I am trying to write a self-assessment about you to say something about the process in which you (me) have been immersed while writing this text now; “process involving a critical understanding of the reading act, which is not limited to pure decoding the written word or written language, but anticipates and extends the understanding of the world” (Freire,1981p.6). I need to focus on “my ideas via the many readings, my dialogs, and journaling take time with the familiar and unfamiliar language and ideas, work through the arguments”(Activity 5,CC ).When I try to write about the importance of the act of reading I felt taken to my past and gladly "re-read" moments of my practice that are stored in memory, more remote from the experiences from my childhood, to my adult life when the act of reading constitutes in me critical understanding of the world today(Freire,1981,p.5). The hard part of starting this letter is to get out of the comfort zone (Macedo & Araujo, 2005, xvii) and try to read/write my own life with honesty, and conscience. I want to immerse my own being on the sweet memories of my childhood because it is in this stage where I started to read the world and the word and those moments are deposited in memory. I can feel the pleasure of "re-read" moments of my life that are responsible of the human being I am today.
First, "reading" the world, the little world in which I moved; and how at age of three years old the perfect world flipped over without me being even aware of what would represent growing up without a father in a standardized world to a nuclear family. It is in this moment that today I can reflect about Dewey’s concept, the suggestion of something Not observed, because there are some actions that bring a message to you without being named. At age of 6 years old, I started to notice that something was different about me. I needed to prepare the gift for daddy’s day; also my teacher asked me to sing for daddy’s day, and these situations produced sorrow in me. I had no idea what it means to be without a daddy in our society. Today I understand that the rules and the world were made for perfect families, not for dysfunctional families. It was my first wake up! In this moment I can now reflect I started to read the world: I was different. Trying to re-live my childhood in the act of writing this letter, I see myself sliding in the hallways of my school, going to the Pulperia (store) across the corner to buy a coconut or sour cream ice cream; practicing for September 15(Independence day) parades and spending a sleepless night waiting for the Diana’s play to wake me for a great day! That world from my perspective of childhood could not be more perfect, except for the big details that I grow up without a male pattern at home.
The reading of that context was also represented by the singing of the birds in the mornings, the strong noise of storm, the smell of sugar cane in the time of cutting, the smell of the fresh coffee each morning, the beautiful blue skies that I was expecting all summer with the hope to enjoy the transparent water of the river, in front of my house, that embraced me with warm water in vacations. I can smell the aroma of guayabas as I rocked in its branches. I can see myself spending hours in the clear nights of October trying to guess what else could be out there? At 7 years old I turned into a “social worker” assisting my mother and her colleagues in native communities in Talamanca. I started to read the world, watching all those people without shoes, eating rice and beans, kids my same age with big stomach, that my mother later explained to me was because of parasites. "Reading" of my world was always important for me, my childhood process made a child anxious to discover what lay beyond the stars, where the airplane was going that was flying every night at 8pm. My teacher of primary teaches me to be literate, but never how to connect theory with praxis, connect the word and the world with education, everyday lives (Macedo & Araujo, 2005, P. xIv). Growing in a “Democratic” country brought me some privileges that today I try to understand. I definitely will need more than one page to analyze if my first reading of the world was immersed in a false conscience or social amnesia. I am anxious to know how this story will continues, still it happens, please work in your self-reflection process.
Best regards,
Your young conscience
