https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_to_Learn
I write this while thinking about meeting our new grandson, Liam Skai Fitch. I’m Pops, by the way. Judy is Grammy!
This topic made me reflect deeply about my long life and the profound importance of intellectual freedoms. Does anybody put this in the mix when we talk about our freedoms as Americans?
Do you think about this as I do?
My home life as a child and young man was not a good place for freedoms to learn for anyone, especially kids. We were taught to look, act and do as they did. You know, mom ‘n pops stuff, not my soul stuff…
What does learning look like when a young Southern California surf duude enters the US Navy, barely 17? What does it look like when you didn’t graduate from HS? Even worse, a “D” average to be ashamed of?
Makes me sick, even after all these decades. How in the deepest depths of my heart and soul we would ever in America or the planet allow this unmitigated torture on our kids?
Why? I have to ask why educating our children isn’t the highest priority? How many kids like me do you know? I was never alone on the streets without kids just like me.
We didn’t feel. We were numb. We didn’t know love or how to love. Hugs sounded stupid. “Why do people hug each other?” We asked ourselves this silently, while dreaming of getting a hug from Dad, especially Dad.
I think again about the freedom to own our education as a right, not a privilege. I think again too, about all the boys and girls in the 21st Century, especially in America. It’s the same now as back 70 years ago from my generation, do you see?
Take a look! Look with open eyes in every nook, cranny, corner, and crevice in your neighborhood and uptown too.
What do you see? Yeah, you see kids just like me who need a hug, a chance to dream, a chance for freedom from a life without love.
Please share with me your “Freedom to Learn” story. Do you see what I see, or something else?
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Children and Families in Life After Trauma (CFLAT)
