I have thought about this a lot.

If I have a creed, this is it:

My god is language, written and read.

And there is no other god but this.”

- From the book This is All: The Pillow Book of Cornelia Kenn

Personally, there is another “world” event that I will always remember just as vividly, although I didn’t see it on TV screens or radio broadcasts. It was the day I learned, for the first time, about a deadly new disease called AIDS.

The day started like any other. It was 1989 and I was in Ms. Textar’s fourth grade class, and it was her first day back from a three day absence. I think most people can agree that when you are a kid, in terms of excitement, having a substitute teacher is only second to having off from school altogether. Therefore, the first day the teacher is back is usually pretty miserable.

This day was no exception. Realizing the substitute hadn’t really done anything with us, she was eager to get us caught up, and the morning drudged on with lesson after lesson.

Just when I thought I couldn’t stand it any more, she told us that we would be skipping the regularly scheduled writing lesson, and to clear off our desks because today we were going to learn something new. This was so unlike her that the class took on a rather stunned silence in anticipation of what it could be.

I watched as she began to write HIV/AIDS on the board in big capital letters. It was almost as if in the time it took to write those words, my usual monotone, composed teacher transformed into an impassioned, erratic person. What followed was a rather fanatical rant; they didn’t know where it came from, but it could be passed from person to person, there didn’t seem to be anything that could cure it. I remember her emphasizing that they thought it was particular to people who used drugs, but she was adamant, almost angry, that this wasn’t always true. It turns out that she had just found out her father had the disease, and he was not a drug user, never had been. At this point she became visibly emotional, and continued to scribble on the board all of the information she knew about the disease, almost as if her talking through it was helping her make sense of it herself. She told us what it did to the body, and her vague understanding of how it progressed from HIV to AIDS, that it all had to do with T-Cells. Every time she said something, she had to say more to explain what the previous thing she said meant, and the rant got more and more complicated to understand. My mother was a nurse and I often talked about things like this with her, so I tried my hardest to keep up so I could ask my mom about it when I got home.

All of a sudden the bell rang; it was time for lunch, and I remember leaving class in a bit of hysteria. I still had so many unanswered questions: Could someone in my family get it? How do you know you have it? How long do you live once you get it? How come I’d never heard of it, and my mom was a nurse?

Apparently, I wasn’t the only kid who had questions, and word quickly spread through the school about our “alternate” lesson. When we returned from lunch, we learned that our teacher was meeting with the principal, and I overheard teachers talking about how what she did was inappropriate. For the rest of the day, they split our class up and distributed us throughout the other fourth grade classes, Ms. Textar having been sent home.

When I went home that night, I told my mom what happened and asked her if she knew anything about the disease. I remember her telling me that it wasn’t a new disease, that it had been around for years but no one talked about it because it was believed to be a disease of only gay men, which my mom discounted based on what she’d seen. She told me other information that my teacher hadn’t, like it was transmitted through bodily fluids and blood transfusions.

A few days later when my teacher returned to school, I wanted to tell her what my mom had told me about the disease, because she seemed so confused about it, but it was clear at this point that no one was supposed to bring it up.

Her father died a year later, when I was in the fifth grade. I remember exactly where I was in the hallway when I heard her run out of her room crying at the news he had died.  I think that learning about the disease in the way I did gave me a personal investment in the situation, unlike if I had just learned it from a textbook, and hearing about his death deeply upset me.

It’s sad that some two years later in 1991 when Magic Johnson announced he had HIV, there was still so much that wasn’t talked about with my generation surrounding the disease.

Even though it was a world-wide epidemic, I know that the bastardization of the disease in the United States is real based on my memory, or lack-thereof, in learning about it. Now, just like then, I honestly can’t remember the last time I read a news article about the disease, whether it be a development in treatment, or a new drug that could help. It seems to be a disease lost to my generation.

]]> http://gypsytomysoul.wordpress.com/2008/07/03/lesson-plan-aids/feed/ 0 Gypsy Girl http://gypsytomysoul.wordpress.com/2008/07/03/a-fighting-chance/ http://gypsytomysoul.wordpress.com/2008/07/03/a-fighting-chance/#comments Thu, 03 Jul 2008 05:10:32 +0000 Gypsy to my Soul http://gypsytomysoul.wordpress.com/?p=178 ]]> I suppose I can take some solace in the fact that lots of kids get told by their parents “don’t stare, it’s not nice.” It makes the fact that I might have had a staring problem when I was younger not seem so bad. I only wish someone had told me that in addition to staring not being “nice,” it could actually get me beat up, too.

It only took me one day to learn this lesson, and about two and half years to deal with the repercussions.

It all started in the fourth grade, the day the new girl Tameka, came to my school. I’ve never been the new kid at school, but I imagine the worst time of the day is lunch time; when you have no affiliated group to sit with. To make matters worse, my elementary school had this really stupid practice where they would make the new kid stand in the middle of the cafeteria until a lunch maid assigned them to a lunch table, which was usually about 15 minutes into lunch. It basically meant that everyone stared at them until they were assigned a seat.

Apparently, no one told Tameka this. In typical “new girl” fashion, she was an instant enigma. More importantly, she was strikingly gorgeous, tall for our age, with piercing (read threatening) green eyes and the longest, curliest hair I had ever seen. Now mind you, when I was young we didn’t have an inherent obsession with beauty that stemmed from magazines and television shows filled with emaciated prototypes of the ideal girl, so at that time, her kind of beauty almost seemed unnatural, freakish. That was the reason I was staring at her.

The problem is that of all of the people who stared at her that day, I must have been the one who stared at her the hardest. I didn’t find this out until about a week later, when word around the school from all of her new-found friends was that Tameka was going to beat me up for having an “eye problem.” Crap. Crap. Crap. It seemed pretty lame to explain that the reason I was staring was actually a compliment, sort of. It didn’t help that she was all-together scary, and I had no doubt that she could take me in a fight.

Luckily for me, I always had gymnastics after school, so the after-school beat down never happened. Days turned into weeks and then months, and before long I thought the whole thing had blown over.

Fast forward two years, we are now in the 6^th grade. Strangely enough, we have a mutual friend Marisol, who hangs out with both of us, though never together. It’s a well-known fact that Tameka still doesn’t like me, and at this point I have stored up enough resentment to not like her, also – I mean who holds a grudge over something so stupid for that long, anyway? At this point, if we ended up in the same room together, we had perfected how to co-exist without technically acknowledging each other.

So the night of the school dance, because I was friends with Marisol, and Marisol was friends with Tameka, it became apparent that we were all going to be at the dance together.  I assumed we would not-so-politely ignore each other as we usually did.

This plan seemed to be working until, completely unprovoked, she got smart with me and I snapped. See, she knew and often exploited the fact that I lived in fear that one day she really would beat me up for real, but what she didn’t know was that as time went on, that fear had turned into anger, and I was fed up. At this point I was ready to fight just to get this charade over with, which I said to her in not-so-many words. Crap. Crap. Crap.

Now it’s like I’m the new girl…standing in the middle of a crowded circle in the gymnasium, being stared at by most of the school, while Tameka tries to free herself from Marisol, who has been desperately trying to hold Tameka by the waist to keep her from attacking me. Marisol is screaming for me to run out of sight, while everyone in the crowd is looking at me incredulously for just standing there, waiting to get beat up. (There is no doubt in anyone’s mind, including my own, that Tameka will obliterate me in a fight).

No one understands that I am fed up, though. That this time, I will not give into the fear, I will not run. So I continue to stand there, looking tougher than I feel, telling Marisol to let her go, as Tameka thrashes around in Marisol’s arms trying to break free and make good on my dare. I stand there long enough that Marisol, who has been slowly pulling Tameka towards the door, finally crosses the threshold and they both disappear out of sight.

Just like that, things with Tameka and I ended exactly where they had begun…a stare-down that ended with a stare-down.

I feel that way about Rosario, the boy who I bullied for his lunch through most of the second grade. You see, even though I was from a 5 person household and money was scarce, my mom always seemed to make too much for me to qualify for free lunch. And times were tough. Which meant that there were plenty of days when my mom didn’t have money for me to get the school lunch, so I usually had only a sandwich and a piece of fruit, or sometimes I had nothing at all.

Rosario was unlucky enough to sit across from me at our lunch table; and he always had lunch. And not just regular lunch, either, he had a la carte items, too. See, at my elementary school, they used to send you home with a little Scantron lunch form so your parents could fill out what days you were getting lunch and send in money. In addition to getting the regular school lunch, your parents could pick a la carte items too, like an ice cream sandwich and things like that.

It was kind of a big deal because the a la carte line was separate than the regular food line. In the regular food line you grabbed your milk first, then your cold tray, and then your hot tray, which was placed on top of your cold tray so you could carry it. The a la carte line was separated off and in the center of the cafeteria. Those students who got to stand in the a la carte line seemed like celebrities, the “chosen ones” of cafeteria lunch.

There were plenty of days when I didn’t make it to the regular lunch line, let alone the a la carte line. In fact, I remember only being able to go to the a la carte line twice in my elementary school career, usually for my birthday or some such occasion. Either way, even on days when I was food-less, it wasn’t the regular line that I cared about anyway; it was the a la carte line. That is what I cared about. That is why I felt cheated. It’s sad to realize, but not eating; that I could handle, I was used to that. But having to watch people line up at the a la carte line, that was too much.

So almost everyday, without fail, I bullied Rosario for half of his ice cream sandwich, or a doughnut, or whatever extra item he got from the a la carte line. He used to always try to offer me his actual lunch instead, because apparently he felt the same way about his a la carte items, but I never cared about the food.

I realize looking back on it that it was probably one of my first lessons on the dynamics of class and socio-economics, and not something I’ve entirely escaped. Even as I get older, sometimes I still feel like that little girl – watching the chosen ones, and wanting my own piece of their pie.

About 45 minutes from Philadelphia, Reading is primarily a blue-collar, factory town (even though by now most of them have closed and left the city). This started a long time ago because of the Reading Railroad (yes, the one on Monopoly) bringing business and commerce into the city. When the railroad closed, it became known for Outlet Shopping, (it used to call itself the Outlet Capital of the World). Now they are leaving too. The only other thing we are famous for is The Pagoda, a Japanese-style building that was brought to the city very early on and serves as a common looking point (read make-out spot) that overlooks the city. In some ways, Reading is a dying city, an archetype from an era long gone.

When I think of Reading, these things come to mind…Most people don’t go to college, they get a trade…You can’t walk more than 5 blocks in any direction without running into either a bar or a church, and you can join and pay dues to both…People who are from Reading call it the Baby Factory, partly because Reading is a factory town, but also because the amount of babies produced, especially by teenagers, is astronomical…You rep what part of the city you are from, (Southwest, Southeast, Northwest, Northeast) and you go to elementary and middle school according to that geography. For the most part, these sections of the city also break down by socio-economics first and ethnicity/race second, although the neighborhoods/blocks aren’t necessarily stratified that way…Either way, once it’s time for high school, Reading only has one, The Castle on the Hill, so everyone filters into one huge high school with over 4,000 kids. (the only other high school is a Catholic one) As you can imagine in a school that size, there is a pretty huge disparity between what you learn and what other people at other schools do (a fact I didn’t realize until college) and the drop-out rate is about as bad as the pregnancies…There is a tendency to have a limited world view/perspective, especially by the older generation, and an air of “this is all there is” that can be suffocating to the younger generations…There is a constant stream of negativity mixed with hopelessness that permeates, because for the most part people don’t really hope or dream there, they just live. The only focus on living life in Reading is about getting through it, not out of it. That being said, there’s a lot of fight in people, after all, everything is usually a struggle…Most of the city is made up of row homes, so “moving up” in Reading means going to the not-so-far outskirts to live in Millmont, Birdsboro, Shillington and Mount Penn where you might actually have grass and a front yard…people will tell you that Reading is a middle class town, but in reality not only is Reading not even lower-middle class, it is just lower class, and in some cases lower-lower class …not many people leave Reading, whether it be to travel or go permanently…If you are lucky enough to get out, you mistakenly think that you can return as if nothing has changed, but you can’t. Once you leave, you can never go back, although you don’t know that at the time. You are gone before you knew you left, so you never really get to say goodbye. You spend your whole life thinking Reading is the world, and as soon as you step out of it, you realize how big the world really is. Which is what happened to me.

I don’t mean to imply that growing up there was all bad, because it wasn’t. I have tons of nostalgic moments where the things I miss are sitting on the stoop on summer nights, listening to music from someone’s car stereo, watching for boys going down the street…going to playgrounds in various parts of the city and playing pick-up games (I usually pretended I didn’t know anything about sports so people would think I didn’t know what I was doing, and then I would sneak a pass or get the touchdown) …the 5 and 10 cent candy stores that I went to every morning on the way to school…house parties and school dances… sleepovers at best friends houses…going to the corner sandwich shop for a twin burger.

In some ways, that is the problem. Whenever I visit Reading, I have opposite emotions that seem to contradict themselves. It’s always equally fulfilling and draining, disheartening and motivating, at the exact same time. Not to mention that, inherently, no matter what I say, there will always be a certain source of pride about being from Reading, a certain resiliency and survival spirit that I wear like a badge of honor.

That being said, I don’t mean to overstate the importance of being from Reading, per se. Even though these are my stories that are particular to that place, I think there are things in each story that will resonate for a lot of people, no matter where they are from. I have chosen to focus on Reading because there was a point in my life, that was honestly not that long ago, where being from Reading haunted me, like a ghost I couldn’t escape. The best way I can illustrate that is through the following analogy:

Growing up to meager means and opportunity made me feel like I’d always be a girl who was trying to be a flower when she was really just destined to be a weed…because I always thought that since monumentally great things didn’t happen to people where I came from, that they wouldn’t happen for me, either.

Now I know that although where you come from is a part of you, (and in my case a large part), it doesn’t have to define you, and that great things don’t happen to people, people make great things happen…which means that actually, I am a flower who refuses to settle for being a weed…and in a weird, twisted way, being from Reading is the reason for all of that.

Do you have a story that you think embodies this notion?…

• Was there a moment or event where you did something uncharacteristic, simply out of the need to grow as a person?
• Was there a time when you went against all reason and followed your heart?
• Did a major life event (death of someone close to you, loss of job, end of a relationship etc…) trigger a personal epiphany, leading to changes in your everyday life?
• Do you have an inspiring, transformational journey to share?

If so, I would like to share Your Gypsy Story!!

HOW TO SUBMIT YOUR GYPSY STORY:

1. Email gypsytomysoul@gmail.com with your FULL NAME as well as HOW YOU WOULD LIKE YOUR NAME TO APPEAR IN THE POST. (For instance, Full Name = Anna Joe, How You Would Like It To Appear: AJ).

2. Please list CITY and STATE you are from. (Brooklyn, NY)

3. AGE is OPTIONAL.

4. If you have a blog and would like your blog listed in the signature of your post, include the BLOG LINK in the email.

5. If you would like to include your email at the end of your post for people to be able to comment to you directly, put INCLUDE EMAIL IN POST. (Your email will be kept confidential and will never be used by me other than to communicate with you about your post. )

6. Your story should be no more fewer than 300 words, and no more than 800 words.

7. Please, keep the post content appropriate. No profanity, sexual content etc.

8. You will receive an email confirmation with the link to your post to forward to friends/family as soon as I post it.

If you have any other questions, please email gypsytomysoul@gmail.com.

Angels continually pass
as my demons force-feed me hate
Not even angel wings
could prevent this suicidal leap of faith

The mountain to tell
is too tall to climb
The peace in the clouds
is too hard to find

I search for an answer
but can’t even find a clue
All the while my demons lay dormant
waiting for an excuse.

(I wrote this poem to embody the ways in which we sometimes wrestle with our darker emotions, often times feeling defeated by them.)

Each one…different
One swollen
One heavy
One smearing
Always though,
With no place to drop

Instead, it’s like they disappear
Somewhere between my cheek and my shoulder
Or my mind and my heart

Pulled…
Pooled…

Yet going nowhere.

(I wrote this poem to capture the state of limbo that comes when things are unresolved in your heart and/or in your mind).

Slipping, sliding, smoothing of oils
Skin-to-skin
Palms of life
Touching the parts of me
That are knotted
Working out the kinks of who I am
As I lay there…motionless
Paying for the right
To feel

(I wrote this poem as part of a shot-gun poem cypher one night with friends where we gave each other topics, and ended up loving how it turned out).

Or is my melancholy
More of a purple
The kind that takes you to the deep recesses
Of your predicament
Letting you find strange comfort
In brooding over it
As you wallow in self-pity
Long enough to feel better

Maybe my melancholy
Is much more of a red
The kind that burns from within
And no matter how I try to snuff it out
It flares up again
And leaves only the remains
Of what used to be
My livelihood

Honestly,
I know that ultimately,
My melancholy hue is really white
Burning hot and shining bright
Oddly transparent
Yet blinding my sight
It is the color of what used to be
My inner light

(I wrote this poem to capture the different ways that we feel darker emotions, and equated them to what I felt was an appropriate hue).