So I'm back from taking Taylor and her mom home. Had a really lovely time. Met a lot of her friends from the summer leadership program and got a chance to talk a lot to her mom. The funny thing is, she knows me. All those years she was in a nursing home, she was hearing about me daily from Taylor and her dad. And yet, I know very little about her, so it was nice to learn more. She grew up in the ghetto, raised by a single mom with substance abuse issues. She ended up raising her 6 younger brothers and a niece pretty much by herself, managed to graduate from high school, even if she had to repeat a year. Worked to put and keep herself in school.
She was a nurse (which I never knew, so Taylor's not the first to go to college, just the first to go straight from high school supported by an intact family) and then EMT and had just passed a test to become the kind of EMS worker who could give controlled substances when she was in the accident that sent her into long term recovery that meant regular surgery almost every six months for something like 8 years. She loved her work, but really can't do it anymore, but there is no bitterness there. She's just planning to try something else.
I shouldn't be surprised Taylor's such an awesome kid. Even when her mother couldn't physically be there for her, she's one hell of a role model.
(Also? It's really touching that when Taylor introduced me to people as "Ms. Sara, my mentor" eyes would light up with recognition. The woman who made sure Taylor got into this program HUGGED ME. )
Taylor and her mentor are both made of AWESOME.
OMG WE GET INSTANT RUNOFF VOTING!!
That's really great, sara.
And weehoo no thyroid cancer!!
sara's story made me sniffly.
Sorry Dana for the crappy day.
I am so tired. Gah. How come conferencing with students all day is so tiring?
Honestly, I'd attributed a lot of Taylor's drive and focus to her dad. And he is responsible for a lot of it. But her mom is really the other half. She thanked me again for being a mother-figure in Taylor's life when she couldn't, but the thing is? She was. I'm more the auntie-figure.
I'm so grateful that Taylor's dad for some reason thought I was a teacher all those years ago and asked me to help her with stuff, even after I disabused him of that notion. If not for that, I'd not know her, and that would make me a poorer person.
I just got home and mr. flea is upstairs snoring like a lumberjack. He's so loud I don't think I'll even be able to get to sleep on the couch. Ugh.
ION genealogy so fun, here is my great-grandmother when she was 3 or 4: [link]
I'm more the auntie-figure.
But that is still important and awesome. You really have helped shape Taylor into the amazing person she is and is still becoming.
