The Rudest Students

I've only been teaching for one year. Already I am convinced that teachers are the rudest of students. Every course I have attended with a group of teachers has been an exercise in frustration.

I'm serious! Being in a classroom with other teachers is like being in a room of stray cats. There are 15 distinct conversations going on at once, all while the teacher is teaching. And they're not quiet, whispered conversation, it is always full voice, or even done in a louder competitive voice. What happened to the concept of whispering? Does no one know this effective, simple skill for communicating quietly? I swear that I am the last person on Planet Earth that knows how to whisper? It must be a lost art - like moonshining.

Let me also let you in on a dark secret of the teaching profession; there are some really, really stupid teachers. Are you in shock and awe? Not most teachers, not even a lot of teachers, but enough. I have noticed that the stupidest teachers seem to have been educated sometime in the '80s. I know, I know, some of my best teaching friends were educated in the '80s. Just pretend that I am not talking about you. When I was a lad, I remember finding a teaching certification, as a prize, in a box of Lucky Charms. I think this must be how a lot of teachers became certified back then (that or they went to BYU).

Winter is gasping its last breath as I write this. The snow is flying. I could do without winter most of the time. I find winter to be a rude guest that tends to wear out its welcome. Still, I have a sneaking suspicion that I would miss it if it were gone…..just a little.

Welcome spring, my old friend. Welcome magical high desert nights with your punctured pinhole sky. I look forward to warm days, warm nights, migrating seagulls and your nemesis crickets. Welcome flowing desert creeks and mountain blue birds. I’ll be listening for you, wily ol’ coyote and your witch howl. The mountains and desert stillness will be painted with cactus and sage brush flowers. I can already imagine the sound of laughing children chasing lizards and begging to stay outside longer. I will sit beside a canyon and listen while the wind rushes through the pine and there I will feel my God. There and no where else. Blessed spring, blessed summer, blessed Mother Earth.

It is the best of times. It is the worst of times. If you’re like me, you are wondering what awaits us as a nation. Perhaps you ponder our future with a lot of fear and little hope. I find myself wondering and worrying so often these days that I can barely contain myself.

I worry about our world and our seemingly never ending quest to bring about our own extinction. I worry about our nation; we seem so hell bent on spending ourselves into third world squalor. I even worry about my friends in my church who seem so focused on the tiniest sins that they blind themselves to the gargantuan suffering in the world around them. Seriously, shouldn’t we be concerning ourselves with the bigger issues of our time, like starvation and calamity, instead of worrying about movie ratings and Victoria’s Secret posters? It is time to grow up as Christians. I think I’ll go into this further in a future post.

So what is a person to do, when the world around them seems to be falling apart?

I say that it is time to buck the system….just a little.

Here are some things I am going to do:

1. Eat a bowl of oatmeal every day. I cannot afford to go to the doctor; even though I have health insurance. Yup, I am for nationalized (socialized- the word doesn’t even scare me) health care and preventative medicine.
2. Go for a walk for 30 minutes a day, preferably in the desert. Again, I am a teacher; a visit to the doctors office can break me.
3. Repair my shtuff. Why buy new? Fixing is a dark art that brings healing. And screw this economy, it was built on sand.
4. Make my tiny house work for me. Again…screw this economy.
5. Build a rocket stove – I am going to cook stuff outside and that act alone will have a purifying effect on my well being. You know – a BBQ with meaning on a hand built stove, not the soulless contraption you bought to make your outdoor cooking “bigger and better.”
6. Do something illicit – I am tired of always toeing the line for a broken system devoid of meaning. Those of you in on this know what I am talking about.
7. Have recession parties. You bring the rice; I’ll have the ol’ lady cook some beans. Let’s jam out on some instruments and laugh and speak of deep things. It hardly costs anything and is more edifying than a night at Wal-mart.

What sorts of things are you doing to make life “real”

A Small Observation

I am not a sports guy. A global hoe-down like the Olympics or World Cup, or something cozy like a family get-together is what it takes for me to watch sports. After watching the Sugar Bowl with family last week, I just wanted to declare to my little corner of the world:

The BCS is BS and this proves it. Eastern elitism reigns supreme.

Championships are won, not selected.

Congratulations Utah Utes National Champions 2008

The Jimmy Chamberlin Complex - Cranes Of Prey