White knuckles and prayers

 Some days are just hard.  On such days, I cannot deny that it is prayer that gets me through.  Some days, I pray the entire drive to school.  I outline my struggles.  I ask for help.  I am desperate for it.

My prayers are always answered.  Maybe not best-day-ever answered, but I keep on surviving.

So many kind people tell me they are praying for me.

I wonder if those prayers sustain me on the days that I am not white knuckle praying my way to school, on the days that I feel pretty good.

I don't know, but I appreciate the prayers all the same!

There are people I pray for too.  People in my family are going through real and intense struggles.  I have friends who are going through hard times.  It makes me wish I could do more.  I wish I could just fix everything.  It feels feeble when all I have are prayers, but then when I consider how much I appreciate the prayers of others, maybe my prayers are worth more than I imagine.

I'm grateful, as ever, for counterweights.  Life is never always gloomy.

I am less tired than last week.  A lot less tired.  I am still tired, but it is more manageable.  We had YEN (Young Empty Nesters) on Monday at Rod and Kim's house.  It was a good time.  We love YEN. Everyone brings really good food and no matter who we sit by, we always have a good conversation.  

One of Adam's coworkers lives in Louisiana and sent us a King Cake for Mardi Gras.  We took a big pot of baked beans to YEN, but took the King Cake along too.  It was surprisingly good for a cake that had been mailed to us.  Also, it was a conversation piece (no one found the baby inside--it must be in the leftovers we brought home).

The big exciting thing that happened yesterday was I gave my students another fractions on the number line quiz and they did substantially better.  It helps when I am at school and, you know, teaching.  Who'd have guessed....

Also at school, we read about the first African American U.S. Senator.  None of them knew what African American meant.  I explained that all of us, except Native Americans, have ancestors that came from somewhere else.  The children of immigrants lit up.  This was something they understood.  Some of the others looked at me with skepticism.  "I think I'm just from here...."

"Yes, you are, but somewhere in the past, your family came from another country."

We talked about it a few minutes and I explained how far back, my ancestors came from places like Great Britain and Sweden.  We are all immigrants.

It's my tiny effort to plant in them the idea that immigrants are a good and important part of our country.  The news makes me feel helpless, but I can counteract racism in my small domain.  That and bribe them with Takis to finish their lessons. 

Here's to keep on keepin' on.  Some days I am barely scraping by, some days are much better.  It's all adding up to my life and the lessons and formation of character I need.