all in a day's work. (i wrote this a while ago)

If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, do we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that.

- Shakespeare

I end up quoting that one often, for all sorts of reasons. But a boy in my grade named Elijah really brought it home, and more in the way of Shakespeare than I thought anyone ever could. I walked into fifth hour expecting a good forty-five minutes of reading and sobbing to a different tune (New Moon, by Stephenie Meyer), and instead walked into a small circle of desks pulled together, with Mrs. Beams, Elijah and Zach propped on top of them, Elijah's face tear-streaked, Zach's head bowed.

We walk, we speak, we have friends, we have enemies, I'm talking right now, so why does everyone treat us like we're stupid?

(This happened like two days ago so I can't remember the exact words)

These words came from a frustrated and crying young black man, after a girl allegedly told him Caucasians and African Americans should drink from separate water fountains and be forced to sit in the back of the bus. Elijah also spoke of a group of people he thought were his friends that had a racist song on their iPods.

Do you hear that? It's the sound of muffled sobs. He led every student in the room to tears, including myself. He made me cry so hard, in fact, that in sixth period, I walked up to him and hugged him. This is a guy I have never spoken to in my life, except for the occasional 'hey' in the hallways.

After he left, Mrs. Beams (I've mentioned before about how awesome she is) gave a little speech to sum up everything that happened. That led her into a little classroom conversation about respecting people and everything. Abbey and I mentioned that this 'racist' thing was much the same as 'homophobes', and Mrs. Beams blew me away with some of the most amazing things ever said. I raised my hand and said, "It's like when people who are homosexual, they get called derogatory terms and told they are going to hell." To which she replied:

Exactly. And no where in the bible does it say that homosexuals go to Hell. It says the only way God will send you to Hell is if you are a nonbeliever. Furthermore, I don't understand why you can't have a homosexual teacher in your class, I mean they aren't talking about their sexual preference or trying to lead you into it, they are teaching you about the subject you need to learn. I don't think it matters, when it comes down to it, if a person is gay or not.

She went on to say that at our age, she doesn't feel that we have a set idea of our TRUE orientation, that we're too young to be completely decisive about all that.

She is the best teacher ever.

By the way, I so hate it whenever someone says "That's so gay." or calls something gay. I just say, "Hmm, yes that is so homosexual, isn't it?" and walk away. Because really, when you indicate something (and usually that something is bad) is 'gay' you are pretty much indirectly stereotyping the homosexual community, as if every gay person does whatever you called gay or that happens to them all the time.