If you're family then you are anxiously awaiting Halloween pics. If you're not family you may be delightfully surprised to get a break from what you thought would be my obligatory Halloween post to show off my most adorable Snow White and the 2 dwarfs (who remained *dwarfed* for exactly 3 minutes, long enough to get a few shots of them screaming bloody murder over the bearded hats I made them wear!) but due to some technical difficulties and not wanting to spend an hour down loading ALL the pictures on my camera to get the 8 from Halloween posted, I'm delaying that post for this one.
Because you see, I am amazed EACH day that I go to pick Olivia up from school (her dad has drop off and I have pick up, its a nice little plan if I do say so myself) by what I encounter. Olivia's school is in what I would refer to as an *interesting* neighborhood. And at the risk of sounding like a suburban snob (which I deny to my core but is probably undeniably true) is one that our family may not normally venture into.
Which, in fact, is one of the appealing factors of this school. As long as its in the daytime.
On our way to the school from our house (which MIGHT be 2 miles) we experience some drastic cultural changes. And I'm not talking about racial kinda culture, I'm probably more talking about socioeconomic culture and therefore general social culture. I might make a point to one day count the number of boarded up houses on the street we drive on, but my best guess would be 25. That's a lot of plywood.
This morning on the way I noticed a guy sitting on his front stoop with a toddler who looked easily like she was not quite 1. She had on a summertime onsie with no jacket, pants, socks or shoes standing on the concrete. I couldn't help but glance at the car thermometer... 53 degrees. Holy H1N1 opportunity, Batman! I *might have* talked to myself out loud about the guy letting that little baby do that.
I pulled up in front of O's school where I wait for her classroom door to be opened and I go and sign her out for the day. As I was waiting this pimped out car (is that a term the young kids are still using?) complete with those spinning rims and a bumper sticker on the back window (? is that in style now too?) that said, "Only haters talk sh*t". Nice. The guy got out wearing a fine urban get-up including a tilted ball cap with rhinestone writing and a lit cigarette dangling from his lips. Hmmm. Hadn't seen that parent before. He marched right up to the preschool door Olivia should be coming out of. I KNOW my mouth was hanging wide open as I waited to see if he was going to put out the cigarette before he picked up his kid. Nope. Interesting.
Then (there's more???) as I was signing Olivia out for the day, the teacher nearly plowed me over on her way to *address* 2 teenage girls who had their faces painted like skeletons. She told them to stop peeking their heads in the preschool windows and scaring the little kids (ummm... yeah, that would be my little kid, thankyouverymuch). The teacher went on to tell me about how she had to shoo them away earlier and that the next step was to call the police. Again, nice! When I asked why they weren't in school (something I thought the teacher might have mentioned) she said, "Oh, they are probably suspended." Good idea, release them from being the school's problem so they can come and harass my 3 year old. Thankk you, Dayton Public.
So, these are the people in the neighborhood! Hey, I bet you don't get this in the suburbs!
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2 comments:
you said you wanted to stay in NYC, so a little of NYC came to see you in Dayton, just to make you feel at home. :) actually, we don't usually have all that, except maybe on the subway, oh, and in Elena's swim team locker room.
E your blogs are so funny to me! I miss you!!
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