Roots and Wings - Mentoring the new generation

For about a year or so now, I have began teaching kids culinary skills at a high school and at a youth center. The age groups are 5-8th graders and 9-12th at a CPS high school. Along with that work, I have been working with the NAACP ACT-SO South side of Chicago Scholarship program for the last two years and I now sit on that volunteer board as the Secretary after helping out when my eldest child was a competitor.

While I had anticipated doing some mentoring, and hoped to build into my business plans to find a way to develop an internship, I did not think that I would be, at this point of my life, doing as much as I am for and with kids. I have not yet finished raising my own children and now I am mentoring many more.

After a loss of position and a downward turn in my health, I was grateful for the needed time to investigate my medical problems. A return to working near 20 hour days for a business that was simply providing a hourly wage, making others much richer, and me only slightly better off, didn't seem possible or practical. I am not the same hardworking chick I once was and when the opportunity came to try my hand at teaching culinary, instead of only producing large quantities for service while my health worsened from the stress of the job, I accepted.

Both populations of kids have their associated issues of behavior, which is different for each group, but they have never done anything outside of the typical actions of their age groups. Pre-teens and teens have the prerequisites of talking too much, listening too little, short attention spans, easily distracted, thinking only about a response to questions instead of listening to the information given, and let us not forget the attention-seeking actions that express need for attention and acceptance from peers, adults, and members of the opposite sex. All that aside, let's talk to their needs for stability and the need for dreaming big.

The kids in my classes, and others to whom I speak to often, either have big dreams of their futures or none at all, it seems. Leaving them to either desire to do the impossible or misunderstanding that nothing is possible. I haven't seen much of a middle ground with these kids. While some wish to fly on wax wings too close to the sun, others are too scared to make attempts.

Every dreamer needs a good dose sense and solid foundation and every bird scared to leave the nest needs a firm push outward to test their wings. My high school kids are learning much more that culinary skill, if they attempt to pay attention to lecture and conversations, as I spend time teaching life skills, nutrition, household management, diets, social commentary, current affairs, and what else seems important at the time. Food involves aspects of culture, socialization, economy, mathematics, applied chemistry, art, tempting of all our senses, and transmitting care, love, and survival.

No matter what a young ones' desires to do with their years, grounding them in understandings, wisdom, and careful practices is doing them the service of your knowledge about life in our society. But be careful not to plunge their path into utter darkness and fear, so that they never attempt flight for in doing so, you steal the life blood from the innocent. It is not easy to strike a balance, give wise council, and fair warnings to individuals that think they know everything, hard headed, and stubborn. But to fail, or refuse to try, lending your experience to them so they may avoid the potholes and pitfalls is a sin. Failing to do your duty to inform the next generation leaves them to reinvent the wheel again without diagram or Allen wrench to assemble that which they bought at Ikea. Sad.

Too many wish only to complain and too few are willing to help; which camp is your tent pitched in?