For the sins of our community

We are spending this week talking about juvenile offenders. This is possibly one of the toughest topics to talk about, for a number of reasons.

Many of the students know someone that is an offender and a good amount of them know someone that is currently serving a long sentence. The question presented is should violent juvenile offenders face mandatory life sentences for their crimes.

There's a lot to look at. Was there abuse in the offenders life? What type of abuse? And many other questions regarding the offender him/herself. Yet the questions don't end their what about the victims and the families of the victims.

In the end we are left with pain and grief. The victims families are left with the emptiness of loosing a loved one. The offender is often left with emptiness as well; sure it's a different kind but nonetheless there is a drastic void in their lives.

The schools, our churches, the police, social services, society at large has failed not only rhe victims but the offenders as well. The vast majority of these offenders were victims of horrendous crimes.

We cannot continue in this world without dealing with the truth. The truth is we as Christians have failed to show the love of Christ.

God be with us all.

Small town part time

My hair is cut, my fave freshly shaven, and my uniform cleaned; it's time for work. Yes today I was not in the classroom, I was not in front of my students, I was not counting the hours by ringing bells.

The nice thing about small town cop work is it doesn't change quickly. It's been about a month sense I last wore the badge on my chest. It's a good feeling knowing that you are wanted and welcomed as a police officer in today's world. That's one of the beautiful things of small town police work. There's still a large part of the community that sees you as relevant.

Now I'm home, the uniform is away, and I look forward to a school week to come.

Not a Christian

The 2016 election is over, thank God, yet now the fallout is upon us.

I don't expect people to be happy when there guy/girl doesn't win the race. I get that, it's just like a sporting game when your team looses. You get upset, and that ls okay.

Yet this is different, really really different. Today after I finally got home I surfed through my social media account and saw numbers of posts telling me that I was racist, a bigot, a traitor, and even un-Christian because I happened to vote for the guy that won.

Now I have not posted my vote on line and until now haven't told the masses who I voted for. So none of these "attacks" were directed at me, yet they were.

When you say that all people who voted for someone must be this wrong that is so evil it is anti Christian in essence; well then you are lumping me into that.

I actually didn't vote for anyone, I happened to vote against someone. Yes to me one person was worse than the other and that's how I voted. I voted against rather than for.

Somehow I didn't realize I would loose my Christianity in am election.

Reality

I am into work today a little light footed. I'm not a supporter of the person who won the election last night but I'm even more of a not supporter of the person he ran against. So I'm a little excited about change. As I walked in I had a conversation with another person that shared my thoughts. The drive in was easy and the day seemed as though it old unfold well.

Then as I walked past my neighboring teachers door I heard her call my name asking for me to come in her class. As soon as I heard her voice I knew something was wrong. She then, in a panic, let me know that her youngest brother had died last night.

Just like that the peep, the light footedness was gone. Her brother had died.

I began attempting to help her get her things and finish lessons for a sub so she could get out of the school. Not many words were exchanged, not many were needed.

She got what she needed and I took the rest, then she left. I felt horrible for her. That feeling of loss must be enormous, it's not one I know as all my close family are still with us.

It was a reality check. I'm still young compared to some, but knowing that this time is coming. When will I be forced to say goodbye to my loved ones without notice?

My heart goes out to her and her family.
God be with the fallen souls.

This world

I don't know.

You know I teach 175 students Monday through Friday. That's 175 sons, daughters, brothers, sisters; children. Even the oldest of them are still children.

Some of them are great kids, some of them are a handful, and some of them are two handsful.

It's hard to walk away from the classroom feeling successful, even on your good days. Sometimes you just want to grab these kids and hug them, but you can't not in our stupid world.

It's not just teaching. Even when I was on the street daily I would grieve for the children more than I ever did for the adults. God, God only knows how many times I just wanted to scoop a kid up and walk him/her away from whatever awful situation.

175 of them and even the bad ones I like. They are my students and yeah I get pissy when you try to mess with one.

First Post

I've been thinking about posting my thoughts online again for some time. Really it's just a place for me to put my ramblings that I can go back to from time to time.

I'm working 50 hours a week at my primary job and with two part time jobs and being a part time students I don't always have time to formulate my thoughts.

My morning gig is teaching criminal justice to high school students. It is both very rewarding and extremely challenging. One of my part time gigs is putting the badge back on for a few hours every so often. The other is to help run the family business. Then two nights a week I'm in class, swapping roles and playing student.

I'm dyslexic and I'm not always going to proof read so if your one of those guys/gals crazy enough to read this; I'm sorry.

It's been almost two years sense I've even looked at blogger and I see that nothing has changed. That's nice.