THE REST OF THE STORY HOW TO

We made excuses taking into consideration everything that he had been dealt up to this point but there was only so much that we could do. We were careful about picking our battles, tried VERY HARD to use positive reinforcement as well as other tactics. It was almost scary, the look in his eye as he walked around the house looking for something, anything to touch that he wasn’t supposed to- another child’s toy, our cell phones, fragile items, computers, ANYTHING, just to be told, “No!”. The tantrums would eventually stop but as soon as he was done he’d immediately start looking for something to do to get in trouble. It started with the cussing…AGAIN which led to time outs, which led to tantrums, which led to physical altercations which led to longer time outs and more hitting and door slamming and wall kicking and whatever-he-could-get-his-hands-on breaking, and spitting in my face and calling me names. We should have known that this next one was going to be even worse, but it didn’t occur to me until it actually was. We’d seen this shift before, but were able to manage our way through it, even though each new cycle was significantly more difficult than the last. We had several days in a row that were difficult but not impossible– there was definitely a shift in the little one’s behavior. The kids went a couple of weeks without seeing their mom due to communication problems and the little one being the most sensitive just kind of lost it. We had about three weeks of “great”! but at about the fourth week, things started to spiral out of control. Visits with the Grandparents were ceased and life was a lot easier. Just after my last blog, the one where I talked about the little one being removed for the night, things got remarkably better. The story of what really happened…The rest of the story. This is not me crying for attention or begging for praise, this is just my story. There were already many other preconceptions about them that people naturally assumed, they certainly didn’t need any more.īut as the foster-mom, I need to expel the stress and anxiety that I have experienced over these last several months. I wanted the kids to be accepted and given a fair chance they deserved that. It was very important to me that no one passed judgment on them, that no one had any preconceived notions or anticipated any potential issues that would most likely never affect them directly. Not knowing how long the kids were going to be with us and knowing that some of their classmate’s parents are friends of mine, I felt like it wasn’t fair to share some of the real stuff we were dealing with. I shared lots of good stuff and some not so good stuff but I kept a lot of to myself. Throughout the five months that the kids were with us I shared– a lot. I want to be able to fall asleep at a decent hour tonight, without the perpetuating blog-monologue running through my brain. I have hemmed and hawed over writing this blog for several weeks now but I have to get it out. But what I haven’t shared yet, at least publically (er…semi-publically… okay, to those very few of you who read my blog) what really happened. So, most of you know that the kids went back to live with their mom more than a month ago. This entry was posted in Issues by Patrick Ryan. We’re thrilled to be publishing Jenzo DuQue’s “The Rest of Us,” and we look forward to what he does next.Ĭlick here to read a Q&A with the author. I don’t want you to read this story with any expectation other than to be blown away by its narrative drive and its wonderful blend of languages. What unfolds does so easily and brilliantly-or so it seems, until nothing about it is easy or brilliant, until everything about it is complicated and, at times, dangerous.

“Suddenly,” Frail Boy tells us, “we were young men.” And there they are, stepping out of childhood and into a dangerous adult world that has been right under their noses the whole time they were growing up.

THE REST OF THE STORY HOW TO

They have to figure out how to stand their ground while taking their cues from others, and the older they get, the more cues there are to sift through. José, Cristian, and Frail Boy (as the narrator is known) are street-smart kids pumped up with their own ambitions and tamped down by societal expectations. “The Rest of Us” tells the story of three boys growing up in a melting pot that refuses to melt. His prose has an urgency to it, a forward lean, and his voice is fluid. In the same way you listen to Willie Nelson sing and pluck his worn-out guitar and know he was meant to be a singer plucking a worn-out guitar, when you read Jenzo DuQue, you know he was meant to be a writer.