I am the first to admit that I was a bully as a child. This sweet little girl with the curly blond hair, who staged her own Broadway musical productions in her parent’s living room, used to tap dance around with her dark side. At the age of four, I decided that if anyone crossed my path that I would, without warning, bite them. Under the eye.

I would like to take this opportunity to apologize to all the kids in Bayside, New York who spent their summers with a band-aid under their eye. I am truly sorry. I also believe the statute of limitations has run out so don’t go hiring some lawyer. And besides, I am a creativity coach and the literal translation of this means “woman without money.”

Stock in Dial soap plummeted when I outgrew biting unsuspecting kids. But payback was a bitch. I became the one being stalked by two mean girls who were hell bent on making my life miserable in the fourth and fifth grade. And I had to live with it because people assumed it was just a phase they were going through – sacrificing young virgins on the playground?

I even became a pacifist who abhors any form of violence or cruelty on TV, in the movies or between Kathie Lee and Hoda. I wanted to show by example that I moved away my demons and became a productive person who wants to leave her mark on the world. My teeth need not apply.

Thinking I would ease into a bully-free life as an adult, I foolishly entered the job market. The thugs of yesteryear were now wearing suits and cheap shoes. And instead of threatening to tell everyone that I ate butter sandwiches (don’t knock it till you try it) these bullies held my paycheck ransom unless I played victim.

These overgrown bullies seem to have reached a level of authority by impressing the crap out of likeminded bullies or intimidating scaredy cats who were hiding out in a corner office. I spent several years dodging their acerbic barbs and threats because I needed the job. Life in a refrigerator box held no appeal to me. I will also admit that my job performance suffered because I could not thrive under a reign of terror. My colleagues and I were suffering from PTSD from Monday to Friday. And here I thought being a bully was just child’s play.

In my case, blessed Karma raised her perfectly manicured hand and bitch slapped the offenders. They lost their jobs. Sadly, it was not because the company became altruistic. Oh please. The economy took their power away. I would like to thank our country’s recession for lifting the chains off so many of my co-workers. As for me, I now work for myself and I have a time out corner at the ready in case I start to give myself some attitude.

Can we get rid of all the bullies in the workforce? I doubt it. Can we make them card carrying members of Bullies Anonymous? Yes and while we are at it, I say slap their pictures on milk cartons. Let our kids read about their dastardly deeds while chomping down on Captain Crunch. Let’s scare them into nice kids.

And if that doesn’t work, I will personally go into their offices and slap the ipads out of their hands, wipe the smug expressions off their faces and say, “I am your 2 o’clock meeting. I just came from my dentist’s office and my incisors can cut glass. Shall I make myself comfortable?”

I am taking a stand, on behalf of Corduroy. I am not referring to the “…textile composed of twisted fibers that, when woven, lie parallel (similar to twill) to one another to form the cloth’s distinct pattern, a “cord” (Wikipedia). To be honest, the jury is still out on that one. Some years I like corduroy, other years I don’t think it should worn by anyone over the age of ten. What I am referring to is the picture book, Corduroy by Dan Freeman, which was written in 1968. Corduroy is an imperfect little teddy bear, who lives in a department store, waiting to be purchased.  A little girl named Lisa eventually purchases him. He finds both a friend and a home.

I am sure I’ve read that book and looked at the pictures in it no less than 200 times in my life. It was my favorite book as a child. It was my seven-year-old favorite book in preschool. And now, I have the pleasure of introducing it to my two-year-old, who I hope will enjoy it as much as his brother and I did and continue to do. Which is why I was shocked to read an article in the New York Times several weeks ago that reported that the purchasing and reading of picture books are down because parents are pushing children towards chapter books at an earlier age. This trend is attributed to anxiety over meeting the standards for standardized texts.

People. No. No. No!

As an English educator and an avid reader, I honestly cannot express enough how awful a thing this truly is. I learned to read very early. I loved to read very early. My seven-year-old is a fluent and avid reader. He started reading independently at three! He was three years old when I realized that he had not memorized the story, but that he actually knew words by sight. I didn’t try to teach him to read. I didn’t try to force him to read chapter books. More than anything, what I wanted to do, was to inspire him to love books. And that meant, all types of books.

Even I, at the age of 43, love illustrations in books. What is there not to love? Illustrations tell stories in and of themselves. Oftentimes stories that are more complex than a child is actually able to read in words. But beyond complexity, what about joy? Forcing a child to read books that are frustrating, too far beyond his or her level of comprehension, or about subjects that he or she just isn’t ready to have developed an interest in, is a surefire way to turn someone off from reading.

I don’t just want my children to know how to read well. I want them to love to read. There is such a huge difference in knowing how to do something well and loving to do something. I wash a damned good dish, but darn it, I hate doing the dishes. If this trend continues, I would bet my last dollar that many more of these children will know how to read well, but not love to read, and that would be an absolute shame.

I still have that nostalgic feeling of wonder and love, when I read Corduroy and I’m an English professor. People, your kids are going to be okay. Let them have their picture books.

Five years ago just before my little girl came into the world I had one fear and expressed my fear to those in charge.  You see, my first two children were born with the umbilical cord wrapped tightly around their necks.  I was very lucky to have a doctor who didn’t even flinch with them, a doctor who did not even make me aware of what could have been.

Things were different with my third child.  I expressed my fear and explained my concern that the odds seemed high to me having had the same problem with two previous pregnancies.  She didn’t seem to worry, so it put me at ease.  After all, she is the medical professional, not me.

My daughter was blue and not breathing when she was born.  The moment I heard call the NICU STAT, I realized something was not right.  It seems like a blurry nightmare.  After what seemed like hours, she thankfully stabilized and did well.

Today, five years later I finally had the courage to dig deeper into the records from that day.  Not much information was given to us at the hospital.  I now know on that day my daughter was intubated, crashed, had a collapsed lung, and then had her lung blown back up with a needle through her chest.  I am told she almost did not make it.  I am told if she were at a different hospital where they do not have round-the-clock staffing of pediatric doctors, she more than likely would not have made it.

I am very thankful for the doctors who saved her life that day; however what makes me angry is that it should have never happened in the first place.  Research says that more than 70 percent of all medical errors ending in death are a result of miscommunication. I have since learned that babies born with cords around their necks have a simple protocol to prevent situations like this.  Years ago babies died for this very reason.  Today, it should not happen.

Sorrell King’s story ended differently.  Her baby girl, Josie was just 18 months old in January of 2001 when she was admitted to the hospital after suffering first and second degree burns from climbing into a hot bath.  She healed well and within weeks was ready to be released.  Two days before she was to go home she died from dehydration and misused narcotics.

98,000 people die every year from medical mistakes.  This is equal to that of a large plane crashing every day.  The thought of this sickens me.  They tell us we should be more on top of the doctors, ask questions, and don’t think of them as the one with all the answers, the one to trust.  I do realize we are all human and mistakes happen, but why do they not listen?  Why do some doctors not take our concerns seriously and brush us off with vague answers?  Who can you trust with your family’s health, if you can’t trust the doctor taking care of you?

Look around, what have we become? Sure, we all love the finer things in life, but has it gone too far? Do we not appreciate what we have and always desire more? Go back a few, well maybe about 50 years. The majority of people didn’t have what we have today. The ‘rich’ person was few and far between. People thought of this person as someone out of reach and their material things as something that only ‘rich’ people have. Today everyone wants to be that person. So many people want everything. People feel they are entitled to have everything. They are not happy unless they do.

It is everywhere. Greed, desire, want. It is so easy to get caught up in the ‘want’ way of thinking. The word ‘want’ and the word ‘need’ have sort of meshed in the last 20 years. The desire for larger houses, better cars, Pottery Barn rooms, and everything under the sun. Who do we think we are?

Do we really ‘need’ these things. No. Do we ‘want’ these things. Yes. I hear people saying things like, ‘I need a new quilt for my bed because it doesn’t go with the color of the room’. Do you really ‘need’ a new quilt or do you ‘want’ a new quilt? Of course you don’t need a new one. Not unless you have no other blankets in the house to keep warm! When did we start thinking this way?

With the way the world is today I think a lot of people need to take a step back and rethink. Think about the difference between ‘need’ and ‘want’. This is hard thing for some people to come to terms with. I think the best way is to put yourself in a different place. What if the moneymaker in the family suddenly lost their job, you are running out of money to pay your bills, and you may have to give up your house. This is all too often the story of lots of people these days. Put yourself in that situation. Is that new patio set really that important anymore? Do you now look at your house differently? You now want more than ever to just have your house (the way it is) old cabinets and all. All of a sudden it is such a beautiful house full of memories, something you would do anything to keep. You now don’t care about the new furniture you want because it doesn’t match perfectly with the curtains or the redoing the kitchen because the cabinets are not the right color.

I believe more people need to start thinking about the important things in life and not the materialistic things. People say this all the time, but are they really doing it?

How do we teach our kids the value of a dollar and the important things in life if we are not doing this ourselves?  That necessary quilt you want for your bed in your child’s eyes is the same as the ‘want’ they have for the new generation iPod or the brand-name boots.

What happened to the simple life and will it ever be back?