"No, Diego, it's a 'bling-ring'."

Every Monday through Thursday, I tutor nine year old Edison. On Monday, he came into my little closet of a classroom and starting waving his hand in my face. He was wearing a ring made out of a one dollar bill. He let me see it, and while he was writing on the board, I made my own. Every time he did something right, we would make fists and do the fist-pound, except Edison made a noise similar to the light saber movement (ask Peter or my brother to do it - I can't) and scrunched his face all up. The power of the ring, apparently, is very strong. I didn't feel it like he did.

After his class was over, I put the ring in my bag, because there was no way that I was going to wear it in public.

Every day after tutoring Edison, I catch a bus home. Now, as you know, my bus experiences haven't been pleasant. The stop I'm at is about 3 stops before it gets PACKED, so about 53% of the time, I'm able to get a seat, which I LOVE, because my bag is heavy, and I don't feel AS ill.

On Monday, I caught the bus like I usually do, and was able to get a seat right away. I was wedged (not exaggerating) between an OLD man (like, may-have-met-Jesus old) and a woman with her what looked/sounded like a 3 year old daughter. As I was sitting there, the old man kept giving me his two-tooth grin, and the little girl just kept STARING at me. I kept looking straight ahead, feeling very awkward, and VERY out of place.

As I'm sitting there, beginning to sweat because the bus was getting fuller, and apparently no one believes in opening the windows, I feel something on my hair, just a swift movement like a bug or something. This was no bug. It was the three year old girl. I thought it was an accident. I kept looking ahead. I feel it again. This time, there is no mistaking that it is this little girl, petting me like a dog (and we all know how much I LOVE dogs). Now, if I were her mother, I would have swatted her hand down and said, "Leave the poor, sweating white girl alone!", but as I looked over, I saw Madre sitting there grinning at her daughter - God's OBVIOUS gift to the world.

As I continue sitting there, more awkwardly than ever, trying my hardest to ignore this little piglet that keeps touching me, I hear her say to her mother, "Mommy, is her hair REAL?!" Madre just smiled and said "Yes, my love." Yes, you idiot, it's real, you've been touching it for the last ten minutes. I wish I was kidding when I tell you that for the entire 27 minute bus ride this girl was touching my hair. I wanted to smack her.

Today, as I was looking through my bag for a pencil during class, I found the ring that I made with Edison. So, I put it on. I suddenly turned into the coolest teacher ever. I decided that next week since it's just review, I'm going to teach the kids to make one. While they were reading today, Alfredo gave me a dollar and I made him a ring too.

I was sitting in the teacher's lounge, just laughing at my ring, and Diego comes in. So I show him and laugh. He laughs too, and gives me a dollar. He wore his ring on his pinky for the rest of the day, and every time I looked at him I just burst out laughing. He was calling it his dollar ring, but I kept telling him, "No, Diego, it's a 'bling-ring'." This made him laugh even more. I love that I'm thug enough to be wearing bling made out of dolla billz.

On my way to tutoring today (Edison, that little donkey, didn't show up), I realized that I didn't have enough money for the cab. I was a dollar short. As I was looking through my bag I thought, "WOW it's a good thing I'm wearing this bling-ring! I can take a cab!" So I paid for the cab with my ring. I felt hella cool.

OH, speaking of dollahs, my students have been asking me to speak in a British accent. Ummmmm. No. They don't understand why I won't, and in reality it's because it's EMBARRASSING, and all I can think about is how my sisters and I used to speak in British accents all the time when we were little. This one time, when I was in 3rd grade, we went to Disney World, and at one of the water parks, Jenna and I decided to speak in British accents all day. Mom yelled at us because there was actually a British family near us. Then we got all embarrassed and didn't go back to the towels ALL day because we didnt' know if they'd heard us. I'm sure they did.

Until next time,
Sara with skillz and dolla billz