Independence v. Freedom

Christine and I had just driven into the big city in bumper to bumper traffic after a quickly devoured dinner and a sloppy 'distract and run' toddler maneuver. We had worked all day during what most educators in Texas formally call "the week we attempted to bring down democracy (against our wills) thanks to fat cat capitalists and a deal they made with the devil," also known as, "the demise of public education in America." (Most people, though, know it as the week of TAKS* testing.) And here we were, tripping our way into an unfamiliar auditorium, preparing ourselves for what we hoped would be a grain of inspiration.

We settled in to listen to Dr. Diane Ravitch, author of The Death and Life of the Great American System when we bumped into friends, Irina and Paula. We know these incredibly intelligent and insightful women from the Friday Night Salon group we sometimes attend. We sat down next to them and after settling in I brought up our consortium topic for this week and hoped for their input as, of course, they would have something brilliant to include. Rather than trying to write my way through sporadic dialogue and note passing during the event, I decided, instead, to show you my scattered notes:

The top half obviously is our thoughts on independence (note that I accidentally wrote independent at first - Freudian slip, as Irina pointed out). Freedom is at the bottom. Oddly, as we were brainstorming I decided that both words have negative connotations to me. Independence often leads to lessons learned in literature. Freedom has become a buzzword for American everything. We throw it around like it's cheap and most of the time use it in instances of blind patriotism. "I've never had an independence fry," Irina pointed out, grinning.

*Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills
This post was inspired by the Loose Bloggers Consortium, a small and feisty(!) global community. We write weekly on a common topic (Independence v. Freedom, this week) and post responses - all of us together, simultaneously, from all over the world. (Lovely!) Please visit Anu, Ashok, Conrad, gaelikaa, Grannymar, Judy, Magpie 11, Maria and Ramana for other wonderful posts.