What I was reading while on vacation...

 Intermittently, I had access to the internet, which mostly meant that I was reading the news.

Here are some stories I just need to share. [I tested the links, and these were all working... hope they are when they reach you, too.]

This piece details how some undocumented students are leaving their hiding places to make real their experiences for their fellow inhabitants of the United States.

This past semester, I was lucky to take a class with NM's Centennial Poet - so when I read this piece on California's unconventional poet laureate, I was tickled.  I wish I knew more about poetry, understood it better, could express myself in tightly knit and worded pictures as poets do ... alas, mostly I just read what they write.

My ongoing interest (and feud) with standardized testing and the way that the powers that be want to use them to "evaluate" teachers could not let me pass this one by ... even though it is not the most interesting piece I read on education while traveling ... those will have to wait or possibly not make it at all as I didn't save them ... to balance it out, listen to this man's story on NPR ... he is asking all the right questions ... and I can't wait to be his colleague.

I find myself most fascinated by these pieces (both in the NY Times and the LA Times) where doctors talk about what it is like for them to practice.  This piece is specifically about how doctors grieve and how it affects their ability to be objective in end of life situations ... fascinating!

One of the things I am reading about this summer is indigeneity -- and/or how it is that Indian as an identity is proscribed, inscribed and transcribed onto people.  So, though this piece is not terribly interesting, the content is fascinating ... what does it mean to be Indian, indeed.

In a similar but not necessarily directly related vein, this piece reports on some indigenous students (and their parents) fighting back in my hometown against those who outsiders (read: white people) would consider their own ... this is a little more sad for me than it is fascinating ... but an important movement to watch in any case.

Another related piece examines how the immigration crack down is seeping into the Canadian border.... note the different town from, say, Arizona.

Walking down the other border, I ran into this long but truly unforgettable piece ... there is so much here ... the man who would help those who are not related to him in any way ... the cast of characters, worthy of their own television show ... and, not the least, another sad commentary on our selfish and incomprehensible immigration policies.

You'd think I didn't have time to enjoy the beauty of Germany, Switzerland or Italy ... but you would be wrong ... I just can't live without the news. It's official, I am a news junkie...