting for the season and the reason.

Day by day I am falling in love with my life again.  Funny thing is that I didn't even really realize that I had fallen out of love.

I was too busy driving to soccer and swimming and soccer and rowing and soccer and guitar and soccer and basketball and soccer to realize that I was also driving myself into the ground.  I was too busy to think. With adrenaline riding side-saddle I planned events and executed them with precision. I managed to be in three places at once; to make sure bags were packed; water bottles filled; to home make lasagnes; to shop and shower and dress but I failed to show up.

I was too busy mentally pre-planning bedtime; lunches; practices; games; life; that I was too busy to live it. Thankfully there were days when I snapped out of my self-imposed walking coma long enough to absorb and enjoy but they were too few and too far between for me to take pride in this.

It is only now that I have waded through the hazy days and made it to the shore on the other side of summer, and soccer, that I recognize myself.

In recognition of this, I have made a momentous decision. This year, no rep soccer.  No soccer of any kind until spring. Guitar - yes because it requires more from the player than it does from me. Swimming - no because in spite of my strong feelings about it my little swimmer loves swimming but some of that love gets lost when it comes to lessons.

I already feel the shift. We are laughing more and playing more together.  There is more time for long dinners and visits from friends.  There is time for cuddling and family movies and laying on the couch.  There is time to watch baseball and go to the driving range and the library. There is time to walk and get lost in our new neighborhood. There is time for me to sit and listen, really listen and not just critique, my budding musician. There is time for me to shoot hoops with my bballer instead of just waving goodbye as he heads to the court. Time to teach the young one to ride a two-wheeler; to get on my own bike and ride alongside. Time to strap on my roller blades and stretch before placing one foot in front of the other and feel the solid earth roll past beneath me, to push harder and feel myself fly.

In all this time and through all these moments I feel myself breathing. I feel myself falling in love again with motherhood, with my body, with my life and myself.