“His name is De’Andre Swagboy Pierce. That’s gonna be my baby’s daddy right over there.” She motioned to the boy sitting in the corner, trying to look a little too thug. “Pierce is my last name, Baby Daddy’s gonna be salty when he realizes I gave it my name over his.”
Chanel Cookies Pierce is a fairly normal Texas sophomore. She plays on the JV basketball team, has a “B” in her geometry class, and hopes to get a job at the Sonic next year so she can have some extra spending money. But the one thing that sets Cookies (she prefers to go by her middle name) apart from the other 1000 students I’m speaking to today is the baby carriage in her hand. I didn’t think much of it until I saw her purse lying on top of her baby, sitting in the sun, on a hot Tuesday afternoon. I couldn’t help myself; no one else was saying anything, so I took it upon myself to be the responsible one… and sent over one of my guys to check it out.
Clarence: Excuse me, do you think maybe we should find you a spot in the shade with your baby?”
Cookies: Hahahah! That’s not real! You must be trippin. Hahahahaha! It’s just a doll, I carry it around as my punishment.
Clarence: (confused) Your punishment? I don’t understand. Is this for some class or something? SETH! You better come over here.
She continued to tell Clarence and I the story of what I’ve now deemed to be her scarlet baby. It turns out that Cookies’ Dad walked in on her and her boyfriend having sex last week. She’s 16. He’s 17 and drives a ’92 probe with 22’s. Her parents, realizing this situation was serious, took a chance at a highly unorthodox punishment. To really teach Cookies a lesson, they came up with the idea of a scarlet baby.
“My momma don’t want me to have a baby when she did. She loves me an all, and I’m her only so she wants more for me. She had me when she was 15 and had to drop out of school and stuff. Her life was hard, still is, but she has so much hope for me.”
Cookies’ mom has tried other punishments before. She tried grounding her daughter, blocking MTV, BET and the Food Network (she’s a bit overweight), taking away her cell phone, and even not letting her go out when boys are around. But nothing has really sunk in until this.
Cookies has to walk around school for two full weeks with a fake baby, as if it was a real one. She’s not allowed to neglect care or leave him unattended, and a few teachers and other parents are in on it to make sure she holds up her part of the bargain. She had to pick a name for him (didn’t get to choose girl or boy). Her mom gets her up at 4 am to the sounds of a crying baby over her stereo. She has to have him with her at class, lunch and practice, and can’t go out with her friends unless she can come up with enough of her own money to hire a professional baby sitter.
“It was kinda a joke for the first few days. My friends would borrow De’Andre Swagboy for pictures. The boys snickered. But then I was tired all the time and then I couldn’t go to the movies last Saturday or the mall on Sunday. And I can’t get in a car with my friends because there isn’t enough room for the carrier. And now I only have 4 days left, and I don’t know if I can make it… “
Me: But you’re leaving the doll out in the sun, with your purse on top of him, or it, or whatever you call it.”
Cookies: De’Andre Swagboy. Well that’s the thing. I can’t handle it right and he ain’t even real. My momma said I better treat him like a real baby, you know, that cries and stuff. And after a few days I started to really try. But it got too hard, so now I just let De’Andre Swagboy sleep till 3 when I get back home from school. It’s easier that way.
Clarence: So why didn’t you give the baby your “Baby Daddy’s last name?”
Cookies: Cause mine sounds better. His is dumb.
Me: What’s his last name?
Cookies: (pause) Uh… YO, JORDEN! WHAT’S YOUR LAST NAME?
Me: Nevermind.
Cookies went on to explain that this has been a real lesson to her. The teachers talk about teen pregnancy in school, and teach about protective sex in sex ed class. But you never actually have to deal with it in person. And schools are still missing the boat. In Texas (where this story occurred) schools are not required by law to teach sexual education courses, and those that do (mostly High Schools) must emphasize abstinence and the failure rate of contraceptives that might prevent STI’s or pregnancy. In fact, just this past Feburary 23rd state lawmakers filed legislation that would require sex education classes in Texas to include information about contraceptives. Cookies and I discussed how teen pregnancy affected her school. She said the few people she knew that had gotten pregnant in the past years just kind of disappeared. After a certain point they just left school and you never heard from them again. Therefore, not only were the students not getting proper sex education, but also they weren’t exposed to the life changing effects of having unprotected sex… the life of a teen parent. Out of left field, she threw out an analogy that almost knocked me off my feet:
“You know how like in Chemistry you’re taught how to do experiments with dangerous things and stuff? Well take away any of the hands on parts, and that’s what you get with our school’s pregnancy teachings. If I had never used a Bunsen burner or hot plate, I would probably think I can just use them whenever with no consequences. Now that I’ve had a hands on experience, I know that I won’t be ready for years to have a baby. But I thought it’d be no problem before. You don’t know till you get burned.”
There has been some controversy at the school about Cookies’ punishment. Some parents think it’s too heavy, some teachers think it’s a distraction for other students. But Cookies’ mom is holding her ground. And from what I saw, Cookies’ casual attitude had been all but exterminated (well at least probably cut in half). She knows it’s not a joke anymore, and her scarlet baby has spread to the other students as well. The general consensus at this school is one of protected sex if any at all.
Chanel Cookies Pierce wants to be a pediatric nurse when she grows up. She wants little De’Andre Swagboy to be a football player. And she’s headed in the right direction with a 94 in her child development class, even though we need to work on her vocabulary and pronunciation a little.
The real hero today though is Mrs. Cookies (whatever her real name is) for standing up and actually creating a punishment that teaches rather than just prolongs the inevitable. In a day where it’s easier to step back and say that it’s not your problem, she’s standing up for what she believes in. No matter how much flack she’s taking from other parents and school administrators, she’s taking real world education into her own hands and standing her ground. I admire that. As for her dad who walked in on the incident? Well, I don’t admire him, but all good lessons have to start somewhere…
WJNTY – Seth
Way to go, Clarence. ;)
ReplyDeleteI've been waiting for you to write an entry on preventing your daughter from having sex too early! My daughter is 13 and I worry about her everyday.
ReplyDelete