going around and a friend says she's going to send it to me so I've been thinking up my answer.

The email asks you to name six things that are "different" about you.

Now, to look at me and my friend, you'd think we were typical suburban Moms, driving around in SUVs and station wagons, all wrapped up in the kids and paying the bills and etc. So how could either of us have six things that make us "different?"

One of my six things is that I am an atheist. Friend is a Catholic, so this leads to some interesting conversations. Remarkable mainly for their amicable and yet probing tone, I'd say.

Now, if you are running for President, you probably won't be an atheist. So, on some level, you believe in what I consider to be some really strange fantasies. And you propose to run the country I live in!

But, unless I just don't vote, my choices are likely going to be between one slightly less religious Christian over a slightly more religious Christian.

And I've got to figure out if your odd beliefs are going to make it possible for you to make rational enough decisions about things that will impact me and my family.

Now, another thing that makes me "different" is that I am a homeschooler. Actually, we are a family of unschoolers. If you don't know what that means, you can look it up. There is a lot of information in the tubes about unschooling -- and some of it is even true.

But for our purposes here, the point would be that I do not send my children to the local public school.

Not because I send them to the local church school, which would be the norm around here. But because, after trying public school and after a great deal of thought and study and discussion, this is the path we have chosen.

But not many Presidential candidates are going to be homeschoolers. And they sure aren't going to be unschoolers!

So, I have to look at each candidate and try to figure out what the heck they mean by their statements about "education" and how what they mean might impact me and mine. How are their do-gooder or "it takes a village" or other sentiments likely to restrict my choices. If at all.

Everyone's for "education" and everyone has their ideas about what to do to "fix it" or what the sources of any problems are. And they'll all have to mouth the appropriate amount of pro-education platitudes to get the teachers' unions support. Or try.

(If they are Dems anyway, and who the heck else am I going to be looking at really -- because this is one area where Dems make me look at Reps! But then I quickly look back, after I get a load of what religious wackiness looks like and what anti-choice thinking could lead to. . . )

But from among the Dems, what sort of noises could I be looking at that might make me think a Dem means much of anything when it comes to education? I honestly don't know. As a "different" sort of Dem Mom, I don't know which Dem is likely to get the idea that I want to be left alone to homeschool in peace and to see my tax dollars and others going to help any and all children and young adults who want to improve their lot in the world through learning.

Which, and this is where I think all the pols end up just being full of hot air, is not really just about racking up more credit hours.

So, community college. Sure. All for it. But I need a candidate to tell me what he really means when he talks about making more community college available to more students. What strings are attached? Who is putting together what? Who's paying for what? Blithe offerings of "more for all" isn't enough anymore.

Which isn't to say that I could vote Republican. But I want to hear details from any candidate who wants to talk about education.

Like, how does "more community college" tie in with the candidates energy policy? (Because, you see, I think it should. . .)

OK, off to check on DH and try to think of some more ways I am "different."

Nance