I Was Not The Kind Of A

As I Entered This World, I Would Leave Behind The Nurturing Of My Family And My Home, But In Another Sense I Would Take Their Protection With Me. The Lessons I Had Learned, The Feelings Of Groundedness And Belonging That Have Been Woven Into My Character There, Would Be My Companions On The Journey.

My Father Was A Tomato Farmer. There Is The Phrase That Says He Or She Worked Their Fingers To The Bone, Well, That's My Dad. And He Was A Very Good Man.

Child Psychologists Have Demonstrated That Our Minds Are Actually Constructed By These Thousands Of Tiny Interactions During The First Few Years Of Life. We Aren't Just What We're Taught. It's What We Experience During Those Early Years - A Smile Here, A Jarring Sound There - That Creates The Pathways And Connections Of The Brain. We Put Our Kids To Fifteen Years Of Quick-cut Advertising, Passive Television Watching, And Sadistic Video Games, And We Expect To See Emerge A New Generation Of Calm, Compassionate, And Engaged Human Beings?

Since I Couldn't Actuate The Things That I Wanted To Do, The Only Weapon I Had Was To Say No.

I Was Fortunate Enough To Have Been Raised To A Certain Point Before I Got Into The Race Thing. I Had Other Views Of What A Human Is, So I Was Never Able To See Racism As The Big Question. Racism Was Horrendous, But There Were Other Aspects To Life.