Ten Things . . . The Stories Behind the Stories

Toni wanted to know more about a couple of the Ten Things I've Done That You Probably Haven't, so here's some back-story.

If you want to learn more about any of the other eight, just let me know.

3. Came out as a lesbian in a letter to the editor of my local newspaper.

You can actually read all about how that came about here, the letter itself here, and the results here.

10. Had a cop walk in to my classroom while I was teaching (7th grade), ask for a student by name (one of my favorites, as you can imagine) and later arrest him for attempted murder.

My first year out of college, I taught in an inner-city Houston middle school. There was a lot of gang activity there, and over the Easter break, a 7th grade boy (not one of my students) was shot and killed by one of the gangs.

Really awful, and yet, sadly, not very surprising.

The student who was arrested was one of the gang members involved. My understanding is that he was charged with attempted murder, rather than murder, because they didn't think they could prove that he was actually the one who fired the fatal shot, but he was definitely shooting.

That was the only year I taught there, but a friend of mine who was teaching 8th grade had him in her class the next year. So, I guess he somehow managed to get off.

This kid made my life a living hell for 45 minutes everyday, so the day I found out that he'd be in jail through the end of the semester just may have been the highlight of my year. As you can imagine, the whole experience was quite an eye-opener for me.