Tina Friesner:  

"We from Grant are brothers." Who designed that misguided pin? Its promotion of friendly interracial relations, depicted by a dark hand clasped with a light hand . . . totally ignores an entire gender! As did the shop teacher, who refused to allow girls in his class. I am bonkers about wooden boxes and signed up for shop to make one. My counselor informed me that although Title IX had just passed in Congress, Grant officials hoped that I wouldn't cause trouble! I didn't understand until a later year that she had told me that the principal refused to abide by the federal law meant to end discrimination against girls and women in education! I should have sued! The next year, Abbi was allowed to take shop but no one told me that I could. When I was 15, I noticed that biblical people changed their names. So I changed my name. My brothers estranged themselves from me decades ago. Richard was found in his recliner in January, 2015. He had last been seen at the library the day after Thanksgiving. I thank everyone who was nice to him. I wish that people who knew my brothers would explain them to me. My parents are in boxes. If only I could go back in time to when I had a family, including my parakeet and my fish. Oh, to live again with my 1896 oak piano, with ivory keys and front panels of plaster cast oak leaves. When I called my mother at Christmas in 2007, she informed me that when she moved two months earlier, she had simply abandoned my piano in the house! See in the 1975 yearbook the photo of me from behind, sitting beside Pat Hiltner. Here I have proof of what I have bragged about all these years: I was the pianists' page turner in high school! You have to be experienced to know the exact moment to turn the page! (Not to mention that I received Alameda's best penmanship award in fourth grade! Not to mention that my owl drawing garnered the best artwork award in sixth grade!) My Grant counselor had me take the typing class to become a secretary because I said that I couldn't afford college. She didn't inform me about applying for financial aid! When I was a kid, the job opening listings showed that the highest paid women's job was that of legal secretary. I became one, paid ten cents above minimum wage! ("Be careful what you wish for.") I was coerced by a federal jobs program into working for an attorney who had earlier been taken out of practice for "moral turpitude." His wife got him reinstated. He had told me that he would give me a raise after I worked for him for a year. After a year, I asked for my raise. He refused, saying that he couldn't spare money because he was sending his daughter to a private college. Then Ed Fadeley coerced me into working for him. Read about him in the news. (What they said.) I see online that Mark Crislip honed his sarcasm to post a medical blog about pus! I often wonder how to contact theatre star Doug Campbell. He should be easy to locate online, since he is extraordinarily talented as an actor and singer. We need a video of his impression of M...Expand for more