Sunday, October 5, 2008

Obama trip photo



This is a photo from last weekend. A number of high schools went to the event, including a couple from Montgomery County, which is why, ahem, the racial makeup of the photo isn't quite representative of BCPSS. Several of the students in this photo are my students or former students, though, and my center fielder next year is the kid on the left in the gray hoodie making an "o" with his fingers. He runs like a gazelle and was able to get around on some of the best pitchers in the city last year as a 9th grader; I look forward to watching him continue to grow as a player. I bet he'll be the fastest player in the city this year.

I'm not in the photo. When this was being taken, I was in the back of the building, assisting with an emergency surgery on a student. Thankfully, there was a pharmacy right next door where I was able to get tweezers, gauze, and hydrogen peroxide. And that was definitely the strangest story of the weekend, but, unfortunately, I can't get into any more of the pretty funny details. The moral of the story, though, is to look where you're sitting before you sit down.

Neither the school itself, nor the teachers, had any hand in organizing the trip. It was actually organized by a Mongomery County student, and later some adults were asked by these organizers to go on the trip as well. One kid bragged to us that he had checked, and that he couldn't be suspended for any behavior on the trip, because it wasn't a school trip.

At the last minute, funding for the trip fell through (probably because the donor was a broker, and the financial crisis occurred), so all the teachers chipped in $50, and the kids each $10, for the trip to occur. The weekend was very disorganized, and sort of put me out of whack for a whole week because of no weekend and little sleep, but I'm sure glad I went. It's so cool to have been part of an important political movement, and, more importantly, to see kids actively engaged in the world in which they live. And if Virginia goes for Obama, which I think it might, it sure will feel great.

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