Advice: Wanted or Unwanted?

In one of the well-known baseball strips, Charlie Brown says, "The world is filled with people who are anxious to function in an advisory capacity."

I'm feeling the burden of that right now. Social media gives all of us the opportunity to function in an advisory capacity--instantly. There are friends who legitimately seek out your opinion, and then there are retailers and news outlets who ask you how you feel because your participation is money in the bank for them.

Some days it is far too simple. People doling out opinions you disagree with are therefore tiring and unnecessary. Others who articulate beautifully what you yourself think are helpful and refreshing. Discussions where both parties truly listen before responding seem nonexistent.

Yet this morning I asked my friends on Facebook to help me figure out the dynamics of school closure announcements and the result was wonderful. We didn't all share the same point of view. But everyone was respectful, and I was really able to learn something. The experience lifted my spirits.

I'm going to spend most of my very cold day at home working on projects around the house, including making some progress on a rag rug I have been working on for months. When it is finished it will be colorful, a bit asymmetrical, slightly lumpy, and beautiful. I probably won't post any pictures of it because I don't want to subject it (or myself) to helpful advice or even constructive criticism.

Sometimes you just want to keep things to yourself. I think today is a good day to hunker down and do just that.

Posted with Blogsy

Comments

Teacher Gifts

Today is the last day of school before the Winter Break. It’s a good time to remember the far-reaching nature of our public school system. You may not have children. You may have sent your children to independent schools. It matters not. You will be impacted one way or another. Yesterday I read a long thread on Facebook about several waves of illness in the schools right now. There’s influenza A and norovirus, I believe. And of course there’s COVID. Apparently in some individual schools the rate of illness is high enough for school admin to notify parents. When I was little the acceptable holiday gift for a teacher was one of those lovely floral handkerchief squares. (I don’t know what it was for male teachers. They were rare in my elementary years.) These days the range of teacher gifts is wider and I have fond memories of Target gift cards which I have written about before. I think it’s safe to say that giving one’s teacher Influenza, norovirus, or COVID is not the ideal holiday...

They Can Wait

This is not a typical Saturday post. That’s because, in my community, it’s not a typical Saturday. Oakland Mills High School, after years of deferred repair, needs massive renovation. It’s pretty simple: when you don’t fix a problem it gets bigger. The school system itself said the the OMHS school building was "no longer conducive to learning" back in 2018. 2018 . But Thursday the Boad of Education voted to push it out of the lineup of important projects which will be given the go-ahead to proceed soonest. In my opinion it’s a terrible decision and sets a dangerous precedent. To explain, here’s the advocacy letter I sent in support of Oakland Mills High School. I was rather proud of it. I am writing to ask you to proceed with needed renovation at Oakland Mills High School in the most timely and comprehensive manner humanly possible. I have read the letter sent to you by the Oakland Mills Community Association and I am in complete agreement. You are extremel...

Separate and Unequal

Remember “Separate but equal”? Remember how that really meant that Black schools languished in broken-down buildings without adequate heat or toilet facilities, with cast-off, ragged learning materials, underfunded and largely ignored? The Supreme Court struck that down in 1954. The evidence was clear that separate was not equal. Plessy v Ferguson had led to - - no, endorsed - - deeply unequal schooling and opportunities. We tend to think of Brown v Board as being purely about racial integration. It was not. It was about the logical consequences of segregation. And they were not, not, not equal. The ruling in 1954 didn’t transform public education for non-whites into a land of milk and honey by any means. But it articulated some essential truths in a way that made including everyone a legal precedent which could be relied upon and built upon. It was better than what came before it but it rested upon unsteady ground. It did not necessarily change the hearts or minds ...

Village Green/Town²

Search This Blog