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Showing posts with the label memoirs

Love and Hope and Children's Books

Dear Kim, Last week I was asked to comment on a recent book banning that occurred in an elementary school. Part of my reflection included: "... Yes, at 14, my life was different. No longer was I anxious about settling a drunk mother to sleep or watching her slowly (then suddenly) kill herself. Instead I was worried about taking a t-shirt without asking my new stepsister, aware that little belonged to me in this new house with this new family. The problems weren't equal, but they were still teen worries, anxieties, things that consumed my mind and spread like cancer, eating all other thoughts.  At school, where people tried to make me memorize the Latin names for chemical elements, or saw me smiling and joining every after school club; people couldn't know how hard I was fighting. Fighting to keep the worries away. Fighting to understand who I was, who I wanted to be, and even if I wanted the gift of life. That fight is not unique. All kids are fighting. They n...