Girl, 10, Arrested for Using Knife to Cut Food at School

A friend of mine sent this article to me.

A 10-year-old Florida girl faces felony weapons charges after bringing a small steak knife to school to cut up her lunch, according to a report on WFTV.com.

School officials say the Ocala 5th grader had brought a piece of steak for her lunch, and had brought a steak knife. According to the report, a couple of teachers took the utensil and called authorities, who arrested the girl and took her to the county’s juvenile assessment center."She did not use it inappropriately. She did not threaten anyone with it. She didn't pull it out and brandish it. Nothing of that nature," explained Marion County School Spokesman Kevin Christian, who added that it made no difference what the knife was being used for, they had no choice but to call police.

"Anytime there's a weapon on campus, yes, we have to report it and we aggressively report it because we don't want to take any chances, regardless," Christian said.

The girl now faces a felony charge for possessing a weapon on school property and has been suspended from school for 10 days.

My first reaction was, "Are you fucking kidding me?" This school's administration called police on an 11 year old child and had her arrested for having lunch. You know that this kid's mom probably was packing her lunch and thought, my baby can't eat the steak without having a knife to cut it. And, for that matter, this child probably just learned how to cut her meat on her own.

The administration's position is that they have to call the police, no matter what, if a weapon is found on campus. This type of blanket rule is ridiculous. A steak knife, accompanied by a steak, is not a weapon. It is an eating utensil. But because the school "had no choice" this poor little girl will be scarred for life over trying to eat her lunch properly.

And does the school have no choice in what punishment it hands down? Are they forced to suspend her for 10 days? I am infuriated. Not only are they attacking a, by their own account, innocent girl, they are casting a shadow over proper table manners.

Honestly. How much harm could an 11 year old girl armed with a single steak knife do? I get that they probably did need to punish her in some way, just to send the message to the other kids that no matter what, knives are not accepted, but two weeks' suspension? People, when I found out I had a D in English, I stole a blank report card, filled it out, forged my teacher's name, had my mom sign the fake, and in turn forged her name on the original and when I got caught I only got 3 days' suspension.

Marion County School, I hate you and I hate your assface.

I'm Tight With The Universe

In my pursuit for all things hokey and spiritual, I signed up for daily affirmation emails from The Universe.

Yes. The Universe and I are friends. And every day (during the week. The Universe needs to get it's drink on during weekends too people) I get a morning email from The Universe with a little hopeful happy message and it just sets my day right.

Last week was my birthday and I received a special message, just for me:

A few years back, not so long ago, heaven and earth erupted into a major celebration with the news of your impending adventure into this very time and space. You see, someone like Susan Kent doesn’t come along all that often. In fact, there’s never been a single one like you, nor is there ever ANY possibility that another will come again. You’re an Angel among us. Someone, whose eyes see what no others will EVER see, whose ears hear what no others will EVER hear, and whose perspective and feelings will NEVER, ever be duplicated. Without YOU, the Universe, and ALL THAT IS, would be sadly less than it is.

Quite simply:

You’re the kind of person, Susan,
Who’s hard to forget,
A one-in-a-million
To the people you’ve met.
Your friends are as varied
As the places you go,
And they all want to tell you
In case you don’t know:
That you make a big difference
In the lives that you touch,
By taking so little
And giving so much!

Susan, you are so AWESOME! For your birthday, friends and angels from every corner of the Universe, including buddies you didn’t know you had, will be with you to wish you the HAPPIEST of Birthdays and an exciting new year in time and space. You won’t be alone!

I love The Universe. And the Universe loves me right back.

Have You Seen This?

My friend Cootie e-mailed me a link to this. It is brilliant.

Mom Strikes again

So I sit down to write and I forget. I had a specific topic in mind and I forgot. Within 35 seconds. I sat. I opened my file. All the while I knew what I wanted to write about. The email opens and I type, "So I sit down to write".

And thanks to $150 per session therapy, I know that what I'm doing is called avoidance. What I'm going through is apparently too much for me and I can't mentally handle it.

It's obviously, about my mother.And as I write more comes back. Like the part about how when I talked to my sister I was discussing how I thought Mom had actually started this whole thing with a Google on what breast cancer metastasizes to. She found pancreas. Then she found the symptoms of pancreatic cancer. Then she imitated those symptoms and took herself in for testing.

She starves herself so that she has the "losing weight" symptom.

She hurts her back lifting a concrete birdbath, but makes sure everyone knows that back pain is a symptom of pancreatic cancer.

She called me to say that she was having a PET scan to look for pancreatic or liver cancer and that she called only because I requested to be informed of all health-related occurrences.

"I hate to ruin your day, but you said you wanted to know."

I thanked her for keeping me in the loop and asked when she'd get results.

"December 10."

"Okay. Call me when you find out."

So, at 8 PM on December 10, I call her to find out what's going on since I haven't heard from her all day.
Mom's not there. She's at work.
My sister A is picking up pizza.
V - who answered the phone - is on IM with her friend.

I ask V to have A call when she gets home.
An hour passes. (My hometown is 1 mile square in area.) So, I call back.
V answers again.
Me: Did you forget to tell A?
Her: No. She's getting out of the shower.

I end up on the phone with A and find out that they got the results in the morning and that everything was fine.

I got off the phone and drank until I threw up.

Ho, Bitch, Slut

I talked to V, my niece, the other day. We talked after I had a phone conversation with my mom. Mom gave me the update on how she had gotten her shutters installed on the house for $10 a window. He did 3 windows which equaled 3 hours of work. Mom had to force this poor guy to take a $20 tip. Imagine the life situation that would make you feel $10/hour for manual labor was sufficient. Anyway. She went on to explain how she had been Googling to determine whether the pain in her back was from trying to lift the 150 lb. birdbath in my grandmother's backyard or from a pancreatic tumor.

[Side Note: This past week Mom asked me what I wanted for my birthday and I told her then asked what she wanted. (I'm 12/9 and she's 12/11.) She said, not sarcastically, "I want to live." People. If there ain't drama, it ain't my mama.]

So, as we're getting off the phone Mom says, "Oh yeah. Some of V's friends called her a slut and a ho and a bitch. What do you think I should do?"
Me: Stay out of it, Mom.
Mom (to V in the background): She told me to stay out of it.
V (from the background): Uh!

I asked to speak with V and asked her why the girls were calling her a bitch. She didn't know. So, I asked if she thought it might be because she was being a bitch.

No. Of course not.

So, I proceed to talk to her about how girls can say mean things and that I was sorry her feelings were hurt and I encouraged her to realize that if these girls were the kind of girls who talked shit behind their friend's back (in G language, of course) that these were not the girls she wanted to be friends with in the first place.

And then. I swear to God. I hear myself ...
quoting Erykah Badu.

Yep.I used the Apple Tree reference.

See I picks my friends like I pick my fruit
My ganny told me that when I was only a youth
I dont walk around trying to be what Im not
I dont waste my time trying to get what you got
I work at pleasin me
Cause I cant please you and thats why I do what I do
My soul flies free like a willow tree
Doo wee doo wee doo wee

I explained the apple analogy. "If you were at Super Wal-Mart picking out an apple, you wouldn't pick the rotten apple. You'd pick the good apple. Right? So why would you pick the rotten girl to be friends with?"

V said, "Huh?"

I said, "Just try to ignore them, honey."