Chris Smith: Stepping up and out for the awesome Mrs. Williamson

Your favorite, most life-?altering teacher?

Many will say Lynette Williamson, who early this year had us howling and nodding at her revelation in the PD that “I hate all my students equally.”

In her guest commentary, the Analy High English teacher and debate coach took on what she described as an increasingly common perception by some students and parents that for her to give a teen an unsatisfactory grade is a sign that she doesn’t like him or her.

Williamson shared that “a parent emailed me her son’s above-average SAT scores in an attempt to argue the D+ he’d earned in my English class must’ve been due to my bias. From the looks of things, the teachers in his trig class (F) and chemistry class (F) must’ve really hated the kid, too.”

Williamson has had to excuse herself from the classroom. She has been diagnosed with ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, and says one of the symptoms might cause folks to whom she’s speaking to suspect she had martinis for breakfast.

Williamson is resolute that on Saturday morning she’ll be with her family at Santa Rosa’s Howarth Park for the Walk to Defeat ALS. She welcomes donations to her walk team.

Search online for “ALS” and her name, and you’ll find her fundraising page.

The teacher will watch from the sidelines on Saturday and a number of her grateful former students will walk for her.

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TO CANNES, TOO: Sonoma State students Max Heller and Alessio Guerra aren’t our only aspiring filmmakers packing up to take shorts, the cinematic kind, to the Cannes Film Festival.

Kwasi Turner, a 1995 graduate of Rancho Cotate High, will trek to the famed fest’s Short Film Corner to share the project he produced, “Do They Fit?”

Kwasi has gone online -?gofundme.com/wtwnzze8 - with a request to help cover the costs of the dream trip.

The title of his film, directed by DeForest Mapp, speaks of a pair of slacks and also of a pair of ex-flames who reconnect at an Obama fundraiser.

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DO YOU CHICKENQUE? This makes 55 years that folks will gather for the slice of Sonoma County that boasts vast grills sizzling with marinated chicken, legions of uniformed 4-H kids proudly serving and showing off their endeavors in agriculture and possibly the free world’s greatest selection of cakes.

ChickenQue, the 4-H Open House and Chicken Barbecue, is from 11:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sunday at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds’ horse racing grandstands.

Organizers say it’s the largest single-day chicken barbecue west of the Mississippi.

If you’re never gone, treat yourself to it and tell me if you weren’t blissed out by the food, blown away by the kids and pleased that you didn’t have to the drive to yonder The Big Muddy to take it all in.

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CURSE THOSE CONS who telephone seniors and pose as a grandchild who’s in trouble and in need of wired dollars.

The third time she was targeted, Jeanne Johnson asked the caller who’d addressed her as Grandma, “Which granddaughter is this?”

Answered the young woman on the other end, “Don’t you recognize my voice?”

“No, I don’t,” Jeanne replied. “Why do you think I am asking for your name?”

Click.

Chris Smith is at 521-5211 and chris.smith@pressdemocrat.com.