WAYT: Housecleaning

News from the front: I finally got a new job! I've been busy getting started there and putting the past behind me.

Nearly all of 2012, for me, was spent searching for this new job. I'm lucky my new place chose me, and I'm lucky to live here in Bloomington, Illinois, where there are still choices available and I can decide to look for a new job and eventually find success. I know in this country right now, not many people can say that.

Now I'm looking forward to 2013. I feel like it's going to be a banner year for the Arnolts household. My husband will complete his Master's degree. My son will turn 3 years old and WILL be potty trained. The world will keep on spinning, and hopefully, changing for the better. I've set some goals for myself. Hopefully I can relay my progress to my readers through this page. Please stay tuned!

2012 was mostly a calamity. Part of my radio silence for the last little while was prompted by Sandy Hook. I wanted to come on here and rant endlessly about the failure of every legislator in the US to take gun violence seriously. But I was plagued with grief for the tiny babies who were lost. All I could think was, what if one of those babies was their parents ONLY baby? The Sandy Hook tragedy was overwhelming, unnecessary, and unbearably hard to wrap my mind around. Still, every mention of it makes me weepy.

Luckily, the election turned out just as I knew it would. I say luckily for a whole host of reasons, but in this instance, I say it because I'm hopeful that President Obama, more than any other person, can achieve some meaningful change to gun laws that will protect my husband - a teacher - and my son - a baby and future public school student - and myself - a private citizen with everything to lose. I won't even bother to apply my sentiments to Illinois. This state is so backwards, I hold out no hope and see no point in wasting my breath.

In Washington DC, of course, it's business as usual. Which is to say, no one who has been elected to represent us can make tough decisions unless they receive assurances that the big money is still behind them - which isn't the "us" they were chosen to represent. If the fiscal cliff "negotiations" didn't give each person reason to pause and realize each legislator's true measure, I don't know what will. Without doubt, we will face the same last-minute scrambling when the next law with a deadline comes "creeping" up on us.

It makes me sad that this is the state of our union. But there are many other types and forms of unions that are equally important in my life where my voice can be heard. This is my hope for 2013.

WAYT: Almost road rage

I have serious impatience when I’m driving.  I get to work half an hour early every day (and leave half an hour early every day) because I cannot stand to drive in the work traffic.  I can’t even explain to you how much I need people to follow the rules of the road. 

I don’t consider myself an expert but there are certain things that everyone should do when they’re driving that it seems NO ONE does when I’m out and about.  Please, at the very least, follow these six simple rules and I won’t have to suffer from high blood pressure or honk at you for five minutes or give you the middle finger. 

1.  Drive in the right lane unless you are passing.  This is more than a courtesy.  It’s an actual law.  I used to work for someone who helped to pass this law in Illinois.  Once, I was driving him somewhere and I was using the wrong lane.  This was the first time I was made aware of this law and ever since, I have followed it and not just because I got in trouble.  I follow it because it makes good sense and because it is courteous to stay out of the way.  Furthermore, if you’re going to be turning left in three miles, you can get over into the left lane shortly before you need to turn.  You don’t need to get over so far in advance before your turn that you’re backing everyone else up while you drive along thinking about no one but yourself.

2.  Do not drive so slowly that you are endangering the lives of yourself and everyone around you.  This is a huge peeve.  If you’re driving 40 in a 55, you are going to get yourself killed.  If you are elderly and you feel unsafe driving at the speed limit (or within 5 miles per hour of the speed limit), please get in touch with me.  I will gladly accept paid offers to drive the aged and infirm wherever they need to go.  Seriously.  Public service AND public safety are that important to me. 

3.  Navigate into the closest lane when you are turning.  You can’t just go swinging your car into whatever lane you like.  This is especially important when other cars are allowed to turn at the same time that you are turning.  Everyone can do their driving at the same time if everyone turns into the appropriate lane!  It’s like magic – it’s almost like the people who designed the rules were thinking about easy flow of traffic when they dreamed up this one.  So get with the program!

4.  Slow down to the speed limit or less when driving in a construction zone.  I just received an email from my father-in-law informing me of the new cameras that will automatically send you a ticket when they record you speeding in a construction zone.  Those signs about killing construction workers should be enough to slow you down.  But apparently, for most drivers, vehicular homicide isn’t enough incentive.  The fact is, if you’re speeding in a construction zone and you hit a giant sand-filled cone, a stray piece of equipment, a big chunk of the road or a giant pot hole, your car – and maybe you – will be dead.  I’m all for moving along at the correct speed but this is one place where I will always slow down.  And if you want to tailgate me and curse me, feel free, but I will speed up for no one in a construction zone. 

5.  Leave your dog at home, or strap him down.  Legislators can pass all the laws they want to ban texting or talking on the phone while driving, but I want to know why no one is talking about every other person’s dog running loose in the car.  Every car I pass has a dog hopping around in it.  Before you leave the house with your dog, please consider the fact that if your dog is not wearing a safety restraint, he will die if you crash.  Also, your dog will get both of you killed when he jumps up and licks you in the eye when the light turns yellow.  I love to see a cute dog, but I especially love to see a happy dog safely in the back seat hanging his tongue out the window and not distracting you while you’re operating a (potential) one ton death machine. 

6.  Teach new drivers REALITY-BASED driving skills.  I cannot tell you how many times I have come up behind a “Student Driver” that is going at least 15 miles per hour under the speed limit.  Why are instructors teaching them this?  What are they thinking?  Do these teachers realize that all they are doing is creating a complex in these kids?  While the students putz around in this embarrassing marked car, getting honked at and passed at Mach speeds, they feel embarrassed and irritated at you for giving them a bad driving lesson.  The first thing they are going to want to do when they are behind the wheel by themselves is open it up on a country road and just fly.  Just tell the kids that it’s okay to drive the speed limit.  It’s even okay to push that limit.  The main thing any new driver needs to know is to be aware and protect yourself.  Watch for slow drivers, get over for emergency vehicles every time, slow down for speed zones – but do not watch yourself get smashed by the idiot driving 80 in a 55 because your teacher told you to go slow.  Tell these kids the truth!

I’m sure that many of you have irritations when you are driving.  What are your rules of the road?  What do you think of puppy passengers?  I’m seriously considering writing to my legislator and asking him what can be done about that.  Stay tuned!

WAYT: Pay the piper

I just read this article about student loan debt.  Unlike Rick Santorum, I don’t think it’s snobbish for President Obama to want everyone to have a college education.  I think the President is being pragmatic.  In the United States today, those who aren’t unemployed are likely underemployed.  If you’re not experienced, educated and well-connected, you probably aren’t doing very well right now.  And President Obama wants to see us, as a nation and as individuals, succeed.  I can’t blame him for that. 

Obama has a few ideas about how to improve the government’s involvement in student loans.  I can’t tell him how to fix it or even if he’s on the right track.  But I can tell you, my readers, about the real dangers of student loan debt.  I don’t know about the effects of this debt on our economy and whether it truly is a threat to our overall recovery, but I can tell you about the effects of this debt on my economy and my family’s recovery. 

Frank and I attended Illinois College, a four-year, liberal arts institution.  It cost more to go there than Heartland Community College or Illinois State University and maybe even more than Illinois Wesleyan.  It wasn’t just the tuition – it never is!  It was also the housing, the meal plan, the travel back and forth (if you want to see your family) and the books.  In the end, we walked away with over $45,000 in debt.  Ouch.  What were we thinking??  (But we are geniuses.  At least we walked away with that too!) 

We are given ten years to pay this debt back.  We had three choices for repayment.  One was to pay the equally divided amount, to spread the payments out over ten years.  The next form of repayment was based on income.  Since we were unemployed at the time, that wasn’t going to work.  The last option was to pay gradually.  The payments would start low and then increase over ten years, operating under the assumption that we would make more money over time to afford the higher payments. 

My first job out of college paid a pittance.  But I owed what I owed so I made the decision to pay the equal amount and we set Frank’s up to be paid back in the same fashion.  I felt that was the most responsible philosophy. 

My biggest issue with our debt is the fact that no one warned me.  No one said, “If you borrow that much money, you will have to pay this much every month.”  What were they thinking – my mom, my high school counselors, the FAFSA people?  I could have gotten the same education anywhere.  Don’t get me wrong, Illinois College did a lot for me and I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but if I had known this would be my reality, I would have chosen differently. 

Furthermore, no one warned me that we would pay ridiculous interest on these loans.  I pay less interest on my two cars and my house COMBINED than I do on these loans.  And I can’t refinance them.  Trust me, I’ve asked a lot of people.  We’re stuck with over six percent interest for the life of these loans. 

And now Frank is going back to school.  He’s a great teacher and I’m so proud of his drive and determination to make the most impact and do the most good that he possibly can.  But now that the government is changing the rules, he can only receive the loans that charge you interest every single day you own them.  That makes the cost even higher. 

My baby sister, who at 18 is no longer a baby (I know, alright!), is getting ready to graduate high school and start college.  She considered Heartland but decided on ISU.  I am terrified for her.  I don’t want to tell her not to pursue her dreams but I can’t live with myself if I don’t warn her of how this debt will change her life.  I speak from experience when I say that our student loan debt is holding us back.  If we could keep that money that we pay every month, we would be different people. 

It’s not responsible these days to say that kids shouldn’t go to college.  Kids need to, they have to!  I’m looking at you, Rick Santorum.  What are you thinking?  Every kid isn’t cut out for college, that’s true, but to say that we should all skip college is snobbish of you!  My cousin is living a great life having learned a trade and I would never begrudge him of the choice he made.  I’m proud of him for knowing himself enough to make the right choice.  But there are so many things that hold us back and this student loan problem is a big obstacle when it shouldn’t be.  It’s really sad that some kids out there will have to choose between an education or a life of poverty – or an education with a life of poverty. 

So rather than calling names, Rick, Barack and Mitt – and every other politician – put yourself in my shoes, my sister’s, my husband’s.  One day I’ll have to have this talk with my son and give him the reality check I never got.  Please don’t make me break his heart.  Please find a way to help us succeed at life. 

WAYT: The math is wrong

While the state of Illinois languishes in debt up to its eyeballs, the Illinois General Assembly is busy debating whether or not high school students should be required to take more math classes. 

Our Lieutenant Governor has been on a grand tour of all of the state’s community colleges, and the most important thing she learned was that students are not good enough at math.  The next logical step is to get high schoolers to take MORE math.  In the eyes of our humble politicians, practice WILL make perfect. 

What are they thinking?  I mean, really, what is the thought process behind this push, at this particular moment in Illinois history?  Get some perspective!

I object to this four year plan because I am terrible at math.  Just today, I realized that I can’t even record numbers correctly, let alone calculate them.  I wrote a check for $56 but recorded it as $65 in my register.  Genius!  And I took the four years of high school math the GA now recommends – how could I still be this stupid? 

Sixty six percent of my high school math teachers were terrible at teaching math.  I remember I had a tiny Asian geometry teacher who was amazing.  She had songs and illustrations and maybe it makes her sound juvenile, that she was so enthusiastic, but I learned from her.  The old guy who taught me two sections of algebra and the old woman who taught me trigonometry were horrible teachers.  They may have been complete geniuses but they had no clue how to pass that genius on to me.  The words “lost in translation” come to mind. 

When I went to college, I was seriously at a loss when it came to math class.  I tested into the lowest possible section but luckily got a sympathetic teacher who miraculously made my calculator and brain work together for the first time.  He understood that I was never going to be a math whiz and he helped me get through it and on to where I belonged without further damaging my self-esteem or GPA. 

But let me assure you, I did not need four years of math in high school.  What I needed was therapy for my random dyslexia (clearly) and more emphasis on basic math skills before high school.  I still cannot recall a single thing related to fractions and trust me, I’ve really tried to remember.  To do basic multiplication, I use the same rhymes I learned in fourth grade and a hand trick for all the multiples of the number nine. 

I really don’t want the General Assembly legislating that my son will have to take four years of math.  I suffered through that trigonometry class trying to smarten myself up for my ACT test, and I guarantee all that I really accomplished was to take four months off of my expected life span from all the angst and tears.  If Auggie is no good at math, I am going to feel horrible, watching him beat himself up the way that I did.  There was nothing more demoralizing than math.  Truly, I have the most traumatizing memories and I just can’t stomach the idea of him suffering the same fate. 

Future generations would really benefit from APPLIED math, if they have to up the required minimum.  What good does it do a student like me to sit in a high school classroom and be talked to about equations when I could have been learning how to translate measurements in the kitchen or how to quickly figure out that I wrote $65 instead of $56 in my checkbook?  For the smarties who excel at math, PLEASE, put them in four years of math.  Leave me to what I can handle and those other kids can go on to do great things. 

Obviously the General Assembly didn’t take four years of high school math.  They can’t balance a budget to save their lives.  It’s really the pot calling the kettle, especially considering the work they should be doing.  I’m sure they think that talking about math classes has something to do with jobs in Illinois and overall American competitiveness in the global market, but I’m telling you, they’re totally off base on this and they’re wasting our money while they’re at it.  Even a mathematical moron like me can see that! 

I’ve brought up a lot of topics here: government mandates on education practices and requirements, teacher quality, career preparedness, future workforce, etc.  This is why the GA can’t just go spouting off about four years of math.  They need to look at the bigger picture.  Our problems are about more than math.  Stepping into the middle of this issue is ignoring a whole host of other issues that are just as important.  They cannot simply address shortcomings in math; there are many other areas that affect this one subject in school and that affect any given child’s future. 

WAYT: Get ready for the primary!

I have been so incredibly busy at work lately.  I haven’t revealed the name of my employer on here because I don’t know how they would feel about it and because in this day and age, the work I do can be even more polarizing than my own personal opinions. 

One big project I’ve been working on is helping to sort out the new legislative districts.  The primary election is less than one month away!  What are you thinking about the upcoming primary? 

A lot has changed in Illinois because of these new maps.  Everyone who we’ve known since living in Downs has been mapped out of our area and new people have been mapped in.  This election is going to bring big changes to who represents us. 

The trouble (or is it good news?) is that I personally heard from both of the candidates vying for the State Senate seat in our new district.  My organization conducted an interview and I just happened to be asked by my boss to go with him to staff the meeting.  It was incredibly interesting.  Suffice to say that one candidate is a long-time legislator and one is completely new to state politics.  The differences were stark.  There is an air of experience that a person carries with him when he’s been at the game for a while, and with politicians, it’s palpable.  Sort of like fairy dust, shimmering in the air around him – you can see it. 

There are benefits and downsides to having legislators with experience.  On the one hand, experience gets you somewhere.  If your legislator has been around for a while, he knows people and has connections.  The good things that you want him to do have a shot of surviving the legislative process.  On the other hand, experience draws your legislator into the deep, dark alleyways of politics.  If your legislator has been around for a while, he knows people and has connections.  The things about politics that everyone hates – money and influence – start to impact your legislator and thereby, the legislative process. 

The word “election,” to me, is synonymous with the word “choice.”  This primary isn’t something to take lightly, because for years now already, Downs and every community surrounding it has been affected by Illinois’ on-going budget crisis.  The person we choose to represent us will inherit many tough battles.  Will the voters choose someone who can handle the pressure?  Will the voters choose someone who we can ask to fight for us – someone who can take the heat from his constituents?

The way I see it, elections must go beyond picking the best person for the job.  You have the make that person accountable to you, whether he/she got your vote or not.  I hope that whoever is chosen in the primary, voters will take their action one step further.  Vote, and then, regardless of the outcome, call, meet or email your officials! Tell them your opinion so that you can hear what they’ll do about it.  Start the dialogue now. 

It’s not about voting early and often, because we all know that phrase has sadly become a sick joke in Illinois.  It’s about speaking your mind early and often.  Your legislators need to know what you are thinking.  You can’t complain about the unfairness or the bad decisions if you’ve never tried to impact the process, and they can’t do the good work you want them to do if you don’t tell them your goals, dreams, ambitions, complaints, irritations and must-haves. 

Of course, it all begins at the ballot box.  Make sure that you have your voter registration in order for the primary election.  Do your job!  What are you thinking if you don’t?