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A ‘sister city’ in Mexico has sent volunteer firefighters to help with Oregon blazes

The entire west coast of the United States is either on fire or covered in some measure of smoke and ash at the moment. We’ve seen photos of the midday sky the wrong color, from eery orange to apocalypse red. Entire towns have burned down, air quality indexes are hovering in the hazardous zone for…

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Annie Reneau

Array
Photo credit: Alejandro Navarro/Twitter – Array

The entire west coast of the United States is either on fire or covered in some measure of smoke and ash at the moment. We’ve seen photos of the midday sky the wrong color, from eery orange to apocalypse red. Entire towns have burned down, air quality indexes are hovering in the hazardous zone for millions, and our skilled, brave firefighters are overwhelmed.

Right now, the west needs all the help it can get.

Enter the volunteer firefighters of Guanajuato, Mexico who have arrived in Southern Oregon to help try to get the raging blazes under control. Known as the Heroic Fire Department of Guanajuato, the firefighters come from a city in central Mexico that has a 50-year “sister city” relationship with the Oregon city of Ashland. According to Portland Monthly, the five firefighters dispatched to Oregon have trained in the area before, which means they can jump right in.


The men include Captain Aldo Iván Ruiz, Captain Juan Armando Alvarez Villegas, Sargent Jorge Luis Anguiano Jasso, Sargent Luis Alfonso Campos Martínez and firefighter Miguel Ángel Hernández Lara. They arrived in Oregon Thursday, along with the city’s mayor, Alejandro Navarro. The group has already gotten started and are “very moved by the terrible impact of the fire on families and their homes,” Mayor Navarro wrote in a tweet, adding the hashtag #PrayForAshland.

Ashland is a picturesque town in Southern Oregon best known for its 85-year-old, Tony award-winning Oregon Shakespeare Festival. The Alameda Fire that threatens the town and has forced evacuations is just one of many fires burning in Oregon. Today, the New York Times reported that 500,000 people are under evacuation orders in the state. That’s 10% of Oregon’s population. Other states have begun sending firefighters to help as well.

Five firefighters might not sound like a lot, but every set of skilled hands helps—especially individuals that are familiar with fighting fires in a specific area. While this story is a lovely example of support, it also highlights one of the many benefits of maintaining positive relations across borders and nurturing international friendship and cooperation.

When need arises, friends and allies step up to help. Thank you, Guanajuato, for sending help to a state that isn’t even in your own country. Your generosity is definitely appreciated.

https://www.twitter.com/poppykat2/status/1304152886176169984
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  • Indigenous woman cries tears of joy after hairdresser discovers ‘unruly’ grey hairs
    Photo credit: Canva – Indigenous woman cries tears of joy after hairdresser discovers 'unruly' grey hairs
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    Indigenous woman cries tears of joy after hairdresser discovers ‘unruly’ grey hairs

    “What a sacred and healthy perspective.”

    Jacalyn Wetzel

    Grey hair has been a concern for people since before hair dye was invented. Some people pluck them and dye them as soon as they see them growing in, while others embrace the silvery hairs. Chiara Do’wal Sehi (Sunshine) Enriquez, an Indigenous woman from the Karankawa Tribe, recently shared her excitement about learning she had grey hair.

    For a brief period of time, people were actually dyeing their hair grey prematurely. It wasn’t uncommon to meet a 20-something with “granny grey” purplish-silver hair, but the popularity faded nearly as fast as it started. But for Enriquez, grey hair isn’t a fad or something to hide. It’s a right of passage to celebrate.

    indigenous, grey hair, getting older, culture and humanity, going grey
    Indigenous woman with long braids.
    Photo Credit: Canva

    During the colonization of the Texas Gulf Coast where the Karankawa originated, the Indigenous tribe was nearly eliminated. According to the Texas State Historical Association, the Karankawa people fought to maintain their land from 1685 until 1858 from French and Spanish settlers. Due to this multi-century, on-and-off battle for their territory, the tribe’s numbers became so small that they were considered “extinct.”

    Enriquez is a descendant of the small number of Karankawa that survived. To her, living long enough to experience the growth of grey hair is a gift. The woman shares how much her “unruly” greys mean to her in a video uploaded to her Instagram page.

    indigenous, grey hair, getting older, culture and humanity, going grey
    Indigenous woman standing in sunshine.
    Photo credit: Canva

    “I got my hair styled today. I don’t get it cut. It’s a cultural belief that I was taught by my mother. We don’t cut our hair, we let it grow. We save the cut for very, very serious and important moments in our lives,” she says while sitting in her car.

    The woman explains that while she was having her hair styled, she asked the hairdresser about the texture of her hair. This is when she learned of her wiry new strands. She surprised hairdresser with her delighted response. “She said to me that it was because I had many little greys, and the unruly ones that were pushing up my other hair that weren’t grey were causing it to be a little bit frizzy.”

    Enriquez lights up and smiles while recalling the moment in her hairdresser’s chair. She reveals, “And that felt so incredible. What an honor, and I was…I’ve only ever seen my head grow one grey hair, and even when I knew I had one grey hair, I was incredibly thankful. When she saw that I was smiling and so happy, she said, ‘Oh wow, you really must come from a different culture.’”

    indigenous, grey hair, getting older, culture and humanity, going grey
    Elderly indigenous woman.
    Photo credit: Canva

    She later adds while tearing up, “I’m very happy to report that not only do I have for sure one grey hair, I have many. A plethora of grey hair. What an honor. What a fantastic gift to be lucky enough to see myself grow grey hair. That is so incredible. I am so lucky. What a life it has been. What a life it continues to be.”

    Enriquez wipes away tears as she encourages others to embrace their grey hair. Viewers were moved by her joyfully emotional response to finding out she has a head full of grey hairs pushing their way through.

    One person shares, “As a chemo patient I am always surprised when people are upset about their grey hair. I have come to see it as a privilege and dream of the day I might have greys, though my mom’s hair has never changed colors, and neither did her dads. Their hair has always stayed brown for some reason. Since my hair has begun growing again I have decided not to cut it for as long as possible. So I can say, I’ve been cancer free for this long, and show people my hair for reference.”

    Someone else writes, “This had me in tears because i’ve loss so many people and im only 30 and the day i get grey hairs i will celebrate with them!”

    Another person says, “i’m so happy to hear this expression of delight regarding your grey hair~ i am only just now getting greys & my own natural reaction was very different from my mom’s & grammom’s reactions~ i was surprised to find that i like seeing them appear~ hearing your perspective makes me think that it’s because i am not as tethered to the usa culture as they…
    so thank you for sharing your experience & offering food for thought~ & congratulations.”

    “I have been allowing my greys to come in naturally and have stopped dyeing my hair and it’s very liberating and in a society where ageism is everywhere it feels like resistance. And I love that! I have more greys than my mom. :),” someone else shares.

    indigenous, grey hair, getting older, culture and humanity, going grey
    Elderly Indigenous woman with hair covered.
    Photo credit: Canva

    “What a sacred and healthy perspective,” one person says.

    Another reveals, “I love this so much! Thank you for sharing your joy and gratitude with us. I’m getting grey and have been oscillating between feeling happy about it and feeling like I’m not sure i feel “ready” to have grey hair.”

    Enriquez says, “I’ve always been of the personal belief that humans take the longest to change the color of their foliage in observation of their reconnection with Mother Earth and the cyclicity of her seasons and transitions.” She then explains that trees change with the seasons, grass goes through a cyclical change, and even animals turn grey and calm with age. “And it has always been representative that you have lived a full life. Do you know how many people didn’t get to grow grey hair? Didn’t get to see the hair change? What a gift,” she adds.

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  • A young girl tells Carol Burnett ‘hello’ from her neighbor. It happened to have been Carol’s biggest crush.
    Photo credit: Elmer Holloway, NBC, Wikimedia Commons – Comedian Carol Burnett in a 1958 TV sketch.
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    A young girl tells Carol Burnett ‘hello’ from her neighbor. It happened to have been Carol’s biggest crush.

    “That ‘Tommy’ was from the heart.”

    Cecily Knobler

    When a person consistently brings the world joy, it’s extra special when we see them experience it tenfold. This is what happened for iconic comedian Carol Burnett when a young girl relayed a message from her next-door neighbor. Burnett’s response was pure delight.

    A re-surfaced clip of Burnett shows her taking questions at the Q&A segment before her taping of The Carol Burnett Show. A young girl tells Burnett that she “lives next door” to one of her old boyfriends and that he says “Hello.” Burnett, clad in a lively black and yellow dress with a giant chiffon bowtie, confirms, “You live next door to an old boyfriend of mine and he says hello?” She throws her head back in jest. “There were so many!” The audience, as they so often did, laughs uproariously.

    Tommy Tracy?

    Burnett leans toward the girl and asks, “Who?” The firl answers quickly, “Tom Tracy.” Burnett, who had reportedly not planned the reaction, answers in earnest shock, crying, “TOMMY?! You’re kidding? Tommy Tracy?” Clearly, Burnett can hardly believe it. “She lives next door to… I can’t believe this! ” she stutters as she squats down. “How IS he?”

    The audience continues to eat up the exchange, while Burnett adds a vulnerably adorable tidbit to the story. “Did you know that I loved him from the time I was about 12 years old up till the time I was 17? Which was about ten years ago. I always loved Tommy Tracy. And I always dreamed that someday we’d get married and have two children and I’d name them Stacy Tracy and Dick Tracy.”

    An Instagram page shared the clip, noting a super fun fact: “The audience Q&A was one of the most beloved segments on The Carol Burnett Show, which ran on CBS from 1967 to 1978. Carol never knew what she’d be asked, so it was pure improv. The Q&A was done without any wigs, costumes, or character, just Carol herself, and if she ended up with egg on her face, so be it, which is exactly what made audiences connect with her so deeply.”

    Making sure he could find her

    The Instagram handle continued. “Carol has said she actually considered changing her name to Carol Creighton early in her career because she thought it sounded better, but she kept Burnett specifically because she wanted Tommy Tracy to know it was her if she ever became successful. He sent his regards via a little girl in a studio audience decades later.” (This anecdote has been confirmed!)

    The clip had over a quarter of a million likes in less than a week and many comments. Quite a few simply reveled in the brilliance and happiness Burnett brought (and brings) to a crowd. One noted how sincere her “Tommy” squeal was, writing, “That ‘Tommy’ was from the heart.”

    Many joked about Tommy himself. “Tom went to everyone he knew saying, ‘I told y’all I dated Carol Burnett!”

    Jerry Hall

    This wouldn’t have been the only time Burnett was shocked by a crush during Q&A. In 1976, a young girl showed up in the audience and asked, “Did you know Jerry Hall?” Burnett proudly proclaimed, “I had a crush on Jerry Hall!” The audience goes wild, exclaiming, “This is his daughter!”

    Burnett hilariously responds, “You’re Jerry Hall’s daughter? You could have been mine!” She then comes into the audience to give the young girl a giant hug.

    This clip has yielded well over half a million likes as well. One Instagrammer seemed to sum up what so many of us feel, writing, “Every time I see a clip from her show I can’t help but smile. She’s so infectious.”






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  • After his father rejected a circus’ offer to buy him for $5,000, 3-foot-tall man becomes a doctor
    Photo credit: via Sir Takhtasinhji General Hospital/Instagram – Sir Takhtasinhji General Hospital Bhavnagar and Dr. Ganesh Baraiya.
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    After his father rejected a circus’ offer to buy him for $5,000, 3-foot-tall man becomes a doctor

    He overcame everything to fulfill his dreams.

    Tod Perry

    The odds seemed stacked against Ganesh Baraiya at birth. He had seven brothers and sisters, was born with dwarfism, and has a locomotor disability that impairs his movement. His prospects in life were so limited that while he was in primary school, a circus offered his family 500,000 rupees ($5,350) to take him as a performer. Even though it was a life-changing amount of money, his father refused, in hopes that his son would pursue an education.

    His hard work in school paid off, and in 2018, Ganesh eventually passed India’s medical exam. However, instead of celebrating, Ganesh faced another barrier: the Medical Council of India rejected his admission to an MBBS program because of his physical disability.

    The council believed that his height could be a hindrance during medical emergencies. “I was very disappointed,” Ganesh told the BBC. “I could not see a way out… I was thinking that my dream of becoming a doctor would remain incomplete.”

    Ganesh was hurt, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer

    “When the MCI rejected my application, I was very disappointed. But I didn’t give up,” he told The Federal. “I approached my college principal, Dr. Dalpatghai Katariya, who encouraged me to fight for my right to pursue medicine.” With the help of his friend, he fought the rejection in India’s high court, but his plea was rejected.

    Undeterred, Ganesh appealed the decision, and the case reached India’s Supreme Court. “After four months, the Supreme Court of India ruled in my favor on October 22, 2018,” he told The Federal. “After completing my MBBS and internship, I began my first posting as a medical officer on November 27, 2025. It’s a moment I’ve worked hard for.” Ganesh now works as a medical officer at Bhavnagar Civil Hospital, the same place where he received his medical degree.

    Ganesh’s story is an inspiration for us all 

    While some may believe that being only three feet tall and weighing a little over 40 pounds might pose serious drawbacks as a medical practitioner, Ganesh says his stature offers unique benefits. “Children would open up to me easily,” he told the BBC. “They would tell me their small problems, which they would not share with other doctors.”

    Looking ahead, Ganesh wants to pursue a career that leverages his strengths, including radiology, pediatrics, and dermatology. Now that he has a steady income, he’d also like to build a brick house for his family. 

    Ganesh’s story is a powerful example of what can happen when you refuse to settle, whether that’s joining a circus or giving up when powerful institutions say you can’t pursue your dreams. He’s also a great inspiration for anyone who has had to pick themselves up from a major setback. If a three-foot-tall man born into a humble farming family can fulfill his dreams, then anything is possible.

    “A life without struggle is like not living at all,” he told the BBC. “Many times in life, I feel like I am failing. But you have to keep moving ahead toward your goals.”

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  • A bagel shop manager noticed a stroke survivor struggling to order. His response moved her son to tears.
    Photo credit: Canva – (L) Restaurant manager approaches a table; (R) An elderly woman having difficultly at her table
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    A bagel shop manager noticed a stroke survivor struggling to order. His response moved her son to tears.

    Chris Hansen didn’t make a fuss. He just quietly made sure she got exactly what she wanted.

    Adam Albright-Hanna

    Upworthy Staff

    Chris Leavitt had been his mother’s primary caregiver for six months, ever since she suffered a stroke and he moved across the country to help her. He drives her to therapy appointments, helps her communicate, and tries to give her as much independence as possible on the days when that feels within reach.

    December 20 was her 60th birthday. They’d already had a full day of therapy sessions, but Leavitt wanted to mark the occasion. He let his mother choose where to go for lunch, and she navigated them to Hole in One Bagel Deli, a strip mall spot on Route 33 in Neptune, New Jersey. It wasn’t a restaurant he knew. It turned out to be exactly the right place.

    The obstacles of stroke recovery

    Leavitt’s mother walks with a cane and still has difficulty speaking as she recovers. Once inside, ordering proved harder than expected. The menus were displayed on TV screens that were difficult to read in the lighting, and when Leavitt asked whether paper menus were available, there weren’t any. As he worked to help his mother communicate what she wanted, he was aware of the other customers around them, the noise, the weight of the moment.

    That’s when manager Chris Hansen came around the counter.

    The quiet kindness of a stranger

    He didn’t make an announcement or draw attention to the situation. He simply started presenting options to her, one at a time, letting her point at what she wanted. A poppy seed bagel. Then lox. “I got you,” Hansen told her. “Don’t worry about it.” According to Leavitt, Hansen moved fluidly between helping them and the other customers coming in and out, never once making them feel like an inconvenience.

    @notjustabartender

    Just needed a good cry on the internet today.

    ♬ original sound – Chris

    “From the moment we walked in, the manager Chris showed us incredible grace and patience,” Leavitt wrote later on GoFundMe. “In truth, I’m not sure I would have figured out what she wanted on my own.”

    When their food arrived, Hansen returned to the table with something they hadn’t ordered: a chocolate pastry. He told them the whole meal was on the house. When Leavitt tried to refuse, Hansen insisted. “Please, please enjoy.”

    The power of a random act of kindness

    Leavitt said his mother didn’t fully register what had just happened. But he did. “It took everything in me not to sob inside the deli,” he wrote.

    As they were leaving, Hansen said one thing that stayed with Leavitt long after they drove away: “What’s the point of life if you can’t be nice every once in a while?”

    Responding in kind

    Leavitt, who has worked in hospitality for 15 years, posted about the experience to his Instagram following of over 400,000 people. The response was immediate. Within a day, he’d received more than a thousand comments and messages. He also quietly launched a GoFundMe to benefit Hansen directly, as a thank you. As of late December, it had raised more than $16,500.

    He also brought his mother back to the deli to see Hansen in person, as News12 New Jersey reported.

    The comment that seemed to resonate most with viewers came from someone who put it simply: “A man crying because his mom was treated with respect and dignity is pure gold.”

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  • A little girl’s classmate asked who the man picking her up was. Her two-word answer made him emotional for the rest of the day.
    Photo credit: Canva – Step-dad picking up girl from school
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    A little girl’s classmate asked who the man picking her up was. Her two-word answer made him emotional for the rest of the day.

    It’d be nice if there were a simple rulebook for step-relationships.

    Tim Mercer

    Upworthy Staff

    Julian wasn’t expecting anything unusual when he pulled up to pick up his stepdaughter from school. Just another ordinary afternoon errand. But when one of her classmates pointed at him and asked who he was, his stepdaughter answered without hesitating for even a second.

    “That’s my dad.”

    Stepping up to just ‘dad’

    Julian shared the moment in a TikTok video that quickly resonated with thousands of viewers, many of whom have lived some version of this story themselves. He said he wasn’t sure she’d ever give him that title — not because things were bad between them, but because he’d never pushed for it. He’d just tried to show up, consistently, and let her lead.

    @jayvalenz_20

    she loves me yall lol #girldad #stepdad #chicago #school #daughter

    ♬ death bed (coffee for your head) – Powfu & beabadoobee

    That’s what made the moment so meaningful. She didn’t say it for him. She said it because it was simply true to her.

    People knew how it made him feel

    The comments filled up almost immediately with people who understood exactly what that kind of moment feels like. One commenter wrote that her husband cried the first time one of his stepsons said the same thing. Another, who grew up with a stepfather herself, offered a perspective worth sitting with: “She will see you differently the moment you just call her your daughter, not a stepdaughter. Just like how you felt — that feeling is the same both ways.”

    Kids are figuring things out, too

    That symmetry is easy to miss in blended families, where so much of the emotional weight tends to fall on the adults trying to figure out their role. Kids are often doing the same calculus quietly on their end, watching to see if this person is going to stick around, wondering what to call them, not wanting to get it wrong either.

    Julian ended his video saying he was going to take her out for food — which, as many commenters pointed out, is about the most dad response imaginable.

    The title of “dad” isn’t something you can ask for or negotiate. It’s conferred. And apparently, a school pickup on an ordinary afternoon is exactly the kind of place where it happens.

    You can follow Julian (@jayvalenz_20) on TikTok for more content on parenting and family. 

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  • He googled “what do you put in an obituary” when his dad died and wrote one of the most beloved ones the internet has ever seen
    Photo credit: CANVA – People smiling at a funeral celebrated a life
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    He googled “what do you put in an obituary” when his dad died and wrote one of the most beloved ones the internet has ever seen

    “We have all done our best to enjoy/weather Robert’s antics up to this point, but he is God’s problem now.”

    Adam Albright-Hanna

    Upworthy Staff

    Charles Boehm had never written an obituary before. When his father Robert died in October 2024 after a fall in his Clarendon, Texas apartment, Charles sat down in his Houston home, completely stumped, and did what anyone would do.

    He Googled it.

    “I decided to Google, ‘What do you put in an obituary?’” he told The Washington Post. What came up changed everything. He found the obituary of a Connecticut man named Joe Heller, written with wit and irreverence and genuine love, and immediately thought: that sounds like something my dad would do.

    So Charles did the same. What he wrote for Robert Adolph Boehm, 74, of Clarendon, Texas (population 2,000) went viral almost instantly when Robertson Funeral Directors shared it on Facebook. It has since been viewed more than a million times.

    The viral obituary of a Texas man

    It begins like this:

    “Robert Adolph Boehm, in accordance with his lifelong dedication to his own personal brand of decorum, muttered his last unintelligible and likely unnecessary curse on October 6, 2024, shortly before tripping backward over ‘some stupid mother****ing thing’ and hitting his head on the floor.”

    It continues. Robert was born in Winters, Texas in 1950, “after which God immediately and thankfully broke the mold and attempted to cover up the evidence.” He managed to avoid the Vietnam draft by getting his wife Dianne pregnant three times between 1967 and 1972. His youngest son Charles arrived in 1983, the obituary notes, “with Robert possibly concerned about the brewing conflict in Grenada.”

    His lack of military service was, the obituary observes, “probably for the best” — given that Robert later took up shooting as a hobby and managed to blow two holes in his own car’s dashboard on two separate occasions. His wife Dianne, “much accustomed to such happenings in his presence, may have actually been safer in the jungles of Vietnam the entire time.”

    Good grief: Humor helps a family heal

    There’s the fashion: homemade leather moccasins, a wide collection of unconventional hats, boldly mismatched shirts and pants. The career: he became “a semi-professional truck driver — not to be confused with a professional semi-truck driver.” The hobbies: historical weapons spanning from a 19,000 BC French atlatl to a Soviet-era Mosin-Nagant, plus a wide selection of harmonicas he kept on hand but rarely played. When Robert’s wife Dianne died in February 2024, Charles wrote that God had gotten her “the hell out of there for some well-earned peace and quiet.” In her absence, Robert had thrown himself into entertaining the people of Clarendon with what the obituary calls his “road show.”

    It closes: “We have all done our best to enjoy/weather Robert’s antics up to this point, but he is God’s problem now.”

    Attendees at the funeral were requested to wear “outlandish or mismatched outfits” in his honor.

    The reaction said it all

    Chuck Robertson, who owns the funeral home and received the obituary, told The Washington Post he almost choked on his breakfast laughing. “I told people in the office, ‘Well, this is going to get us some attention,’” he said. “I’d never had a family come through the doors that wrote an obituary as classic as that one.”

    Charles said he was astonished by the response. “I was sad that my father was going to be forgotten and that my parents’ small life would get packed up into my trailer and that would be the end of it everywhere but inside my own mind,” he told TODAY. “That obituary was intended to ease my own pain and make a handful of people in a town of two thousand smile instead of frown, and it’s probably done that for 2 million at this point.”

    The message behind the laughs

    He also has a message for anyone reading: don’t let your parents slip through the cracks in small towns. “There are people all over the country like my dad,” he said. “They go there to retire, then when they’re old, their kids scatter and they end up alone.”

    When the family cleaned out Robert’s apartment, they found four harmonicas immediately.

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  • A Gen Z teacher gave his students 10 minutes to rant about anything they wanted. The essays were gloriously unhinged.
    Photo credit: TikTok | @mrcoachwhitehead – Screenshots of a young teacher talking on TikTok
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    A Gen Z teacher gave his students 10 minutes to rant about anything they wanted. The essays were gloriously unhinged.

    A 23-year-old English teacher cracked the code on getting students excited about writing. It involved a cartoon character getting roasted.

    Adam Albright-Hanna

    Upworthy Staff

    Dean Whitehead is 23 years old and in his first year of teaching high school English. He’d heard enough complaints from students about boring essay topics to know he needed to try something different. So one day he set up a camera in his classroom, opened a shared document he’d titled “Argumentative Fun,” and gave his students an assignment unlike anything they’d been asked to do before.

    Ten minutes. Any topic. No grammar corrections, no spelling deductions. The only way to win bonus points was to be genuinely convincing.

    @mrcoachwhitehead

    ANYTHING TO GET THEM WRITING!!!! #fyp #foryou #teachersoftiktok #teacher #education #highschoolteacher

    ♬ original sound – mrcoachwhitehead

    “It has to be something you feel so strongly about that you can type for 10 minutes straight,” Whitehead told them, as captured in his TikTok video posted to @mrcoachwhitehead. A few students immediately had questions. One asked for a minute to think. Whitehead gave them eleven. Voice-to-text was off the table.

    Students take writing to another level – their own

    The essays came in. They were, as promised, unhinged.

    @mrcoachwhitehead

    Replying to @Titus.333 the moment you’ve all been waiting for#fyp #foryou #teachersoftiktok #teacher #education

    ♬ original sound – mrcoachwhitehead

    One student ranted about curfews, arguing that weekends should be completely free because school is already hard enough. Another went after boys in general. One made a detailed case for wanting to be rich specifically so they could give money to their friends and family. Someone addressed the injustice of teachers confiscating phones. One student, apparently undaunted by the fact that their teacher was reading this, wrote in the middle of their essay that Whitehead wasn’t actually the best teacher.

    Caillou hits a big nerve

    But the winner, and it wasn’t close, wrote about Caillou.

    For those who have blocked the PBS Kids animated series from memory: Caillou is a perpetually four-year-old Canadian child who whines his way through every episode and faces consequences for approximately nothing. The student’s essay, Whitehead reported in a follow-up video that has now been viewed more than 11 million times, cited Caillou’s baldness as suspicious and his ability to get away with everything as a fundamental injustice. “When I say this was the most convincing rant I’d received, I mean it,” Whitehead told his class. “I also hated Caillou.”

    Five bonus points, awarded.

    Finding passion through freewriting

    What surprised Whitehead most wasn’t the content — it was the quality. When students actually cared about their topic, the mechanics followed. “The craziest surprise was they actually did fantastic on their own with grammar and creating full, complete sentences,” he wrote in the comments. “I was super proud of them.”

    The technique Whitehead stumbled onto has a real name: freewriting. Teachers have used low-stakes, high-freedom writing exercises for decades precisely because removing the fear of being graded wrong tends to unlock students who’ve otherwise decided they hate writing. The catch is getting them to care about the topic enough to sustain it. Turns out strong opinions about animated characters work just fine.

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  • A wallaby lost her mother. So this woman carried her in a pouch for a year.
    Photo credit: @lindsays_animal_school/Instagram, used with permission – Baby Blossom enjoying her DIY pouch
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    A wallaby lost her mother. So this woman carried her in a pouch for a year.

    This was a match made in heaven.

    Heather Wake

    Like most marsupials, wallaby joeys typically remain inside their mother‘s pouch for up to nine months to grow, nurse, and stay warm. At around six to seven months, they begin emerging to explore, but will continue returning to the pouch for security. 

    A baby in need

    But when Blossom, a baby albino wallaby, showed up at Lindsay Clarity’s UK-based animal rescue center, Animal School, she was far too young to manage without that safe, enclosed space.

    Unfortunately, Blossom’s mom was nowhere to be found, and every other resident wallaby at the rescue already had a joey tucked into their pouch. There was no natural substitute available.

    Clarity, who had years of experience caring for vulnerable animals (particularly rearing babies), stepped in with a creative solution. She placed a soft pink pillowcase inside a backpack and turned it into a portable pouch. The setup gave Blossom the warmth and closeness she needed to feel secure.

    A year of dedication

    Clarity carried Blossom in that improvised pouch for an entire year. She compared the experience to “walking around like a pregnant lady,” sharing with GeoBeats Animals that it became part of her daily routine.

    Feeding Blossom required extra effort. Specialized milk and a particular bottle had to be shipped from Australia so the joey could develop properly. Every detail mattered, and Clarity stayed committed through it all.

    Growing strong

    The care paid off. Blossom did indeed “blossom,” eventually outgrowing her pouch and exploring the world on her own terms. Today, she’s developed a distinct personality, described as “more catlike than doglike,” and even showed a fondness for soft, calming sounds, which Clarity plays herself. 

    Not to mention, she has a loyal fanbase invested in the daily adventures of her life. What began as an emergency rescue turned into a journey that many people feel connected to.

    As for Clarity, she credits Blossom with changing her life, saying, “Caring for her is one of the most rewarding things I have ever done.”

    Fascinating wallaby facts

    Blossom’s story also highlights how remarkably adaptable wallabies are: able to live in forests, rocky areas, or open grasslands. They are known to be opportunistic feeders, grazing at dawn and dusk to avoid midday heat. ​​They also have the ability to pause pregnancy, which aids survival in uncertain environmental conditions.

    animals, wholesome, geobeats
    A young wallaby Photo credit: Canva

    Albino wallabies like Blossom are especially rare. Their lack of pigmentation gives them their striking pale appearance, though it can also make them more vulnerable in the wild due to reduced camouflage.

    Life at Animal School

    However, Blossom is, of course,  just one of the many happy animals at Animal School. For Clarity, inspiring others to learn about animals has been a lifelong passion. And when she’s not running animal therapy sessions, “Creative Creatures” art classes, or various other onsite activities, she loves using social media to offer glimpses into the continuously fascinating animal kingdom. 

    To stay up to date with Blossom and the other Animal School residents, be sure to head over to Instagram and give a follow. 

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