Mom’s Birthday

“Anywho… I’ll go ahead and try to wrap this up. Hope you boys have a wonderful day. Love you lots. And hey, these long messages aren’t so bad, huh? It’s either the radio or me that you get to listen to. HA! Oh, one last thing, speaking of radio… tune into 101.3 in at 8:57 for Don Blue’s morning blooper call. Okay, I’m really going to go now. I promise. Okie dokie. Love you.” [Click]

Whew! I look at the “time of call” counter on my mobile phone: three minutes and fifteen seconds. The longest voicemail this week, but still a minute and a half shy of last Wednesday’s message. I laugh aloud.

It’s become part of my morning ritual: rise, run, shower, eat, bike to CalTrain, settle into a seat, and spend the ride to the next station (or two) listening to the voicemail(s) my dad left for me and my brother.

My dad breaks-up his early morning commute from the “Far East Bay” to the Peninsula with calls to my brother Jeff and I. (The “Far East Bay,” as a friend living in Oakland once explained, is the area east of the Caldecott tunnel. Only Oakland, Berkeley, and the communities sandwiched between the San Francisco Bay and the tunnel are considered the “real” East Bay.) Jeff is usually getting ready for class up in Chico at this time, one of a small group who elect to take Organic Chemistry at 8:00 AM. I am on my morning run through the Presidio in San Francisco when dad calls. He has his phone programmed so he can send us joint morning voice mails.

The messages range from “quick,” relatively speaking, two-minute “happy Monday” check-ins, to three-minute updates about the weather in Danville (where my parents live), to four-minute “voice potpourri” ramblings, complete with traffic information (on roads Jeff and I don’t ride), music trivia (no, dad, I don’t know the name of the first album the Archies released), and extended bits where my dad pretends to be a radio DJ, his “voice” a mix of Wolfman Jack and that guy from the Shane Company commercials.

At least American Idol is in production, and not currently airing. Last season he would leave messages recapping the show (neither Jeff nor I own a television) and “sing” whatever song Katharine McPhee had performed the night before. It always made me laugh imagining what other commuters must be thinking when they pass my dad on the highway or pull up next to him at a stop sign and he’s singing and dancing to “Black Horse and the Cherry Tree.”

Over the past two weeks, however, the theme of my dad’s messages has been about my mom’s 50th birthday.

My mom is like many in a lot of families: believed by her sons and husband to be the best mother and wife in the world. In our case, though, it’s true.

My mom was born in October 1956 in the tiny village of Szentgotthárd, Hungary. This was the height of the Hungarian Revolution, a bloody and chaotic uprising against the Soviet communist regime. Hungary had fallen under the sphere of influence of the Soviet Union, which ousted the freely elected Hungarian government and imposed a communist government that intimidated a nation, imprisoned and executed thousands of civilians, sent the Hungarian economy into hyperinflation, and burned-to-the-ground the bakery and home of my great-grandfather.

Immediately after my mom’s birth, her parents had the opportunity to escape to Austria. In the dark of night, with less than $5 to their name, they left their homeland. My nagymama and nagypapa then flew to the United States seeking political amnesty. They made a home in Allentown, Pennsylvania, before trekking west to southern California where some extended family had settled.

My mother, however, remained in Hungary. As a newborn she was too young, small, and frail to escape the Communist regime and make a dash for freedom. She was raised by her aunt and grandmother until, as a six-year-old, her parents had saved enough money to fly her to the United States. In 1962 she was reunited with her parents in Orange County, California for the first time since she was born on the other side of the world, into a different political world.

Over the next 44 years my mom would learn English; become an older sister; get sent home from Catholic school for wearing too short skirts on free dress day; work through high school at Alpha Beta grocery store where she met my dad; get married; attend Long Beach State while working as a travel agent; drop-out from college after two years to work full-time so my dad, after balancing community college and 50+ hour work weeks, could graduate from Cal State Fullerton; become a mother of one, then of two boys; help us move and build a home in northern California where my dad found a new job but where we had no family; send me crying to my room in second grade to rewrite the cursive alphabet hundreds of times over; serve as team mom for the soccer, basketball, and baseball teams on which Jeff and I played; nurse us through headaches, stomachaches, earaches, and puppy-love aches; perfect a fusion cuisine of eastern European and American dishes; cry with pride watching me deliver the student address at my college graduation; cry with pride moving my brother into his new home for four years of college in Chico; celebrate 30 years of marriage; build a group of girlfriends that get together to play bunko every month; and teach our household of three boys (my dad, Jeff, and me) that the most powerful and important thing in the world is a mother’s love for her family.

To thank mom and show her our love, my dad had taken on the role of project leader for her 50th birthday surprise celebration.

Mom’s actual birthday was midweek, on a Wednesday. Her parents, who still lived in southern California, were planning to visit that coming weekend. Jeff would, unfortunately, due to school and work obligations, be stuck in Chico. I would meet up with everyone in San Francisco over the weekend. Such was the plan we set in motion.

On Wednesday evening, dad took mom to dinner. When they returned home, Lauren and I were there with flowers to toast my mom on her special day. Surprise number one.

Surprise number two: dad told mom that he was taking her on a short trip Thursday night and on Friday. He would not answer any questions regarding specifics, except to tell her to pack a small bag for sunny weather. They would be back in time for nagymama and nagypapa’s visit on Saturday morning.

Mom figured they were going to head north the next day, perhaps to camp in the mountains. Instead, she found herself at the Oakland airport on Thursday night. What she didn’t know is that Jeff and I had rendezvoused there as well. We settled into a great “lookout” point across the designated gate where dad had told us to meet. We spotted mom because she was glowing with excitement and anticipation, bubbling with a childlike curiosity about where my dad was taking her.

Jeff and I felt like kids again when we used to pretend we were secret spies. We dove onto the ground and did a military crawl across the carpeted floor to the neighboring gate. We got some funny looks from fellow travelers, but mom was so giddy that she didn’t notice us approaching her from behind. Mom and dad were leaning against, and facing away from, a vendor’s cart that had closed for the day.

“Excuse me, “ I said in my ridiculously awful fake English accent. “Would you like any coffee?”

“No thank—“ my mom started to reflexively answer without turning around. She caught us out of the corner of her eye. “OHMYGOSH! OHMYGOSH! BOYS!”

Mom started crying and we all hugged. “What are you doing here? Where are we going?” she asked.

“Happy birthday!” Jeff and I announced.

We all got onto the plane heading to southern California, but mom not entirely sure of where we were going. “Are we going to visit my parents?” she asked. We all knowingly smiled and stayed mum.

On the plane we laughed and joked together, catching up on each other’s happenings and warm with love.

Upon landing my mom caught on, somewhat. We pulled into a hotel near Disneyland. “Are we going to Disneyland?! I haven’t been to Disneyland in over a dozen years! I love Disneyland!”

Indeed, the next morning, we all made our way to “the happiest place on earth.” Watching my mom, all smiles, I believed it was.

We made it through the gates and started walking down Main Street, USA when my mom let out a giant scream. Her parents snuck up from behind and surprised her. Mom was nearly out of tears, but a few more trickled down her face. We all embraced and laughed some more. Joy is the only way to describe what my mom felt. And together, as three generations of family, we spent 16 hours — from it’s opening at 8:00 AM to it’s close at midnight — exploring and experiencing Disneyland.

The next day, Saturday, we enjoyed a large brunch. Nagymama took mom out shopping; Jeff and I played tennis with nagypapa, who ran us all over the court before beating us by three games apiece; and dad went to get some last-minute supplies for one last surprise.

When mom and nagymama returned home from an afternoon of shopping, a chorus of “SURPRISE!” greeted my mom at the door. Our large extended family had all gathered for a birthday barbecue and to celebrate my mom. Again, more screams of shock and happiness and tears of laughter.

The party was wonderful. Jeff and I manned the barbeque, each family member brought a dish of food, and nagymama prepared a large assortment of Hungarian pastries. There was lots of family gossip, laughing, clanking of wine glasses, dancing, loud debating of politics, and picture taking. It was a perfect end to a perfect weekend for a perfect mom.

The next Monday, on my way to work, my phone flashed a signal indicating I had a message.

“Hi boys. Dad here. Just want to say thank you for helping to organize a magical weekend for mom. I know she really appreciated it. We are lucky to have you as sons. Have a great Monday. Love you lots. Oh, I heard Kelly Clarkson is going to be going on tour soon. You wanna’ join mom and I? Kelly can really sing. A mooo-ment like this…!”

Happy birthday, mom. We love you!

Always,
J.R. Atwood

Learning To Learn

I have engaged in a rigorous session of self-evaluation over the course of the last few weeks, triggered, in part, by a number of factors:

(1) I am a nearing the age of 25. This isn’t old, but it’s… older.

(2) I have started to receive wedding invitations in the mail from some friends. A few have even bought houses. If there was any doubt that we were growing up, it has since been erased.

And (3), October and November is application season. Helping my students to complete their forms for undergraduate study stirs my own ambitions to return to graduate school. Where and when to go? Questions to explore.

The best way to work through my wants, needs, and goals is to make everything bite-size, otherwise I’ll find myself entrenched in a deep and isolating period of pensiveness. (I was in that situation twice in college, and it was only with the dogged determination of a few close friends that I was able to kick myself free from living in a world of ideas and ideals.)

The issue for today: Why do I do the work that I do?

I am the Director of Student Life for an organization that works with motivated, first-generation college-bound high school students to help them succeed academically, personally, and professionally. In part, I design and implement programming that supplements and supports our students’ “in classroom” academic experience to create well-rounded critical thinkers and competitive college applicants. We do this with a comprehensive personal and leadership development program that includes service learning projects, community service opportunities, experiential and project-based workshops, retreats, backpacking trips, international travel and immersion opportunities, internships, arts programs (dance, music, visual art), student-led clubs, social events, and cultural outings.

For where I am in my life, this is my dream job. I get to work with high school students everyday and help them explore and pursue their passions. This grounds me in the wonderfully naive world of adolescence where it is truly believed that good people with good ideas are all that’s necessary to end global hunger and perpetuate peace. They see “the real world” as a global community and recognize the superficial demarcations that so often divide us — developed vs. undeveloped countries; Republicans vs. Democrats; Judeo-Christian theology vs. Islam; nuclear nation-states vs. non-nuclear nation-states; the have’s vs. the have-not’s; black vs. white; rich vs. poor — as scars that can, should, and will be healed.

I came here to facilitate this kind of thinking. I believed I could be, and wanted to be, a provocative life mentor, someone to inspire teens to dream big and think critically, just as I was inspired by Ms. Seabury, Coach Trevor, Ms. Johnson, Coach Huntsman, Mr. Rice, and Mr. Geernaert throughout my student career at Monte Vista High School.

***

Most of our students are immigrants or first-generation immigrants. Some are undocumented. There is a toxic and hazardous waste facility with a long history of violations and pollution in the city I work. This community is surrounded by affluence: in the two neighboring towns, the per-capital income averages over $55,000 and nearly 75% of the adult population has a bachelor’s or advanced degree. Yet in this city, the figures are $14,000 and 11%, respectively. (The national average of per-capital income is $22,000.) There is no public high school here, so students are bused to neighboring districts. Nor is there a grocery store in this city of 30,000. There are, however, two McDonald’s in its 2.5 square-mile radius. The asthma and cancer rates are the highest in the county; the violent crimes rate near the highest in the entire country.

I share this census data to explore another motivation for pursuing this work: the want to help improve the political landscape, social climate, and educational infrastructure of this community. I wanted to save kids from becoming victims of such unfair circumstances.

One of our staff members is the former mayor of this city and a longtime activist. She still serves as its mother and protector. My second day here, she took me lunch. She told me that the most paralyzing reality her city endures is the arrogant and patronizing attitude, no matter how sincere, that students and this community “need my help.” “Our biggest issues are that which others presuppose. You need to learn before you can teach. You need to get over yourself before you can learn.”

And that is why I am here. While I came to teach, I stay to learn.

My previously conceived notions and politics are challenged every single day, especially on issues of immigration, environmental racism, institutional discrimination, and the public education system. I still struggle to confront my own “issues,” a scary and difficult process of self-evaluation. But it is an important and necessary journey, one that I take with my students.

We share stories of our families and home life. We explain the history and politics of our communities. We empathize with each other about the exhausting quest to seek validation from peers, while also searching for a unique self-identity. We analyze the influence of the media and question the structure of the education system. We share our faiths and the wells from which we find hope, promise, and beauty in the world. We explore our fears and insecurities. We encourage each other to pursue our passions and achieve our goals. We explore issues of race. We talk about the people who have disappointed us in our lives. We admit that we have disappointed ourselves, sometimes. We talk about the type of people we want to become.

Together, we’re learning to learn.

Wandering and wondering,
J.R. Atwood

150 Years of Ideas About Education

The Atlantic Monthly is celebrating its 150th year of publishing with a monthly series of archival excerpts about various topics and ideas. This month the magazine reflects on ideas about education. Click here to read the fascinating collection of essays.

Saving Pennies Makes Cents

Jamie Malernee of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel published an informative, perhaps an even empowering, article about 20- and 30-somethings who, “foreseeing a murky future of stagnant salaries, soaring housing costs and vanishing retirement benefits are working hard to avoid the financial fiasco so many of their generation are sliding into.” Click here to read “Not all young adults are saving slackers.”