The Fan of Fans

the long walk is happening every day. i graduated high school in 2014. four boys i graduated with enlisted in the military. two of them died before their 21st birthday while in active duty. one of them was injured in an ied explosion and honorably discharged in 2018. he took his own life a year later leaving behind his wife and newborn daughter. the fourth served until 2021 when the last of the us troops where pulled from afghanistan. he had pretty intense ptsd and had devolved into alcoholism to cope. two years ago, he was driving under the influence and crashed his car into a transformer. he died en route to the hospital. none of them made it to thirty.

i come from a small town in alabama. there are approximately two mental health facilities not including the ward at the hospital. there are five separate military recruitment centers. every now and then we get a boy lucky enough to make it to college football but most of the boys in this town become cops, mechanics, drug dealers, part time workers or they enlist in the military.

His response: "No, it's my name now."

I went to the pharmacist yesterday, his nametag is my deadname. He informed me he's immigrating and in the process he's changed his first name to my deadname to have an English sounding name. That's why he's now able to get a reprint of his nametag to be my deadname. And repeated, with the intense seriousness of someone who is going to die on this hill: "It's mine now. Not yours. I'm taking." His tone indicated that decision is final.

They can’t fucking think for themselves (or rather, they’re losing the ability). This is not “ooooh technology scary” -- this is a fundamental, they can't fucking answer questions when I ask them to their faces. I fucking HATE when my colleagues roll their eyes and say, "Well, this is how we felt about phones! Just accept it!" First of all, it's different. And TWO! We're FUCKING FIGHTING PHONES every day! We've literally banned all cell phone use during class in my district because letting kids use their phones and not fighting their use in class FUCKED US OVER, and now we have to FIX IT.

I asked my students if it's nice/helpful/good/acceptable/normal to help someone else lift something really heavy they were struggling with. Of course they agree! Then I asked them if it would still be (or explain to them that it isn't) nice/helpful/good/acceptable/normal to help someone lift heavy weights if they are working out at the gym. The answer is no! Because the POINT is that it's hard to do alone! That's why it makes you stronger! (Plus it gives the kids a very funny and therefore memorable visual for the concept. You can play into it and have a laugh with the kids at how weird someone would be if they did that!)

I often used "Don't lift their weights!" as a shorthand when a student was trying to give another kid the right answer.