Dia de los Muertos

Today is Dia de los muertos or Day of the Dead. It is a part of the Mexican culture to honor those who have died. It is a national holiday in Mexico and it has become more popular here as well. You see these altars set up everywhere.

I just received pictures from Joe, one or Maggie's former teachers at Mission High. There is an altar there for the school community and he put up a picture of Maggie and one of Tyre and his mom Nadine, who have all passed away.

It made me so happy to know Maggie is gracing those halls once again.

Sad week in Maggie's World

There's nothing like that somber phone call telling you someone you know has passed away. The only thing worse is to get it two days in a row. It's been a very tough week in Maggie's world.

Yesterday I heard about Nadine. She was Tyre's mom and she and Maggie were fast friends. Nadine always called Maggie the Single Girl, because Maggie would go nuts whenever that Beyonce song was played (and it was played A LOT). Nadine was a force of nature. I met her shortly after Maggie was born. Everybody knew her. She was completely devoted to Tyre and all his friends and threw the very best parties. I last saw her in October when she had a celebration of Tyre's life on the anniversary of his passing. She had gifts for every single person there and announced them in an academy awards style. I believe I tied for Mom of best female friend of Tyre. She gave me a red scarf and I'm gong to wear it today in her honor. It's only right, Nadine was always dressed to the nines. I like to think she and Tyre are together again. They were as close as two people can be, and while her two other kids and grand kids have my total sympathy, there is something about Nadine and Tyre together that feels like it's going to be ok.

Here she is at Maggie's Mardi Gras Party wearing a Maggie mask and at the hospital when we went to visit Tyre who was stuck in there on prom night.

And then this morning another call. This time it was Robert. Robert was one of Maggie's classmates from Junior High through High school and those transition years beyond. They had a ton of fun together and loved to cause trouble. That would make everybody laugh, even the teachers who tried to maintain order. Robert was a charmer and loved to laugh with the rest of the kids. My heart is breaking for his parents and brother Tony.

This is the hardest part about Maggie's World. So many have shorter lives than they should. Of course that's why their lives shine so bright - they're like comets streaking through life. But those of us who are just mere stars in the sky certainly miss their brightness when they're gone.

I have a feeling there is quite a reunion of the Aptos Middle School and Mission High school Italc class. Maggie and Tyre were there to greet Nadine and Robert. Nadine already has the party started.

I am not a crook

I thought I had already shared this story, but evidently I didn't

Last May we planted some roses in the Mission High garden in memory of Maggie. It was a really great day and all the special ed kids joined in to help however they could or cheer us on if they couldn't. I wrote all about it in this post: Maggie World: Maggie's Garden at Mission High.

We finished about 1:30PM so the kids could get back to their classrooms and get ready to head home. It was quite an emotionally draining day, but exhilarating at the same time. When it was done, we were all spent. My mom went straight home and Steve had to take off for a meeting out of town. That left Eddie and I to make our way home together. (Tim could not get off work.)

As we headed home Eddie said, "You know mom, I could really use a beer." We stopped in the Inner Sunset and went into the Mucky Duck, a friendly establishment and ordered our beer. I had never been in there before, but I looked around and realized I knew the owners of the place. Well I don't "know" them, but one of them has been reading this blog since it started (six years ago this week.)  I asked the bartender if the owner was named  Baker and she said, "Yes how do you know them?"  I explained that I didn't really, but I knew Amanda was a faithful reader of my blog.

Of course then the bartender asked what the blog was about and I told her and tried to explain Maggie in the most upbeat possible way, becasuse that's how I always present her. I told her about Maggie's life, and her passing and that we had just come from planting the roses, hence the reason for an afternoon beer. Now I know that bartenders are good at listening to people's troubles, but this was a lot to lay on this woman.

I ratcheted up my description of Maggie's energy and giant personality. I explained it took seven straps to keep her in the wheelchair and I tried to imagine that life force if it weren't in a disabled body. Laughing I said, "if Maggie had the same personality in a healthy body, I cannot imagine what she would be doing now."

Eddie, who had been quiet through all this because he was still processing the emotions of the day finally spoke.  He was sitting to my left, but he stared straight ahead and said;

"She would be in jail."

Spoken like a true big brother. I was dumbstruck for a minute and I looked at him. He was still staring straight ahead sort of expressionless. I started to laugh and then nodded and said, "You are absolutely right. She would definitely be in jail."

And I was filled with pride, for reasons I cannot fully explain. I actually never thought of Maggie as a non disabled individual becasue it was so much a part of her. But trying to imagine her wildness and personality in a typical body spelled real trouble. Please understand if I had a perfectly healthy 20 year old daughter who was headed to jail, I would not be proud at all. But thinking of Maggie wreaking havoc on society was sort of fitting.

We toasted to our lost little criminal and ended the day on an upbeat.

(one of Maggie's favorite books)

If you find yourself in the 9th and Irving area, head into the Mucky Duck and toast Maggie.

Maggie's Garden at Mission High

Maggie roses in the box. Note tag.

We planted the Maggie roses at Mission High last Friday. The plot we were given is in an internal courtyard that could be an absolutely fantastic place. It's a bit overgrown and not very well managed, but that will change. In the space of a little over an hour our group transformed two rows and planted the roses and had lunch. it was a great day, best told in pictures.

Mr. C", an aide in Maggie's class (and someone she adored) made all the arrangements and explained what we were to do. We were to clear these two beds but leave a few flowers for color.

Before

Mr. C showing us what to do.

So everyone just got to work

 

It didn't take long to clear with all that help. Then we could prepare to plant

Joe Bender (Teacher Joe) and Nurse Janice

Steve digging the hole

Ms. Laura planting the rose

Time to water

Tyre approving the plaque

Steve setting the plaque

plaque in place

Posing for pictures, Grandma Carmel, Steve Eddie and Me (Tim had to work)

father son American Gothic

Food for everyone!

after. bed is clear, roses planted, and watered and straw in place

Now Maggie's garden can take off and add more lovely color to the courtyard. Hopefully more groups will adopt a little part of that courtyard and the transformation will be wonderful. Mission High is in the banana belt of San Francisco - the best weather in the city. The courtyard is protected from the wind, so it is really ideal.

Eva, Duane, Cesar, Rosa and Janice standing in front of  Maggie's bulletin board

I have to thank everyone at Mission High, and especially the staff of room 223, Miss Rosa, Mr. C., Eva, Duane and Nurse Janice for making this happen. (And Nurse Yasmine who is not in the picture) These people gave Maggie a great year in school and a wonderful sendoff. Her teachers and staff from earlier years, Ms. Taylor, Ms. Derkash and Mr. G (Garrido) and all the paras who helped her get so far and do so well.  Thanks also to Mr. Guthertz,  Joe Bender, Mark Erickson, Ms. Laura, Theresa and everyone else who made this garden day possible.

Most of all, thanks to the students, special ed and others who made Maggie want to come to school everyday. You were her peeps.

I will miss Mission High but will always appreciate Maggie's time there.

A Rose by any other name....

Flowers filled this house after Maggie died. We were completely overwhelmed by the kindness and generosity of so many. The colors, the arrangements, the smells and well wishes behind them buoyed our souls in those first difficult weeks.

My lifelong friend Sharon took a slightly different tack. She sent a live rose bush. It arrived in a package from the Antique Rose Emporium in Texas. I opened the package and looked inside and thought what a great idea. We can plant this and it will be Maggie's rosebush. I didn't know how right I was.

I can't remember now where we were going, but we were just about to leave the house so I decided to leave the rose in the box until Steve could plant it in our backyard. He did so the next morning. Steve returned into the house fighting back the tears that came so easily in those first days. I smiled and asked if it was planted and he didn't really talk, he just handed me the information that came in the box.

The name of this particular rose was "Maggie."

Sharon not only sent a rosebush that we could plant and enjoy and think of Maggie. She found an actual Maggie Rosebush. Here it is planted an ready to take off.

With any luck, it will grow beautiful flowers that look like this:

I loved this idea so much that I copied it. I went to the website and ordered three more Maggie rosebushes. They arrived yesterday. One goes to my Mother for Mother's day (late) and the other two we are taking to Mission High School today to plant in the school's memorial garden. We get a little patch of dirt in the sunny Mission District and I'm sure these flowers will flourish there.  We will put up this plaque to go in the garden too.

This was going to be just a little remembrance, but like everything involving Maggie, it has created a lot of interest. (I am bringing food for 40 and hope its enough.) We will plant the Maggie roses and put the Maggie plaque next to them. It will be all Maggie all the time. 

Same as it ever was....

I know that a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet, but I'm not sure the impact would have been quite as strong.

A Rose by any other name

This a a picture of my grandmother, Rose Fitzpatrick Casey. I never met her, she died 19 years before she was born. I think Maggie looks a bit like her. And today she is looking for her as well. 

Maggie is completing an assignment today; but it was not assigned by her own teacher, rather by her Uncle Pat who also happens to be a teacher. Maggie and her classmates have an appointment at the Mission high Museum today so she can do her best to complete the assignment.

This all started a few weeks ago when my brother Pat asked me if I knew where our grandmother Rose Fitzpatrick Casey had gone to high school. Pat has a lot of the family documents (such as they are) but nothing that answered this question. Because of presentations I did at a couple of family reunions, I know a lot of family history, but I didn't know the answer to this question either. Most of my knowledge and the documents involve the Casey's, the paternal side of the family, not the Fitzpatricks on the maternal side.

Pat had already checked with my mom and she didn't know. Her mother Rose died in 1937 when my mom was just a little girl. Her older siblings likely knew, but the last of her siblings died earlier this year. We were sad to realize that meant there as no one left to ask. Naturally that also meant we HAD TO KNOW.

There weren't very many high schools in San Francisco at that time and the one that was full of the Irish was none other than Mission High, the very school Maggie attends today. We know Rose younger siblings Joe and Alice went to Mission, so it is likely that she did as well. Since we have our very own Mission High student, Maggie was the logical one to take this on.

Fortunately, Mission High has a museum. This school recognizes its place in San Francisco history and has taken care to preserve it. I love that.   There is a wrinkle, though. Rose was born in 1891, which means she would have been in high school in 1906, when the great Fire and Earthquake rocked San Francisco. It is likely her education was interrupted by that event and it is possible that records were destroyed. Maggie is on the job and I hope they find something.

I would venture to guess that if she is successful, Maggie will be the only student at the school who can claim a connection from 100+ years ago. It just doesn't happen anywhere very often and especially in this city, which has always been a mecca for newcomers. Mission High has long been a school for the newest populations. In the early 1900's those newcomers were the Irish, like Rose Fitzpatrick. Today Mission is full of students from dozens of countries, who speak numerous different languages. That's part of what makes it so interesting, but also makes it far less likely that anyone else has a great grandmother that went there.

As I sit here typing this, Maggie is doing her thing, digging through the archives. I do hope she has help or those precious historical records will be strewn all over the place.

Stay tuned.

Rose on her wedding day to my grandfather John Casey. She made her own dress. That's her sister Sara behind her and I'm not sure who the best man is.

don't you think they look a bit alike?


 

Mall withdrawal

This broken foot is really slowing me down. It hasn't really been painful so I just went about my regular activities. Perhaps walking 12 blocks on Friday wasn't that good of an idea.  I'm paying the price for that now. It's a bit painful, but mostly it is just exhausting me. I have to choose one outing and pace myself.

This morning Maggie asked if we could go to the mall. She hasn't been in nearly two weeks and she may be having mall withdrawal, a serious condition that targets teenage girls. Sadly, her condition will go untreated as the mall was not the one outing chosen for today.

The outing du jour was Costco. We  have been needing to do a Costco run for a while and I wanted to do it while Steve was available to help me. Even I have limits, and pushing Maggie's chair and pulling one of those giant carts with a broken foot is just too pathetic. When we got there Steve suggested I ride around in one of these. He even offered to rig it up so I could tow Maggie and the basket.  I politely declined. 

 Maggie wasn't buying my argument that  Costco is just a mall without walls. There was quite a bit of eye rolling by someone.

As we were finishing up, a man walked around us to get something. I was suctioning Maggie and probably blocking traffic. I saw him look back at us, but didn't really pay any attention until I heard him say "Hi Maggie, what are you doing here."  That is something that just doesn't happen very often and it surprised me.   

He turned out to be Mr. D, a teacher from Mission High.  Mr. D doesn't teach special ed, but he certainly knew Maggie. He was one of her best customers when they used to do the coffee cart on Mondays.Maggie was beside herself with joy when she realized who it was, reaching out her hand and throwing herself back in her chair laughing. 

 Mr. D's simple greeting and chat completely changed Maggie's affect. He saved me from a pouting Maggie just by saying hello.

 The mall withdrawal is in remission.   

  

Fast Times at Mission High

This is a follow up to the article in Mother Jones magazine that I posted the other day.

Mission High has been a fantastic place for Maggie and this interview shows Maggie's experience is not unique. This is from KQED radio this morning, it's a great interview with Principal Eric Guthertz and the author of the Mother Jones Article.

A Year at Mission High | KQED

www.kqed.org

'Everything You've Heard About Failing Schools Is Wrong' reads the provocative headline of a recent article in Mother Jones Magazine. Thus concludes the author who spent a year observing students and teachers at Mission High in San Francisco. We'll meet the author and two school staff members to tal...

http://www.kqed.org/a/forum/R201208241000#disqus_thread

Mother Jones and Mission High

Maggie attends Mission High which is the oldest school in San Francisco and a beautiful building in a beautiful setting. It has a reputation as a tough school and performs badly on the standardized tests. This information does not square at all with the experience Maggie has had there.

I just saw this article from Mother Jones Magazine, that demonstrates the wonderful things happening at Mission. Also, I knew Carlos Santana went there, but I only learned from this article that Maya Angelou is also a Mission High graduate. Amazing.

Hard to believe, I know, but Maggie did NOT make the article. Nonetheless, I can make this observation. The way Mission handles the disabled and special ed population is very much in keeping with the caring demonstrated in this article. The teachers and staff are very helpful and encouraging to all the students.

It's long but definitely worth reading. It just might challenge a few stereotypes

http://www.motherjones.com/media/2012/08/mission-high-false-low-performing-school?page=4

Mission High Rocks.

In like a lion indeed

March is not starting well.

We went to Social Security and after 90minutes they decided we need to do a phone application on Monday - for another 90 minutes. Sigh. Ok. There were definitely high/hilarious parts of that visit which I will put in a separate post

We left there and I took Maggie to school. As I left the school, I got in a slight fender bender with another car. No one was hurt but both cars are damaged. We were completely blocking traffic so once we disentangled, we pulled over to trade information. I was right in front of Maggie's high school and pulled onto the only available open spot, a bus zone. The other driver was right behind me. She was a very nice woman and because it is pouring rain, she invited me to sit in her car and we traded information.

As I sat there I saw the ticket guy and jumped out of the car to explain why we were stopped there. He didn't care he had already written the tickets for both of us. $255 for stopping in a bus zone in addition to whatever the damage to the car is and the deductible and and and.....  Now the other driver and I are united in our fight against these tickets. 

Waiting for the "out like a lamb part"

Carlos Santana

Maggie went to an assembly at school yesterday. Yawn. Not big news. Every high school has assemblies. However, not every high school has Carlos Santana play a concert at their assembly. Very cool.

 Santana graduated from Mission in 1967 and according to one news story, hasn't been back since.  Yesterday he came to celebrate Mission's accomplishment of getting an 85% college acceptance rate.Mission is making great improvement in academics in recent years. (maybe since Maggie arrived?) Here is the school principal Mr. Guthertz on the school stage with Santana. (Two men I admire for completely different reasons.)

 He not only played, but had the guitar Club from the school on stage with him for at least one song. Someone from the school posted this video on you tube.

 Maggie and her fellow wheelchair users were right up against the stage and she  loved it. We were listening to Santana all weekend in preparation.  She liked the music and especially liked the fact that I LOVED the music. During the assembly itself, the nurse said Maggie was very fidgety while Santana inspired the kids with his words. He told the kids to remember they were significant and that each individual matters. (I think Maggie already knows that she matters.) She was much more into the music.

I came to pick her up early for a doctors appointment and was talking to a reporter outside (casually, not interviewed) who  was waiting for a cab. He asked if I stayed for the concert and I said, "no. I figured this was for the kids and I was afraid I would embarrass myself because Santana was much more my era than theirs." He was about my age and he laughed and agreed; but he said, Santana owned that room in about 30 seconds because he related to the kids so well. His music is not generation specific at all and his personality and warmth came shining through.

Actor Edward James Olmos and director Peter Bratt were there too.

Not bad for a Monday. Wonder whats up for today?

Maggie the Mugger

I just received this picture from Mr. David, one of the paras in Maggie's classroom. Maggie snagged his wallet.

It looks like the pickpocketing class really paid off, but we are going to have to work on the getaway.

Tennessee Taylor

There is an opening on Maggie’s social calendar. It seems a party planned for next week has been cancelled. The honoree left town in a hurry.  We are both happy and sad about that.

The party was for Ms. Taylor, Maggie’s former teacher. Even though she stopped being Maggie’s teacher, she was a frequent visitor to the class and volunteered to do a science project with the kids every week. Ms. Taylor left at the end of the last school year. She decided not to sign a contract to teach this year because she and her husband were going to leave San Francisco.  This City is a great place to live and it draws young people from all over the place, but when it is time to settle down and think about buying a place or having a family, many decide to go back home or somewhere where they have family.  In addition, it is just too expensive here for most.  It is unfortunate because we lose some great folks.  Ms. Taylor and her husband are two of them.

 They planned to head to Nashville where her sister lives.  Good news. Then this nasty job market interfered with their plans, neither of them could find work in Nashville. Bad news. They stayed here even though she had given up her job. Good news (for us.) Then she discovered she was pregnant. Great news!    If they got too close to June, when the baby was due, they would wait to continue the job search in Nashville.  Suddenly things started happening on the job front and her husband found the job he wanted in Nashville. Wow! Great news again.

The plan was to leave in a few weeks and get everything together. That allowed time for the kids to give her a baby shower next week. Everybody was very excited, except her doctor.  Doctor’s orders: She has to go Nashville now, get herself settled, and leave the moving to her husband.   The baby shower is off, but that's a small price to pay for a healthy baby. 

So Ms. Taylor is gone. She left yesterday and she will not be back. We will miss her. We are sorry we will not get to see her beautiful little girl who will have the beautiful name Elisabetta. However, there is facebook and blogs and we will meet her online, which is so 2011.

San Francisco, Mission High, Maggie, and her classmates say thank you and goodbye to Nikki Taylor Guerrini and her husband Richard. We wish you nothing but happiness in Nashville with your little girl.    

MyTV

I received an email from Maggie's teacher advising me about a video made by Mission High students about the kids in Maggie's class.  It make me tear up - it is so sweet.

if you want to see it follow the instructions below. You can see Tanya Derkash, Maggie's wonderful teacher. Her classmate and friend Juan is also featured as is Lepa, who is something of a mentor to Maggie and her classmates.Just so you know, you have to watch the principal do his thing, but that's cool too. You will see Maggie at the computer a couple of times,but Juan and Lepa are the stars of this show, as are the typical students giving their input.


 The link is www.missionhs.org and it is the video that presents on the home page called MYTV.

The part in question starts at 2:50. I'm going to try to embed it