2/12/07

This entry begins with one of my classes tonight, and ends with my experiences this morning. All are stories of survival. They are also stories of talent, ability, and intelligence:

Act I

The trumpet sounds from a place fifteen floors below us, 3 blocks to the north. Its mournful fullness pervades every activity I start with the group. Grace is the leader in volume even if not in reality, and she fills the room with her voice every Monday and Wednesday. She and I both notice the musician’s sound today, and in a moment of understanding and mutual respect I tell her that I thought she was going to be annoying when I first met her, but that she has endeared herself to me with her inquisitiveness, persistence, and her story. At age 42, Grace has never been in a traditional school building. The Philadelphian foster care system of 35 years ago did not hold high expectations for its children, and so Grace grew for 17 years in its charge and never went to school. She left ‘the system,’ and has pretended that she could read for over 30 years until she found a community basic skills class this past year. In a short amount of time she has made incredible progress and, truth be told, I half don’t believe her story. It has been corroborated by others, and with her, I need a second and third opinion to believe. She exudes an eary ability to direct a room of fellow students towards her needs. She doesn’t hesitate to ask, answer, and state whatever comes into her mind. She interacts with others with an innocent and unconditional excitement that is impossible to ignore. I can’t help but think that her powers of manipulation and imitation are so strong that she might be lying about her entire history. I know, though, that she’s not. She’s an asset to the classroom.

Act II

Yemanja was born in Liberia and saw her mother get murdered. She moved to Samstown with her father at 13 where he started to beat her until she left. She had a child at 16, then asked her father if she and her son could move back in with him. After the initial excitement wore off, he began to beat her again until one of her teachers drove her to Philadelphia to live with her sister, who later kicked her out because the sister’s boyfriend did not like having her there. She now lives in the largest homeless shelter in Pittsburg with her 4 year old son. She is tired, almost broken emotionally, and living day to day. She also can hardly read.

Act III

-Jermaine hobbles as he walks with an obvious bone deficiency which has rendered his legs usable, but clearly bowed. I have spoken with Jermaine on no more than two other occasions, and in a very superficial way.

“What are you writing your senior project about?”

“The foster care system”

“Oh, How have you done your research? Did you look at books at the library? How will you organize the paper?” [interested]

“Well, in a sense, I didn’t need to do much because I’ve lived it”

“How do you mean”

“I’ve been in the system”

“Tell me about it, when did you enter the system?”

“About 17 years ago. Well… My mom was a crack-head, and my twin brothers and I were taken from her when we were very young… We lived with mom for ten years before she adopted us, and sometimes, you find out the truth about someone later… She started locking us up in the basement and stuff. She wasn’t treating us right, and we ended up in court for a long while – it was a horrible time. Now I’m out of there and things are better…”

According to mapquest it takes 17 hours, 6 minutes to get from Tampa Bay, Florida to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Its about 1082.67 miles between the two cities. It took me about 19 Hours. I got to the airport around 2:00 PM and walked off the plane in Philadelphia around 9:15AM. wow. Airtran sucks. Why don't I just drive next time? 1-800 Fuck Airtran!