Two fellow homeschooling and blogging mothers suggest we rethink how we approach answering the most commonly and (as one of them points out) most carelessly asked question in opposition of the home education path.  Check out their responses to the “socialization question” at Survive the Experience and The Happy Homeschooler. These posts are elloquent food for thought that my mind is munching on this rainy afternoon in Southeast Texas and who doesn’t like to share a tasty bite now and then?

There is a certain stretch of Texas highway I occasionally traverse to and from various activities with the Triad that always simultaneously humors and sobers me with its ironic scenery.  Positioned on the same side of the road, less than two miles apart from each other, stand two institutional structures.  Both are for the most part surrounded by a tall chain link fence.  Both are about the same height and constructed with the same southwestern peach tinted brick.  Both are scattered with narrow windows that cannot possibly bring much natural light inside the structures.  Both have sizable parking lots with tall floodlights protruding from them.  The inhabitants of both buildings must adhere to strict schedules and myriad rules dictating everything from where they must be when to their very bodily functions; when they may eat or use the restroom.  They both contain brutally challenging peer cultures where deviations from the mainstream culture are at minimum sneered at, possibly crushed visciously and more often than not result in cruelty and violence. 

I can never remember which building is which from a distance and until I am almost upon them, they remain fighteningly similar.  Once I am almost even with them, the differences emerge.  A football field and bleachers peak out from behind the rear corner of one building, while the guard towers that punctuate the fence of the other become easier to distinguish.   As both buildings fade into the horizon in my rearview mirror, I cannot help but sigh and wonder sadly how many inhabitants of the one institution are merely headed for the other in a matter of a few short years. 

Renae over at Life Nuturing Education wishes I would finally get around to this meme she tagged me with over two weeks ago, so her wish is my command!  I am to share five wishes for things I’d love but do not need and five wishes concerning my spiritual life.  The challenge for a mentally overactive Gemini like myself is narrowing the lists to five, but this evening I will try my best to present my heart and spirit’s most entertaining wishes.

Starlight, star bright, I wish I may:
1. have a thousand dollars a month to spend on nothing but books for myself and the kids.
2. invent a truly self-cleaning kitchen and successfully market said invention to fund the aforementioned book budget and allow time for reading the material purchased with it.
3. use a sizable chunk of the remaining profits from this kitchen venture to help my husband build our environmentally sustainable dream home.
4. pour most of the rest of the funds into my children’s college savings plans so they can attend any school in the world they choose and graduate without looming student loan repayment stalking them through their early adult years.
5. totally blow any remaining money traveling the globe with my husband and children as the icing on our homeschooling cake.

I wish I might:
1. find the self-discipline to truly commit to the development of my meditation practice.
2. remember that every step along the path of motherhood is an opportunity for amazing and blessed spiritual growth.
3. empower my children with the courage to strike out and discover their own spiritual paths, even if they diverge from my own.
 4. begin outwardly living my path by actively working to further the work of love in my community.
5. look for and find the truth and beauty in the everyday world around me amidst the often overwhelming ugliness and pain.

Have some fellow bloggers make more wishes tonight!
1. Merriconeag almost always has something beautiful to share.
2. Wendy never fails to delight me with her Well Mannered Frivolity.
3. Stephanie at Throwing Marshmallows might just throw a few of her own wishes our way.