Hava Nagila

I just went to the coolest wedding ever. Two of my former students who hooked up in my class got married tonight.

I coach Academic Decathlon and almost every year we have an "AcDec Romance" Well our AcDec Romance from 2001 got married tonight.

In March of 2000 we all went to France. So many of the folks that were there tonight were on that trip to France. The bride and groom were on the trip but they were not an item at that time. We had adventures. I had issues with the bride slamming four glasses of sauvignon blanc in about fifteen minutes. Her bridesmaid matched her but the bride got really sick. She was horribly sick the next day. The groom, theatrical person that he was, was part of a group of our kids who gathered on a sidewalk in Chartres singing about "Stupid Americans." It was really funny and people threw money in the hat.

In 2001, I had both these angels in two classes. Art History and Academic Decathlon. I didn't notice any particular chemistry until we went to the state meet in March. After that they were inseparable. They've been together ever since.

Tonight I witnessed the most beautiful wedding I've ever attended. I have never been to a Jewish wedding before but this was stunning. It was intimate and funny and everyone watching was involved. I've been to lots of weddings but I was a bystander, not a participant. Tonight I felt like I participated.

We pulled up to the venue and apparently entered through the back door. We didn't know that there was valet parking. Wine was being served from the get go. The reception started before the wedding. That was kind of cool. I visited with the bride who was the prettiest bride I ever saw. She hugged me so hard. I was lucky to have her all four years of high school. She was a delight. She told her bridesmaids that I was her second mother.

The wedding place was odd. It was in an incredibly quirky place not far from the jail. It looked very industrial from the outside, but the inside was filled with odd rooms that were decorated in eclectic ways. We got inside and it was wonderful. It was wonderland.

The groom wore pink converse high tops. This is typical of him. Well, I don't know about pink but he always wore converse high tops. The bride was in a gorgeous wedding gown. She was sublime.

I knew all of the parents involved and it was great to see them. It's just kind of funny to know that his mom and her mom are now related.

The ceremony was gorgeous. There were very many traditional elements that were enacted. There was a canopy and prayer shawls and they stomped the glass to everyone yelling "Mazeltov!!"

It was beautiful. I was happy to see so many people that I'd not seen in a few years. I was pleased to see two very favored students join themselves together. I cannot describe the look on the groom's face as he gazed into his new wife's eyes.

I hope I will be invited to the bris of their first son.

Babies

(sent to a friend in response to an email forward thing that involved Mother Theresa)

Dear Friend I Love you!

I didn't think so much of Mother Theresa. She caused a lot of people suffer that didn't need to suffer. I would not deny dying people morphine to let them be closer to God with their suffering. That does not follow my logic. I would not have denied my grandmother the only shot of morphine she took at the end of her liver cancer. I think she was plenty close to God. Mother Theresa did many wonderful things, but I guess I have some grudges. I wouldn't want to equate any amount of unnecessary suffering as something that my God would want. Maybe she has a different God than I do. The God of my understanding would not want people to suffer for no reason. My grandmother was plenty close to God her entire life and was one of the most profoundly Christian people I've ever known. The God I know would not have wanted her to feel any pain at all.

We leave the US in 13 days to go to England to see #1 and her new husband. We get to meet her inlaws and our new inlaws. The people that we hope to share grandchildren with in not so long a time. I'm ready. I WANT GRANDBABIES. I just wish that my only hope for grandbabies were not across the pond.

My cousin just had a beautiful baby in Denton. Maya Corinne *****. I think she was born 10/22, but I'm fuzzy now. My cousin is a photographer and the baby pictures that she has taken are amazing. Makes me proud of my cousin and her beautiful daughter.

I continue to wrestle the inner city youth. They need wrestling. I read in the paper today that Texas has the highest teenage birth rate. http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/110507dnmetteenbirths.35daddb.htmlThey said that 24% of the teen birth rate was second or more baby. I've had two kiddos (juniors) have a baby this year (both boys are gorgeous) and I've got two that are pregnant now (including a freshman that I just got as a transfer student from BA)

My last year at HHS I had a junior in my jewelry class. She was a special ed kid and she kind of did work as I could get her to do it, but she liked to color a lot. I got her interested in doing an altered book project (where you take a book and paint over it and paste stuff into it) and she came to class with her book. She'd painted over the cover and some of the pages and had pasted pictures of a little boy into some of the pages. It was her child who was seven. She was a special ed junior in high school with a seven year old child. She was so proud of him and said he was the most beautiful thing in her life. I don't doubt that but I wanted to SCREAM that SOMEONE should have gone to jail for making this child pregnant when she was a child.

My next to last year at HHS (2003) one of the Down's Syndrome girls was pregnant. She was so barely functional. I don't know if she even knew what was going on with her. I remember her wearing overalls over her huge belly. She delivered a normal baby and unfortunately died of asphyxiation about two days after she went home from the hospital leaving her normal baby to be raised by her parents. Go figure.

I pray for good and right things to happen..I see some scary things. I know that my friends who are medical caregivers do. Do you remember all the fuss over the baby whose parents were HIV and had Hep and VD? I was told I didn't have to take the baby's picture. I had faith that there was nothing that baby could give to me and I took a good picture (1986 or 87). That was back when we didn't know too much about HIV. She was a pretty baby. I can still remember the baby's face.

My students laugh at me when I dismiss 4th period on a Friday afternoon. I tell them to travel safely and not get pregnant. Kids laugh at me and ask me later what I mean. I ask them if they know what causes babies. They laugh but then they realize that I'm serious. I can't say what I want to say. I can only tell them that abstinence is the only way (per the mandate of the state of Texas). I tell them not to cause babies unless they are serious to a lifelong commitment. I tell them that the only sure way to keep from being pregnant or getting an STD is to be abstinent.

Who in our powers that be was ever a teenager? From the beginning of recorded time, babies have happened. They occur regardless of the "morality" of their culture. I'm disappointed that our state mandates such an archaic exchange of information. We have a problem with too many teens getting pregnant. We are allowed to give them very limited information which has no bearing on their reproduction capabilities.

Would it be better if I could have preached at Miss X who is my student for the third year? If I'd been able to talk to her frankly at the age of 14 would she get pregnant? Would she have a child now if I had been able to talk to her in a very frank and honest manner about what causes babies? I do not begrudge that beautiful baby. But I see CHILDREN at my school who are pregnant and don't have the sense God gave a chicken. I see pregnant children with 29 year old mothers becoming grandmothers and 36 year old grandmothers becoming great-grandmothers.

This is not how America gets ahead. This is how we breed a 5th generation of welfare mentality.

....overheard in the hallway "My Momma don't care if I'm pregnant 'cause we get another check."

I'm serious.

I hope I reach some of them. Please let me reach at least one in the way that the state limits me.

I WANT GRAND BABIES. #2 girl is graduated and working and doesn't want to date anyone in particular and doesn't want children at all. DAMN. #3 girl is a senior at TCU and she's got so much going on. She's prepping for the LSAT. She's got years of school ahead of her. I hope to God #4 boy doesn't knock some chippy up. I guess I have standards.

I miss you and would love to see you sometime. Please let us make a date!

Love,

Me