As the bumper sticker says: "I wasn't born in Texas but I got here as fast as I could." The end of World War II trapped my parents in upstate New York where my dad, a chaplain's assistant, moved the paperwork to separate other veterans from the armed service. While both my brothers enjoy native son status, I'm a Yankee interloper, but it isn't my fault--my mother, who couldn't wait in Texas any longer and joined my dad outside Rome, New York, gave birth to me in a military hospital on base. Shortly thereafter, we were Texas bound, and I've never called anywhere else home.
I'm thinking about the historical context of my birth because the 84th regular session of the Texas Legislature is thinking about repealing the Texas D.R.E.A.M. Act, a law that permits children whose parents brought them into Texas illegally--mostly Mexican children, but not all--and who graduate from a Texas high school and desire to become US citizens may attend Texas public colleges and universities for in-state tuition. It's a fair law, in my opinion, for grown children who grew up in Texas and plan to live, work, and raise families here--unless they are forced out.
It seems to me the Legislature is being short-sighted in wanting to repeal the law.
My generation is nearing retirement at record rates. Every single day 10,000 additional citizens turn 65 and will continue to do so for the next 6,935 days (19 years)! None of them are having babies. But they are coming to Texas for the warm climate, affordable housing, and low taxes. It makes good sense to educate the young adults who are here, giving them the workforce skills and encouragement to build a better Texas. Otherwise, I fear we will lack the labor force to meet the needs of an aging population.
We could argue that this is in the best interest and welfare of "undocumented residents," or interlopers, if you will. But let's be pragmatic: the real deal-sealer is that it is in our self-interest to educate the younger generation within our state lines.
And, for the record, let's be clear: they're not getting free college education--they're just getting a price break.
Showing posts with label brothers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label brothers. Show all posts
Sunday, April 19, 2015
Sunday, September 7, 2014
Collections
When I was younger, I collected lots of wonderful treasures, including dolls and picture books. My father started me with my first collection: stamps. I never was particularly interested in that hobby, but I was very interested in being the center of my daddy’s attention, so I took the stamps he brought me and dutifully placed them into the binders. Lord only knows where those collections are now…
When I was a little older, I became a tomboy, which was only natural since I was the middle child born between two boys. I collected scrapes and bruises from following them over fences and through blackberry bushes or by following the culverts and tunnels that guided the Town Creek from Sam Houston's home and museum and our house. I also collected a toughness that comes from playing firecracker shootouts and having an occasional firework explode in my hand rather than in the air flying toward a brother’s head.
As I entered my teens, I collected lots of personas along with fitting names, trying to find the right fit for the individual I would become. My cousin and I gave each other sassy names to fit the images we had of becoming saucy women someday. I was Kitten; she, Bubbles. My older brother Stone’s friends named my younger brother Pebble and named me Rox. We felt very cool among our friends who had no siblings and were faceless to the older crowd. My friends had fun giving me derivatives of my given name Joyce: I was called Jerse, Joycie, Juice, and Jice. Because I was named after my mother, my daddy kept trying to get me to adopt the name Junior, but I was past my tomboy days and had no desire to be known as Junior.
I collected my first boyfriend at sixteen, and my favorite name, Baby, came out of his mouth in that easy Southern drawl of his, pronounced, “Baay-be.” Occasionally I was known by another “b” name for my cattiness, especially when it came to trashing some other girl’s reputation because she didn’t fit the standard I had set for teens outside my clique. Shame on me.
During my young adult years, I collected college degrees and years of experience in classrooms as both a student and as a teacher. I found that the best way to become an expert in anything was to teach the subject. As a result, I became an expert in college marketing and collected a slew of awards and plaques from state and national organizations while I climbed the ladder in administration and made a reputation for myself. For about a decade, I was one of go-to women in the Texas community college movement. I also collected two sets of divorce papers.
At mid-life I collected illnesses and maladies: fibroid tumors, ulcerative colitis, psoriasis, diabetes… but thankfully, I also had a collection of friends who would not let me give up, lie down, or step off the path but, rather, to move on to the next collection, which is the greatest one of all—the collection of memories.
I may be battered, but I’m far from through!
Sunday, March 9, 2014
Lent
Today is the first Sunday in Lent. When I was growing up, my third generation Irish-American Catholic daddy gave up whiskey and my mother gave up chocolates. They laid their sins of the flesh on the altar and white knuckled it for forty days and forty nights.
I sacrificed, too, whatever I loved best at the time, to show Lord Jesus that a third grader, a fifth grader, a ninth grader could suffer in remembrance of his Great Sacrifice. In the early years of my childhood I gave up dessert or Coca-Cola. One year I gave up bickering with my brothers. I assure you, that was no easy task because they could be such bullies.
Another year I thought about giving up gossiping, but honestly, I can't remember if I actually went through with it. And I would remember because it would have caused an angst that would have been seared in my memory. I was a freshman in high school, and gossip had enormous social cache.
The hardest was giving up cigarettes my junior year in college. I was a journalism major and we smoked in class, peering through the smoky haze as our fingers pecked out stories on Royal typewriters. Trust me, surrounded by the pungent second hand smoke, it was a sacrifice. But the good news is that I didn't pick them up after church on Easter morning. In fact, I didn't smoke for almost two months. But then final exam time rolled around, and I bought a pack of Marlborough and blew smoke to fight the stress.
People still "give up" their vices for Lent, but nowadays the idea has expanded to more than giving up shortcomings. The extra step is to replace them with virtues. For example, a friend of mine has decided to curb her self-centeredness by listening to others, without judgment, with her heart's ear. In a city with four million people, it's easy to get lost in the crowd, to be anonymous and heartbreakingly lonely, so I think my friend's Lenten practice is more than selfless--it's truly inspiring. She is a prayer in action.
There are others who are volunteering at the Houston Food Bank, or being their brothers' keeper by helping returning veterans to re-enter society, or advocating for children, the wounded victims in domestic violence.
Lent is more than doing without, more than fighting the pull of carnal hunger, more than 40 days of sobriety.
Growing up as a child, how did you celebrate the Lenten season? How, now that you are an adult, will you celebrate this season?
I sacrificed, too, whatever I loved best at the time, to show Lord Jesus that a third grader, a fifth grader, a ninth grader could suffer in remembrance of his Great Sacrifice. In the early years of my childhood I gave up dessert or Coca-Cola. One year I gave up bickering with my brothers. I assure you, that was no easy task because they could be such bullies.
Another year I thought about giving up gossiping, but honestly, I can't remember if I actually went through with it. And I would remember because it would have caused an angst that would have been seared in my memory. I was a freshman in high school, and gossip had enormous social cache.
The hardest was giving up cigarettes my junior year in college. I was a journalism major and we smoked in class, peering through the smoky haze as our fingers pecked out stories on Royal typewriters. Trust me, surrounded by the pungent second hand smoke, it was a sacrifice. But the good news is that I didn't pick them up after church on Easter morning. In fact, I didn't smoke for almost two months. But then final exam time rolled around, and I bought a pack of Marlborough and blew smoke to fight the stress.
People still "give up" their vices for Lent, but nowadays the idea has expanded to more than giving up shortcomings. The extra step is to replace them with virtues. For example, a friend of mine has decided to curb her self-centeredness by listening to others, without judgment, with her heart's ear. In a city with four million people, it's easy to get lost in the crowd, to be anonymous and heartbreakingly lonely, so I think my friend's Lenten practice is more than selfless--it's truly inspiring. She is a prayer in action.
There are others who are volunteering at the Houston Food Bank, or being their brothers' keeper by helping returning veterans to re-enter society, or advocating for children, the wounded victims in domestic violence.
Lent is more than doing without, more than fighting the pull of carnal hunger, more than 40 days of sobriety.
Growing up as a child, how did you celebrate the Lenten season? How, now that you are an adult, will you celebrate this season?
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Perspective
I was a middle child, a girl bracketed by two wild and boisterous boys. Is it any wonder I became a tomboy?
I sacrificed for being an interloper. My brothers, when they got BB guns for their birthday, played cowboys and Indian with me. My back got peppered with fiery red spots, like angry pimples, as I ran across the meadow and raced up the mountainside by our summer vacation home.
I received my first black eye from my older brother. He was the rule enforcer when our parents were gone, but they were his rules rather than the family rules, and I did not believe he would actually hit me for changing the television channel. To his credit, he was mortified--or maybe frightened of what our father would do to him when he got home--and immediately retrieved frozen hamburger to put on the swelling and declared I could watch any TV show I wished. The next day I told my classmates I'd run into a door, but my sixth grade teacher saw through the ruse and asked quietly, "Which brother socked you?" I responded with silence, for I'd already learned that sacred tenet of boys: never squeal.
I considered the sacrifices exchanged for the excitement of young male life worthwhile. I still remember our firecracker fights--the acrid smell, the exploding flashes that lit the night, the agonizing screams when a firecracker went off in someone's hand.
Of course life with the boys wasn't all physical violence. I learned to whistle through a blade of grass. I learned to build an Army fort with tree branches and quilts my grandmother made--my mother never forgave us for leaving them out all summer in the humidity until they rotted. I learned to build a pinewood soap box derby car with roller skates for wheels and race fearlessly downhill in front of the college, successfully maneuvering the hairpin curve near the finish line. I learned to cuss. Raw, raunchy, crude. But not within earshot of an adult.
I learned to follow my brothers along Town Creek, from the museum at Sam Houston Park to the gully beside our home. We hid in the culverts and watched dragonflies skim the water and tadpoles scurry like ants just beneath the surface. In the cool shade, we listened to cars and trucks driving by and delighted in our privacy.
At my request, my older brother taught me to smoke. I was fourteen and had just finished the eighth grade. It took me twenty-one years to kick the habit.
I eventually outgrew my tomboy-ness and left behind many of those habits. I can't whistle worth a damn anymore. There is a silver lining, though. I can write with some authority from the male point of view.
I sacrificed for being an interloper. My brothers, when they got BB guns for their birthday, played cowboys and Indian with me. My back got peppered with fiery red spots, like angry pimples, as I ran across the meadow and raced up the mountainside by our summer vacation home.
I received my first black eye from my older brother. He was the rule enforcer when our parents were gone, but they were his rules rather than the family rules, and I did not believe he would actually hit me for changing the television channel. To his credit, he was mortified--or maybe frightened of what our father would do to him when he got home--and immediately retrieved frozen hamburger to put on the swelling and declared I could watch any TV show I wished. The next day I told my classmates I'd run into a door, but my sixth grade teacher saw through the ruse and asked quietly, "Which brother socked you?" I responded with silence, for I'd already learned that sacred tenet of boys: never squeal.
I considered the sacrifices exchanged for the excitement of young male life worthwhile. I still remember our firecracker fights--the acrid smell, the exploding flashes that lit the night, the agonizing screams when a firecracker went off in someone's hand.
Of course life with the boys wasn't all physical violence. I learned to whistle through a blade of grass. I learned to build an Army fort with tree branches and quilts my grandmother made--my mother never forgave us for leaving them out all summer in the humidity until they rotted. I learned to build a pinewood soap box derby car with roller skates for wheels and race fearlessly downhill in front of the college, successfully maneuvering the hairpin curve near the finish line. I learned to cuss. Raw, raunchy, crude. But not within earshot of an adult.
I learned to follow my brothers along Town Creek, from the museum at Sam Houston Park to the gully beside our home. We hid in the culverts and watched dragonflies skim the water and tadpoles scurry like ants just beneath the surface. In the cool shade, we listened to cars and trucks driving by and delighted in our privacy.
At my request, my older brother taught me to smoke. I was fourteen and had just finished the eighth grade. It took me twenty-one years to kick the habit.
I eventually outgrew my tomboy-ness and left behind many of those habits. I can't whistle worth a damn anymore. There is a silver lining, though. I can write with some authority from the male point of view.
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