Adoptive Families, Ignore Us, We Don't Mind.

We get a lot of looks.  Mostly, they are harmless people who tell us how lovely our daughter is.  We can't help but agree, since we think she is probably the prettiest thing that ever graced this side of Mars ( I know Mars spins and revolves around the sun, that's my point).

We get the odd question about whether she is adopted and where from once in awhile.  In fact, Cora and I were noting last weekend...er...the weekend before last, that people in Seattle were more likely to ask us questions than people around our home town.  We thought that was weird, since we had seen at least half-a-dozen probable international adopters/adoptees just on our trip through the zoo (We weren't actually going to ask to confirm, that's just a little rude, unless you have built up a rapport by being in line together for a few minutes, seriously, do you walk up to EVERY family and ask if one of them is adopted?).  You would think, since they were so common in the big city, that people would not have the urge to ask so many stinking questions.  We don't mind, but some questions tend to be fairly personal.  As a way to illustrate these questions here are three YouTube videos by an unknown-to-me adoptive parent.  They are PRICELESS!!









I'm sure you wouldn't, since you read my blog, but if you ever get the urge to tell someone any of these things on the videos, just know, we have ALL heard them already and probably would not like to hear them again so soon.

Some of my students ask questions like these, and I usually answer kindly since they are kids and kids really want to know.  My favorite is, "Are you going to tell her she's adopted?"  My answer is, "Well, it will be kind of hard to keep all the mirrors away from her." or, "We think she'll figure it out." 

I post these videos, not because someone asked me any rude or personal questions today, but because the videos show the whole gamut of what we hear!  If you want to educate your friends about how NOT to be rude, these videos seem to me a good way to do it.

I hope you are all having a wonderful week.  I have another two days of test proctoring.  (That makes me feel so important, but really, it's glorified babysitting, and I get to read!)  The state of Washington wants to make sure its students can read and write.  Sometimes it's a little bewildering what the test-makers thought of to include in the instructions.  "You may now stretch, but don't talk about the test or what you wrote on the test to others."  In my experience, both as a testee and a teacher, kids are LEAST likely to speak of work.  Oh, they'll talk about So-and-so getting pregnant or how So-and-so almost got arrested, but a freakin' test?  To put it in their rough vernacular, "Hey-oh no."

As a point of reference, I got observed by an administrator the other day, part of the normal thing.  My class happened to be reviewing a chapter via a study-guide I had made for them.  It was suggested that I should make class a little more rigorous for my students.  Wish he'd been there the other day when they were yelling at each other about women's rights.

Still, he suggested that we should have a debate or something...yep, that women's rights thing was totally unplanned, but it was awesome to see the majority of the males side with the girls.  One obstinate boy held out that women just weren't as tough as men.  I told him, point-blank, that he was wrong.  I got applauded for that.  Anyway, today I had planned a debate over whether Washington Territory should have been formed by breaking up the Oregon Territory or whether the Oregon Territory should have remained the large entity that it was.

This particular class could probably have fooled a medical professional into believing that every last one of them was comatose.  Seriously!  They were stone-cold little jerks with their vacant stares and the drool!  Oh! Dear GOD!  Sometimes I wish for a cattle prod or some sort of device to make them WANT to learn just a little!

I fared better with my last class.  They actually enjoyed the idea of a debate.  I think I will enjoy it with the rest of my classes, but that other one...they are a pot of stinkers.  I have two or three adults in there as parapros who help needy students.  They seem to suffer the same angst and wish to make the kids WANT to learn.  There seems to be nothing you can do to make them try.  It's disheartening at times.  And then you hear about how some state or government agency wants to pay teachers according to how well their kids do on test scores...WOW!  It seems no matter how many times you go through WHY it's important to do well in school, some kid is going to just NOT CARE!

Well, watch the videos, have a laugh, maybe have a sobering moment, but mostly, have fun.  When you stop having fun, I don't know if it's worth going on.  I like my job.  I love my wife, and I adore my kid.  I have a great life.  I hope you do too.