Every Shabbat when it’s nice weather, we take a walk to the park and to the creek. It’s a busy trip out the door with four kids under the age of seven, and we’re always managing trying to keep everyone walking and not into the street. On our walks this spring I would always have a momentary whiff of gas, and I soon realized I always smelled it at the same spot. We walk to the creek without cell phones, and then spend hours there. On the way home, we sometimes take a different route or we’re dealing with exhausted and soaking wet kids. I would always forget about the gas smell, and always assumed that if it actually smelled like gas, one of the families in the houses around the intersection I smelled the gas would have called it in. Maybe they had already and it’s nothing. I’ve never thought about that momentary whiff outside of Shabbat until today, when this happened:

What we know about the deadly gas explosion in Baltimore:
– A “major” gas explosion ripped through three homes in the Reisterstown Station neighborhood in Northwest Baltimore.
– The exact cause of the explosion was not immediately clear. pic.twitter.com/WMM6SraBSp

For the last week, I’ve been lobbying for our local private schools, which have been closed until at least October 1st by the executives in Montgomery County, Maryland. You may have heard about the controversy, which could become a battleground for private school parents across the country.

Last month, the public schools announced that they would not be opening for in-person instruction until at least January. In part as a result of that announcement, their projected enrollments saw a significant drop-off. Local media reported, “MCPS was expecting over 2,500 new students by the end of August. As of July 1, only about 300 K-12 new students had been enrolled.” There’s no word about how many kids who were enrolled have been pulled out, but it’s likely as significant as the lowered projected enrollment numbers. Schools are funded by the number of bodies enrolled, and this exodus is an existential threat to the stability of the public school model.

Normally, this advice is applicable for those at the center of cancel culture mobs, but it extends to mobs in general, too. A mob is currently coming after talkshow host Ellen DeGeneres and the pressure is mounting to such a degree that there are now reports the host is considering leaving her own show.

The storm started with an explosive BuzzFeed story outlining some serious allegations:

Teachers are shaping the future and are doing essential work. Well, except they are not to be viewed as essential workers and have decided not to come back to work for a full year or more. Remember, in the beginning of the pandemic last fall, when it was two weeks to slow the spread? Then it turned into “We should just call this year off, it’s already so close to the end of the year, and we’ll spend the summer preparing to get back into the classroom.” Now we’re into almost August, and you know what? They’re just not ready and not willing to risk it. Your kids didn’t do anything resembling okay with online learning last year, but it’ll be fine this year. Well, except, sigh, online learning is draining. On second thought, let’s just cancel that, too.

So what, exactly, *do* they want to do?https://t.co/7FXp6LRPeB pic.twitter.com/yNRW7mTRJ2

I’ve been deluged by people over the last few months, and especially over the last week, picking my brain about homeschooling. So much so, I started a YouTube channel discussing homeschooling in a Jewish context. I get constant questions that are all basically this: “What’s the best math curriculum for 1st grade?” or “What is my 3rd grader supposed to know?”

I’m about to let you in on a secret: There is no list of attainments your child has to have mastered by the end of a certain grade that teachers are magically given when they get their certificates. They learn classroom management and curriculum development; but they aren’t given keys to your kid and what they have to learn by certain benchmarks. We are told, and we believe, as parents that we are the ones that know our children best. So why is it, then, that we can’t trust ourselves to know what they need to learn and how they need to learn it?

Over the weekend, I wrote about a massive fissure in a parenting group I am (was?) a part of. The group has a national arm and then nationwide “chapters” organizing nature hikes for parents and their young children. I wrote about my frustration that the group had become so hyper-politicized about Black Lives Matter (BLM) and shared the thoughts of other mothers who contacted me feeling the same.

Since I wrote that post, one of the national board members, the Director of Communications, has resigned. It’s not because the group has gone woke… no, it’s because the group isn’t woke enough. I am about to share screenshots of the resignation letter she circulated, and as you read I would like you to continually remind yourself that this woman is resigning from a volunteer position posting on social media about a nature group that has not, in her mind, gone far enough endorsing BLM.

I had a definite fangirl moment yesterday when one of my favorite writers, J.K. Rowling, tweeted in response to my support for her position on free speech and defense of feminism:

You are the comfort I needed x

I’ve been thinking a lot about where we went wrong as a society. What happened to America, how could so many possibly view the Founders on Mt. Rushmore in the way that this CNN reporter did, and why wasn’t there a greater outcry about her slander?

CNN: "President Trump will be at Mount Rushmore, where he’ll be standing in front of a monument of two slave owners and on land wrestled away from Native Americans.” pic.twitter.com/UYjzEiUkU9

Just two weeks ago the political journalist class was left aghast at claims in John Bolton’s book about statements the President made to China about concentration camps they’ve been building,

NEW Bolton book excerpt in WSJ: In June 2019, Xi "explained to Trump why he was basically building concentration camps in Xinjiang. … Trump said that Xi should go ahead with building the camps, which Trump thought was exactly the right thing to do." https://t.co/7cuIvX1D97

Here’s what progressives don’t seem to understand: If you defund the police, you’re going to encourage an exponential growth in gun sales. If you allow roving gangs of young people to destroy private property without police intervention, you’re going to encourage the creation of vigilantes and militias. If you think you’ll ever have a prayer at gun control again, look no further than this video to explain why you don’t have a prayer:

A couple has come out of their house and is pointing guns at protesters in their neighborhood #StLouis #lydakrewson pic.twitter.com/ZJ8a553PAU