Promise Me Dad #1

Today I started reading “Promise Me Dad” by former Vice President and personal hero Joe Biden. The book is a biography that documents Joe Biden’s life in the office and with family after his eldest son was diagnosed with a brain tumor.

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The book kicks off in the back of an armored limo as Joe and his wife travel to Air Force One for their flight to the yearly thanksgiving in Nantucket. Biden fondly reminisces of the first Biden family Nantucket thanksgiving, making the reader feel like part of the Biden family.

Joe talks about the trip and how the thanksgiving was a much-needed escape from the busy life as a Vice President. This work-less fantasy is cut short however when the secret service sets up a communications room upstairs in the cabin. This is a small price to pay for time with his family, however.

The thanksgiving is a wonderful time for the Biden family but Joe is becoming more and more focused on his eldest son Beau, who has been diagnosed with a brain tumor. Beau cannot stand the worried attention from his father and assures him that he is fine and, “Getting better every day.”

Community of the Self Reflection

School started but a few weeks ago in late August. School starting is, of course, the yearly event in which students prepare for the following ten months of learning, and also begin counting down the days until winter break. The beginning of the school year can be stressful for a lot of students, we are thrown into a building with new people and new issues, and have to figure out how to navigate it. But the start of the school year marks our class of learners moving ahead together to form new communities and classes of learners throughout the school. Although it can seem at times like it is easier to learn alone, I believe it is when we can talk to and bounce ideas off other students that we learn the best. So this year I want to be an active learner in our classroom community. I want to learn what my peers have to say about my writing to improve it. I want to read what my peers have written to see how others around me perceive things. I want to be active and not just go through the motions of the activities I do in class. I want to take each activity by the horns and learn from it. I want to be a learner, not just a student.