Twelve years and nine months ago, I started kindergarten at the
age of four.  My Mom said she had to push a few rules and pull
a few strings to get me in that young.  I think she was just one
of those pushy moms.  (No offense, Mom.)  She says she knew I was
ready, but I think she just wanted to get me out of her hair.
Just kidding.  I think my Mom knew what she was doing, in spite
of the warnings she was given that I would have a hard time later
as a teenager.  

You’ve heard about the book "All I really need to know I learned
in kindergarten" by Robert Fulghum. That’s the one with the list
of skills and values that you supposedly learn in that first year
of school, like listening and sharing, and cooperation and
friendship.  Well, I had already learned those things before I
stepped through the doors of Dietz Elementary.  I learned to share
with a sister who couldn’t share back.  I learned to listen to my
brother make silly noises over and over.  I learned to cooperate
with my divorced parents’ every-other-weekend visitations, and I
learned that real friends are blind to disabilities.

Disabilities, you ask?  Yes, I grew up with disabilities.  Because
I grew up with a sister and brother who were born not as lucky as
I was.  My sister has Prader-Willi Syndrome, a genetic disorder
that gives her an uncontrollable appetite, so the food has to be
kept locked up so she won’t eat herself to death.  My brother has
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome as a result of his birth mother’s drinking
when she was pregnant with him.  To make it worse, my parents had
already adopted them before I was ever born, so I was surrounded
by their idiosyncrasies and inappropriate behaviors from day one.
So I have also learned a lot about disabilities and I know first
hand about the struggles and challenges faced by people who are
differently abled.

With a family like that, you might expect a child with a lot of
emotional problems, and learned behaviors that are not exactly
normal.  So, now that I am graduating high school as an honor
student, ready to start on a new educational path in my life
journey, I wonder, how did I grow up in this crazy family and
still turn out to be such a wonderful person?

Seriously, what went right in those years of turmoil and tantrums?
I grew up surrounded by obsessions, compulsions, perseverations
and a few other behaviors I’d rather not mention.  And that was
just my mother.  Just kidding.  But it was not a normal upbringing.
So how DID I turn out the way I did?  I asked my Mom.

She said there are a lot of reasons.  One is genetics.  I was
blessed with good genes, she said.  I got her brains and my dad’s
looks and my grandmother’s musical talent and my grandfather’s
computer genius.  Not like my sister, who because of a tiny
deletion in Chromosome 15 will live her life as a six-year-old,
with locked refrigerators and group home staff guarding her
constantly.  But good genes isn’t the only factor in my 17 years
(so far) of success.

Mom said that a good environment is important too.  She said she
learned a lot about parenting before I was born, from taking care
of special needs foster kids.  She learned how to take care of me
before I was ever born, by eating right, taking her vitamins, and
avoiding cigarette smoke and alcohol. Not like my brother, who was
born drunk, went through withdrawal, and lives a lifetime hangover,
a boy in a man’s body, who will never drive, never live completely
on his own, never have the opportunities that are open to me, like
getting a college degree, becoming self-sufficient, making lots of
money, and possibly raising a family of my own some day.

Mom said that genetics and environment are important, and so are
role models.  Even though my parents are divorced, my Mom says
their marriage was not a mistake, that she picked out my dad
because she knew he would be a good father, and he is.  He is
patient and understanding, never raised his voice with me, never
raised his hand to me.  Then there’s my grandparents.  Even though
they live 2,000 miles away, they are still closely connected to us
and are role models of what a good marriage should be.  Even though
I don’t see them more than a few times a year, when I do see them,
I see how they communicate and compromise, care for and comfort
each other, and how they support and encourage my Mom, and how they
treat my brother and sister with the same love and attention as
their other grandchildren, and how they enjoy the music I write
and how they say they are proud of me.

Then there’s my teachers.  I’ve had about 40 different teachers,
each with something unique to offer.  One had a great sense of
humor, another had interesting stories from England to share.
Some have used different and exciting ways to teach ordinary
classes.  Some of the most interesting lessons were taught without
the books.  Each teacher has been a role model in a different way,
not by what they taught, but how they taught, with respect for the
students, with the patience to explain the abstract, by putting a
little bit of their own selves into the lesson plans.

But my best teacher has been my Mom.  She always takes the time to
explain her reasons for making decisions that I might not always
agree with.  And even though she doesn’t always understand me, she
tries to listen to my point of view.  She has taught me to look
past people’s faults and disabilities to see the human being inside.
She has taught me to look past strange or inappropriate behavior to
understand that there’s probably a reasonable explanation behind it,
if we take the time to look.  She has taught me that it’s more
important to say "I’m sorry" than to say "You’re wrong."  She has
taught me that hugs are an important part of keeping healthy.  She
has taught me that privileges and independence are not free, that
I must pay for them with responsibility and commitment. She has
taught me to think ahead to the consequences of my actions.  And
that might be one of the most important things she has taught me:
that I am responsible for my own behavior; that what I do today can
affect my entire future; that a choice I make now, could have
life-long consequences for me and for the people I love.  My Mom
allowed me to make decisions for myself about myself.  She even let
me dye my hair blue when I was a Freshman.  She said that I can make
decisions about my life, because I have the ability to see how those
decisions will impact my life down the road.  

She says not all people have that ability though, because so many
people suffer from neurological impairment that keeps them from
having good judgment, that keeps them from controlling their
impulses, that gets them into a lot of trouble in school, in
trouble with the law.  She says that there are a lot of people
out there like that, with damaged brains and messed up lives.
All because of their brains being drugged with alcohol before they
were born. She says that 50,000 babies are born every year effected
in some way because of the alcohol their mothers drank. And that
alcohol does more damage to the developing baby than any other drug.

I asked my Mom if alcohol is so harmful for the baby, why would a
woman still drink when she’s pregnant?  She said there are probably
a lot of reasons.  Maybe she grew up with drinking in the family.
Maybe there’s a lot of drinking in her circle of friends.  Maybe she
has an addiction to alcohol.  Maybe she has poor judgment and poor
impulse control because her mother drank when she was pregnant with
her.  That made me think.  If one mother drinks when she’s pregnant,
and it affects her baby, who grows up to get pregnant and she drinks
when she’s pregnant, and it affects her baby, then the cycle goes on
and on, generation after generation, with more and more kids born
with damaged brains, who can’t control their impulses and have lots
of problems because of their damaged brains.  I figure that the best
way to stop the cycle is to not start it in the first place.

My Mom has lots of statistics, but she says her favorite one is this:
Children are one-third of our population, but they are all of our
future.  I’ve been telling you all of this for a reason.  After 12
years of education, we are all leaving our childhoods behind, and
moving into our future as adults.  It won’t be long before we are
watching a new generation come to life.  I hope it will be a healthy
generation and a healthy life and a healthy future.  How healthy our
society becomes depends on you, each of you as individuals, on the
decisions you make, and your ability to look down the road at the
consequences of your decisions.  If you are lucky enough to have the
brains to make your own decisions, make some good ones.

They say that experience is the best teacher.  And let me tell you,
growing up with a brother who was alcohol effected has been an
experience that has taught me a lot. It has taught me to appreciate
the brains and abilities I am blessed with.  And it taught me to
recognize alcohol for what it is, a toxic substance that can screw
up a person’s life forever.  

Now that I have you all so serious, I’ll end with a few little
quotes that I found on the Internet.  This one is for everyone
over 35:  Before you judge the younger generation remember who
raised them. For the parents:  Children are natural mimics: they
act like their parents in spite of every attempt to teach them good
manners. And for the grandparents:  Few things are more satisfying
than seeing your own children have teenagers of their own (Doug
Larson).   For all the teachers:  A good education is the next best
thing to a pushy mother (Schulz).  And my last quote, for my
classmates and fellow graduates, is Einstein’s formula for success:
If A equals success, then the formula is A=X+Y+Z, where X is "work,"
Y is "play," and Z is "keep your mouth shut."  And with that I’ll
shut my mouth, after saying good-bye to my classmates, I love you,
family, and thank you to all my teachers for all the lessons I have
learned.

Chris Kellerman