"I believe the children are our are future/Teach them well and let them lead the way/Show them all the beauty they possess inside"
- Whitney Houston, The Greatest Love of All
Yes. I went there. I got good and cliché for a moment.
Hear me out.
I truly do believe our children are our future – because they are. When I was growing up, my parents taught me many skills – but the most important lesson that they taught me was that I was going to grow up and live a better life than they did. As Caribbean immigrants, we grew up in a household that was relatively strict (as strict as probably was acceptable and allowed in the States), and my brother and I always knew that we were going to be successful at something. We had a healthy fear of our parents – we knew that talking back, getting less than a 90 on an exam, sassing a teacher, or getting suspended were all crimes punishable by a ‘cut tail’ or ‘allyuh teef (teeth) lik out yuh mout’.
I’m sure you get the drift.
Our current generation is our future, too. After all, at some point, eventually (though the thought of it scares me) we will die, and the current generation will be our age…working in the world…having children of their own, husbands and wives of their own, businesses of their own…
Doesn’t the thought just scare you shitless?
It certainly scares me. And I love children. But the direction that this generation has taken is quite the frightening one. My daughter and I went to the library today, as is our usual practice, to do homework and to read and in general, spend quality time together, and the like. The library has always been a quiet place to do this sort of thing. More and more I have noticed, however, that the JHS and younger HS students from the local school hang out and around the library for lack of anything better to do. They were being rowdy and were subsequently asked to leave by the librarian. An argument ensued, the kid in question called their mom – and that’s when all hell broke loose. The next thing you know, the mom is in the librarian’s face and the children – hyped up by the potential fight – have begun knocking all of the books off of the library shelves.
Now. We won’t get into how the parent was the one who started knocking everything off in anger, or how the cops were called and the library was eventually evacuated. (You read me right.) What we will discuss is when the cops arrived, how some of the kids began to slowly sit and calm down because they had priors. #blankeffingstare
Priors? You’re fourteen!!! What the hell were you doing that caused you to…you know what, never mind…smdh…
The point of it all is that our children have taken a disturbing turn. I can’t blame them alone. One of their biggest problems is their parents themselves. Being a single mom, I fight every day to ensure that my daughter receives all the love and care and education that she will need to be successful, so as to combat the stereotypes already being thrust at her. And I will give her father his due – he may not be the ideal father, and we may no longer be friends – but we both have a vested interest in the well being and development of our daughter. She will not be a statistic. Other parents, however, are not holding up their end of the bargain. Whatever happened to setting the example? To modeling positive behaviors and encouraging said behavior? Hell, what happened to being the adult?
Part of the other problem is my taxes. I know… you’re probably like, what the hell is KP rambling on about now? You see, I was of the mistaken impression that a portion of my tax money paid to the state goes to education and its systems. So when I hear that these same children that loiter outside and inside said library no longer have their last period classes because the state has cut their funding and so they couldn’t go to afterschool, the same school system that asks my child for paper towels, Ziploc bags, calculators and correction tape on their school supply list because the Department of Education cannot afford to buy these things for their teachers…well, then I just wonder why I’m paying taxes. Because if it’s for metal detectors and for staff that don’t even know the students they teach, well, I just don’t know about paying my taxes for this broken system.
But in essence, after all the finger pointing is done…what are the other three fingers pointing toward? A child’s surroundings and living circumstance is only one portion of the equation. At some point – you, as said child, have to care. You have to recognize within you that you are better. There are all sorts of positive influences and resources in every neighborhood to aid you in such. You have to know that hanging out side on the corner, play fighting and disrespecting adults as they walk by is not okay. Or throwing cut parties everyday – at some point, you have to know that you will not graduate if you continue to do so. You have to understand that a GED is not the answer – that is, if you are in the ninth grade and are ‘tired’ of school, you do not jump to take your GED, you suck it up and make it through school because finishing school gives you more options. A GED is for the people who cannot finish high school via traditional means and have no other alternative. It is not a test for the lazy.
And for us adults – we have to keep pushing our kids to care…because if we don’t…if we don’t…this is the generation that will be running the hospices and nursing homes that we will be residing in…and they will not know 2 plus 2 without a calculator, they will not know what a multiplication table is…they will not be able to discern that Africa is a continent and not a country…James Joyce will be a Marvel comic book character to them…and the SAT? Well that just means to sit...that is, if we don’t do some thing now…and I’m not exaggerating.
One.
Bit.
One.
Bit.
Because I believe the children are our future…and right now…that SCARES me.
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