WordSisters

Author: Ellen Shriner

  • Because you never know . . .

    The seventh graders filed into the conference room where me and the other hospital employees waited to meet them. For the past six weeks, we have been corresponding via email as part of a mentoring program established by a nearby public school. Most of the emails focused on answering a standard set of questions about working life.

    Only five mentees made it to the pizza lunch—several were out sick, one forgot his permission slip, and two of the boys lost their nerve—in other words, a typical seventh grade experience. The five brave girls in attendance ranged from a small girl who hadn’t gotten her growth yet to a tall girl with a womanly figure. Hard to believe they are both 12-year-olds.

    I was disappointed that my mentee was out sick, but I was also a little relieved that I wouldn’t have to engage in an awkward interrogation—what often passes for conversation between adults and kids who don’t know each other very well.

    Seeing the students took me back to seventh grade when I was part of two programs—a verse choir and a binary math class. I can no longer recall why I was part of verse choir—did I choose it? Or was I selected because I loved English class?

    In verse choir, we memorized and performed several poems as a group. My favorite—Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Bells”—was our winning entry in a verse choir contest. Imagine a dozen voices chanting lines like these from Poe’s lengthy poem—

    Keeping, time, time, time

    In a sort of Runic rhyme

    To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells

    From the bells, bells, bells, bells,

    Bells, bells, bells.

    From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

    We loved it and so did the judges.

    The same young spirited nun who organized verse choir started an advanced math class that was held after school. I was never a math wizard, but in seventh grade, I did well enough to be invited. We learned about the binary number system (don’t ask me to use it now!) In 1967, computers and programming languages like COBOL were in their infancy. Perhaps Sister David thought she was preparing us for our future, or maybe she wanted to treat us to fun math—I don’t know. I was semi-clueless about the point of the programs in the same way as the seventh graders visiting the hospital were.

    Being part of these programs made me feel special and broadened my sense of possibilities. Today, I understand Sr. David’s investment in us and I am grateful she saw potential in me.

    That’s why I agreed to participate in the mentoring program—because you never know when you might spark something in someone else.

  • Resigning as MVP of the Eating Team

    Screen shot 2013-01-01 at 8.21.20 PMI like the idea of a New Year and New Year’s resolutions. I want to believe that change is possible.

    Achievable improvement has lots of appeal. So at very least, I’ll lose the weight I gained as a MVP on the Eating Team (Best All-Around Consumption – entrées, sweets, snacks, and alcohol). Nothing but fruits, vegetables and low-fat healthy everything from now until at least March.

    But seriously, in a perverse way, I enjoy being virtuous . . . for a little while. I’ll obsessively calculate my Weight Watcher points (but I’ll spare you the details). I’ll be pleased when I no longer need to cram myself into my jeans and disguise my newly acquired spare tire with big sweaters.

    I have other loftier goals—to be more generous, to be more tolerant, to think before I speak, to improve my writing. But I regularly make those resolutions and then backslide, so I’m realistic about the resolutions—I recognize that all I’m likely to accomplish is incremental improvements.

    I have also learned that any time I’m dissatisfied with how I’m spending my days, I need to recalibrate—I can’t wait until another New Year rolls around. Taking stock and making resolutions is an ongoing process for me.

    At heart, I’m an optimist. Lodged in my belief that I can change is a belief that the world can change, too. I’m hopeful about America—despite the political stupidity and individual selfishness that is rampant in our culture. I still believe Americans collectively strive to be better than we have been, and at very least, we will make incremental improvements in 2013.

    But for right now, I’m focused on eating a juicy tangerine—a change I can control.

  • We Have To Do Better

    Although I don’t want to carry a handgun for protection, I understand that other people might need or want one.

    Similarly, I am not a hunter, but I recognize rifles or shotguns are part of the sport.

    But what I cannot understand is why anyone except a military person on active duty in a war zone needs to own an assault rifle. By design, it’s meant to kill a lot of people very fast. Why would that ever be appropriate in civilian life?

    Columbine, Aurora, Virginia Tech, Red Lake, Milwaukee, Seattle, and now, Newtown. No one thinks these mass shootings are acceptable. Yet, we are destined to see more tragedies like these, unless we as a country change our approach to gun control and to mentally ill people.

    The problem is complicated and a solution won’t be easy, but we cannot continue to sit idly by while more innocent people get murdered. We have to do better.

    Banning assault rifles is a good place to start.

    I have heard the statistics saying that when assault rifles were banned during the Clinton era, gun violence did not go down significantly. I recognize that handguns and rifles are often semi-automatic, and therefore they too are capable of quickly killing a number of people.

    But we still can still do a better job of regulating their sale and use.

    Charli James, a Huffington Post blogger, points out eight things that require more time, information, or effort than owning a gun. Being licensed to drive a car (a potentially lethal weapon) and being allowed to drink alcohol (a potentially lethal activity) are two examples of activities that are more difficult than purchasing a gun.

    Nonetheless, the prospect of changes in gun control laws prompted a surge in demand for permits among Twin Cities gun buyers, according to Paul Levy of the Star Tribune. The photo accompanying his article shows a gun store owner holding a huge assault rifle. What can a person even do with such a gun (besides the sickening obvious)? It won’t fit in a purse or pocket for protection. An animal killed with it would be in shreds.

    What compounds the problem of gun violence is that, as a country, we do not care for mentally ill people effectively. There is a chronic shortage of mental health providers and facilities. Often families are well aware that their loved one is dangerously disturbed, but until the deranged person acts, there is no appropriate way to intervene. And then it’s too late.

    I believe that even the staunchest NRA member would agree that mentally disturbed people shouldn’t be allowed to have guns; but obviously, insane people do own and use guns. Surely, we can do a better job of screening potential gun owners.

    Considering all the assault weapons that are already in the hands of Americans – both law-abiding and criminals—a ban on assault weapons now won’t do much in the short term, but we have to start somewhere for a long-term effect.

    Assault weapons turn the whole idea of “personal protection” on its head. Lots of innocent people are put at risk so one individual gun owner can feel “protected.” Instead, we need to protect our children and families from assault weapons.

    As a country, we can do better—we have to.