11:15 AM - Drove down to Albany early for Advisement Day. My advisor is going to be my professor this summer for my summer course and also in the fall when I do Student Teaching. Crazy to think I'm this close to my Master's Degree! Really meaningful meeting today. We actually talked for close to forty minutes, not about my coursework, but my teaching pedagogy and philosophy which is driven a lot by social and educational justice. He played songs from Tupac Shakur which seemed to throw some of his colleagues in the building for a loop at 9:00 in the morning. One that he gave me a printout of the lyrics to and which really hits home since I have been doing the Sponsor a Scholar program in Albany is "The Rose that Grew from Concrete". Talk about some powerful lyrics. It's not about how beat up and torn the rose is.. it's the fact it came from that. When I look at the kids I work with I realize their potential and they are truly amazing kids.. and to think of the backgrounds that many of them come from, the adversity they've overcome, and to think how far they might go in life. Now that's what I'm talking about!
Total Time: 1:00:30 Total Distance: 20 miles
You try to plant somethin in the conrete, y'knowhatImean?
If it GROW, and the and the rose petal got all kind of
scratches and marks, you not gon' say, "Damn, look at
all the scratches and marks on the rose that grew from concrete"
You gon' be like, "Damn! A rose grew from the concrete?!"
Same thing with me, y'knahmean? I grew out of all of this
Instead of sayin, "Damn, he did this, he did this,"
just be like, "DAMN! He grew out of that? He came out of that?"
That's what they should see, y'knowhatImean?
All the trouble to survive and make good out of the dirty, nasty
y'knowhahatImean unbelievable lifestyle they gave me
I'm just tryin to make somethin..
When no one even cared
The rose it grew from concrete
Keepin all these dreams
Provin nature's laws wrong
It learned how to walk without havin feet
It came from concrete
Did you hear about the rose that grew from a crack in the concrete?
Provin nature's laws wrong it learned how to walk without havin feet
Funny it seems but, by keepin its dreams
it, learned to breathe FRESH air
Long live the rose that grew from concrete
when no one else even cared
No one else even cared..
The rose that grew from concrete
Did you hear..
Did you hear about the rose that grew from a crack in the concrete?
Provin nature's laws wrong
It learned to walk without having feet
Funny it seems but by keeping its dreams
it learned to breathe FRESH air
Long live the rose that grew from concrete
when no one else, even cared
Keepin all these dreams
Provin nature's laws wrong
It learned how to walk without havin feet (to breathe the fresh air)
It came from concrete (to breathe the fresh air)
(to breathe the fresh air, to breathe the fresh air)
You see you wouldn't ask why the rose that grew from the concrete
had damaged petals. On the contrary, we would all celebrate its
tenacity. We would all love it's will to reach the sun.
Well, we are the rose - this is the concrete - and these are
my damaged petals. Don't ask me why, thank God nigga, ask me how!
Hahahaha..
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