The Last Post

 

 

153 Sundays to go.

• The Bible tells of the Apostles going fishing and catching exactly 153 fish.

     California governor, Jerry Brown  signed into law a measure that will make it easier to fire teachers in California.     This law will effectively end this blog.   I cannot take a chance that I will get fired over anything said in this blog.  I have spoken of recovery in this blog and my past alcoholism could be construed as dangerous and I should not be around children.  Despite the fact that my alcoholism was always conducted away from school in the evenings and on weekends.  This is just another in a series of moves that the right wing and the super rich have orchestrated to get rid of the “evil teacher unions.”    Proponents will argue it was necessary to take away the rights of dedicated hard working teachers to be able to quickly punish the tiny, tiny few who do admittedly horrible things and should be removed from teaching and punished.
       But the real reason for the law is to begin to systematically get rid of the teacher unions.    They will first go after the brave union leaders.   They  will find small things,  blow them out of proportion and with the help of the corporate media further undermine the profession.    In short time, public education will be privatized for the profit of the super rich which is the eventual goal.  Without a strong union, teachers will be working for a minimum wage with little benefits and no hope for retirement.    Teaching will no longer be a career.   Our young people will be taught by people without the rigorous training now required.    Who is going to get a 4 year degree and endure another 2 year teacher credentialing classes to make minimum wage?     This teacher credentialing program will be ended because they won’t be able to find enough qualified teachers.   Then they will institute their own watered down credentialing program, for profit of course.    A quality education will be a thing of the past.    
       I publish this last blog to establish closure with the few of you who were reading.   I will not delete the blog in case someone suffering might find something helpful.  
       Good luck to you and may everything go your way.

Summer Boredom

155 Sundays to go.

• Kate Middleton’s phone was hacked 155 times by a News of the World reporter. http://time.com/99781/kate-middleton-phone-hack/  This is how far journalism has degenerated.    Also the length the corporate media will go to report celebrity scandals instead of how they’re screwing the middle class.
• Here’s a video giving a taste of what it feels like going 155 mph in a Lambborghini.  http://www.cbsnews.com/news/what-it-feels-like-155-in-a-lamborghini/  I didn’t watch it.    Wasn’t interested.   Going 80 makes me nervous.

Always takes me awhile to fully comprehend that the school year is over.  I know it conceptually.   Obviously I don’t have to devote time to preparing lessons for the next week but mentally I’m still there.   I find myself pulling weeds in the garden  thinking, “I wonder if I tried this with Geraldo if he’d catch on.”    Then about 5 minutes later I realize a) I had no idea I just pulled up a couple of things that weren’t weeds because I was off in educational la-la land and b)  I don’t even have a kid named Geraldo.     Then I go off again into another mental time zone while I try to replant the flower I pulled up by mistake.
I  also think about difficult challenges as if they are happening in the present moment and feel the physical energy angst that arises with negativity.    I’m not in the present moment.   I’m back in the “land of what’s not happening” as recovery guru, Paul Hedderman likes to say.   I snap out of it, try to enjoy what is actually happening but soon I’ll be time traveling again.
The first week or two is very nice but then I start to get a little bored.    I don’t usually tell people that because rather than having sympathy for me they get pissed off.   And who wouldn’t?   Who’s going to feel sorry for someone laying around the house bored while they’re working their ass off?  They wish they could be so bored.    I try to remember how I am in September when I’m trying to control a group of kids and get them to concentrate.   I’m running around like a chicken with my head cut off and it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere.  I get pissed off thinking about how I was bored sitting around doing nothing.   So where would I rather be?   Back in September wanting to scream out loud or bored because I’m not having going-to-Disneyland fun.   A good portion of my alcoholism stemmed from my perception of being “bored.”   Being really, really drunk was more fun than real life.
This summer like every summer I have plans to fight the boredom and accomplish something.   I’m a hack guitar player who isn’t very good because I don’t play enough.    So why not set a goal to play for at least 30 minutes a day?   So, I do but I then realize why I stop.   It’s very frustrating because I want to be Eddie Van Halen but I’m having difficulty smoothly playing easy pieces.    But I just have to fight through it and remember the goal is to play for 30 minutes whether I’m terrible or not.    This year I thought I could also combine it with my awareness exercises.   While playing be aware that I’m playing and notice the negative energy while I’m playing that causes me to stop.   I stop because subconsciously I don’t like the negative energy.    I will play and while playing notice the energy and play through it.   Notice it is not me but is just energy.    I’ll get better while consistently playing for 30 minutes a day.   Playing the guitar will once again be fun.
I can watch baseball and practice awareness.   I like baseball but start getting frustrated because I don’t like the way it is going.    So what?   What do I have to do with the game.   Accept that the outcome is not going the way you want.    Feel the energy and let it ride itself out.    Appreciate that I’m home lying on a couch watching baseball instead of being captive and stressed out at work.    Rest into the feelings and feel them completely.   Enjoy that your home watching great players play a great sport.
I also want to start a daily meditating practice again.   I meditated for years but stopped.   I got into Advaita.   The advaita masters say they’re basically in meditation all day long by being in awareness.    I used that as an excuse because the reality is that meditation is difficult.    Meditation done correctly is not just zoning out.    It’s being aware totally without conceptual thought.   But when I meditate, conceptual thought keeps creeping in.    It creeps in so insidiously that I don’t even realize it.   Just suddenly I become aware that I have been thinking about something that happened two weeks ago for the last 2 minutes.    Then I get frustrated.    Then I feel bad about it because I’ve wasted my time and I’ll never get any good at this and blah-blah-blah…again doing anything BUT being in non conceptual awareness.    But like the guitar playing it takes practice.   But don’t quit just because I’m frustrated.   As they say in AA, “don’t quit 5 minutes before the miracle happens.”

The Last Week of School

156 Days to go.

• 156 people died in the ferry boat disaster off South Korea on 4/23/14.

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       Today at 4PM is the last day I will have to realize the weekend is over and I will be back to the grind tomorrow.     It seems almost unreal that there is only one more week of school.   At the beginning of the year in August, June 13th is too hard to even imagine.    Almost as far off as 156 Sundays from now.    As unreal as imagining an America middle class that has not been ruined by the Republicans and their giveaway of our nation’s wealth  to the corporations and the richest 1%.   

           But it is almost here.   One week to go.     Little markers start occurring to me, like tomorrow will be the last time, my wonderful  wife and I will have to drag our carcasses up on a Monday morning.    Monday will be the last full day before minimum days the rest of the week.    I have already started dividing the day into fractions.   I had a lesson with my 3rd graders showing them the full hours of the day we are in school, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 1, and 2.     Then we brainstormed what each hour’s fraction would be if we broke the day into fractions.    It is on a chart in  front of the class.    Every hour they can raise their hand and say, “Mr. Smirthwaite, there is now only four and two-thirds days left in the school year.”   They’re pretty excited about it too knowing they only have 4 and 2/3 days of dealing with Mr. Smirthwaite.    Actually I’m always surprised at what a high percentage of kids are dreading the end of the year.    I’m a hard task master and I drive them pretty hard.    But I’ve found that children prefer a disciplined class setting with a strict teacher.    The rules are well-defined and strictly followed and they find comfort in that.    Some of their home situations are all over the map and my class is the only security some of them have.     At the end of the year some of them are crying and don’t want to  leave.    This year might be especially hard since I have had some of them for two years.   I was moved from 2nd to 3rd last year and “looped” the majority of them.      

       I appreciate that teachers get 2 and half months off during the summer.    I got into teaching late when I was 37 years old.    My wonderful life had been teaching since she got out of school while I had office jobs.    Always used to be jealous in the summer that my carcass was still having to be dragged out of bed while she got to stay there.    I understood that she earned it and seriously, the same gig and summers off was open to me.    I just had to go back  to school after a four year degree and go to another 2 years full-time to get a teaching credential.    Then I had to face the rigorous pressures of teaching and the pressure of being responsible for the safety of 26 children as well as the endless daily lesson preparations.    Then I had to go there and actually handle a class all day and deliver a challenging curriculum to children who frankly would rather be outside screaming their heads off or playing video games.   The same “cushy” 2 and a half months a year off is available to everyone.   Well not for long if the republicans and the rich they serve are able to privatize it and make  a profit off it.       Then we’ll have the same gig only two hours of class time longer, do it 48 weeks out of the year, for zero benefits, no chance of retirement,  at minimum wage and be made to feel grateful for being screwed over.   We’ll have the same restrictions if not more of how we can teach.    And if we don’t like  it we can quit and go work at 7-11.   Of course the quality of teaching will disappear because only someone insane would want to go through that.    Teachers are dedicated but we all have our limits.

           The last week is no cakewalk despite the minimum days of actual instructional time.    The preparation is the same.   I teach until the end of the last day.    Some teachers cut back a little and try to do more fun activities but I find the children can sense that and their behavior begins to go south.    I lead them  to believe that every lesson counts even though their grades are already being determined.  They have to be entered into the computer on Wednesday to be run off and passed out on Friday.    On the last day in fact, I’m giving a spelling test and they think its going to make or break them passing on to the next grade.  

 

        There is a  little bit of fun.    Tomorrow we are going on a walking field trip to the park for an end of the year celebration and picnic.       We make a year book that has a lot of room for their creative illustrations.    They think they’re really getting away with something.    I let them sit with their friends as long as they can work quietly.   We have more enjoyable writing prompts.   I’m busy going through my files, organizing my cabinets and putting together their grades.    Every once in a while, I  stop and give a student who is getting a little boisterous my best Mr. Smithwaite glare.    He or she feels the heat and settles down.    That’s when a strong and consistently reinforced behavior management system pays off.   I don’t have to scream and yell.   A quick, serious teacher look is all that is necessary.   He or she goes back to what the student should have been doing in the first place and I’m done.  

     The last day is just a whirlwind.  On the drive to school, my wife and I usually listen to a public radio jazz station or a classical radio station.  We both cannot stand the man and woman radio team banter about the Kardassians or the shockrock DJ delivery.    But we found this public radio station that plays Hawaiian music on Fridays.    At 7AM they always lead with a song called “Aloha Friday.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOvS34KxsQU  The chorus goes “It’s Aloha Friday.  No work til Monday.”   The last day we’ll sing, “It’s Aloha Friday.   No work  til August.”   And we’ll laugh like we’re listening to a Richard Pryor stand up.  We’ll laugh until my wonderful and careful wife realizes I’m occupying two lanes from being doubled over, people are honking at me and she has to snap me back to reality.   

        Once the day begins the students have some seat work and some fun activities and I’m a duck.   Calm  and controlled on top of the water for the benefit of a calm classroom.   Underneath, I’m paddling like hell because I have a million things to complete and barely enough time to do  it.    Somehow it all gets done.    The last half  hour, we empty and clean our desks, push them all to one side for the custodians and their summer cleaning.   We then gather around  Mr. Smirthwaite for one last speech.   I tell them how proud I am, how much they’ve grown and I always at some point turn on the water works.   I get choked up and no matter how much I try I cannot control  it.   I know its coming but I still get choked up, can’t finish  a sentence, start again, sputter again and the kids are staring at me like I’m some sort of freak.    And I am.     But its good for children to see a man get emotional and cry and tell them how much he cares about them.    The one line that always opens up the floodgates for me is when I say, “and next year I hope you come back to visit me.    Because at that point I won’t be your teacher anymore, I’ll be your friend.”    We all have a group hug and rain a few more tears and suddenly its over.      Incredibly,  the whole thing is over.    I straighten  some  last minute things, shove and cram loose ends into closets and cabinets and close the locked door behind me.     I turn in my keys to the secretary and walk out to my car.    It is a bizarre feeling pulling out of my parking space and leaving the parking lot.    I turn right and head for my wonderful wife’s school.   It’s over.    It’s really over.   I can’t believe it.    I made it another year.

 

From Kevin Bacon to Nick Nolte

157 Sundays to go.

• 157 dead pigs were fished out of a Chinese river.   http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/19/chinese-authorities-157-dead-pigs-river Only environmental concerns were addressed in the article.   It fails to answer the most obvious question:   How did 157 pigs get in the river?   I could see 2 or 3 but isn’t it odd that some lemming affect could bring 157 pigs to the same fate?  “Hey,  where is Porky going?  Looks like he’s going swimming.   Hey, that looks like fun?”  Maybe some dude or dudes put them in there but c’mon man give?    I want answers!!!
• 157 people people died in a coal mining blast in Turkey this month. http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2014/05/13/157-dead-in-coal-mine-blast-in-turkey/ 
• I was born in 1(9)57.    A few months ago I had a revelation that I am 57 years old and I was born in 1957.    This is really trippy I thought and look how brilliant I am that I put this together.    Until I realized that this happens  to everyone.    Everyone who was born in 2007 will probably turn 7 this year.   Oooohhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!    Jeez, I’m a freaking Einstein!    Put me on the Discovery Channel.

 

 

     I really didn’t want to write this but its so childish I just have to.   It’ll be therapeutic to throw it out and in the process get rid of it.  But if I stumbled on this blog and read this crap I’d think, “this guy’s an immature attention freak. If he has any friends, they’re probably superficial. He probably posts selfies of himself on facebook and goes back all day to see if anyone “likes” it. What a geek!!!!!!”  This is one reason why I have told no one about this blog not even my wonderful wife.   If I know my audience I probably would be altering what I write to make it acceptable.     I’m a people pleaser and this is definitely not pleasing. 

      The pain of separation was semi-acute last night.    There is this teacher I used to work with who I am friends with on Facebook.    She left our school 5 years ago.   She was an exceptional teacher who also shared my liberal beliefs and I connected with her.   Or so I thought.    The past few years I have posted mindfulness teachings that I thought she would resonate with once or twice to her page and made comments on things she has written but never got anything back.    And then last night she made a post about kids with a class picture of kids in her 4th grade class(including some I had the year before in the 3rd grade) who are now graduating from high school.   She tagged a few teachers (including one teacher who we both didn’t have a lot of respect for)but not me.    That was the last straw and I childishly unfriended her.   That’ll show her.    I’m sure she’ll really notice one less than her 400 something friend count that grows every day.    

 

        There’s a lot of things going on here.     But they’re all based on my false identity of self.  This self that I have unconsciously developed over the years to deal with emotional discomfort.     I thought about this as I usually do when I feel any emotional discomfort.    There is this ugly negative dark cloud feeling inside me that arises.      I have been doing awareness techniques for a few years now so I am usually if not in constant contact with my sensations, I’m at least in the neighborhood.    Negative emotions are usually not around for very long.   I sense them.   I  notice them and then feel them without conceptual thinking until they dissipate.    I don’t notice when they aren’t there anymore.   I just realize a when the subject pops up again that I’m no longer feeling bad and remember that a while back I was.    I have a cold sore analogy.    When you have a cold sore its all you can think about.     But when it goes away, you don’t realize it has gone.    The next day or days after you think, “oh, yeah, remember that burning painful cold sore I had a few days ago?   It’s gone.”    I’m not conscious of the immediate release of the painful emotions.   

 

         I sensed the bad emotional feeling and realized it was because of the slight of this “friend.”     I knew it was ridiculous because I knew her barely 5 years ago.    We never really hung out but saw each other in passing, shared a laugh or hanging around the staff room making copies or sat together a couple of times in staff meetings.     I don’t think she had the same reverence for me that I had for her.   I’m a loose cannon and sometimes say inappropriate things to get a laugh or to try to draw attention upon myself when I’m feeling inadequate.  She is was very dignified and careful about how she presented herself.    She probably was glad to not have to deal with me again.    We all know people we don’t wish ill will on but if we never saw them again it would be no big loss.    She probably accepted me as a friend on Facebook because its tacky not to.    So, I’m sensing  this emotional bad feeling and the usual “notice, be aware, let it ride out” is not working.    Probably because I can’t help but go back to conceptual thinking of all the things I just outlined.    I’m feeling less than.    

    I also have to admit that I am feeling this horrible pride that I am better than someone.   I feel that I am better than that other teacher who she feels is OK enough to socialize with.  I cannot accept that I am a worthless piece of crap and she is not.    Two things are wrong with that.   One is the obvious that all humans are equal.   I am not better than anyone else.    And the second less obvious is that I am psychologically dependent on others and have a need for everyone to like me. Probably comes from being the youngest by 5 years in my family.     I cannot accept my own self worth.   I need someone else to validate it.   Obviously my wonderful wife thinks I am far more than acceptable.   The others in  my family love me.    My students adore me.    But one person from 5 years ago that I barely knew isn’t overwhelmingly star struck with me and I have an emotional meltdown.    Aren’t there some people I have been acquainted with that I am at least neutral about?    Why does everyone have to think I am wonderful?     She probably doesn’t even  dislike me.   I am just forgettable  to  her.  

        It goes against this unconscious image I have of myself.    Every now and then I have this semi-conscious mental picture of myself.  Probably everybody does.   It’s that unconscious image that crops up when we are embarrassed, insecure but also flattered.    I’m not looking in the mirror but there’s this hazy mental image.    When things are right there’s this nice guy who’s funny, cool, and Kevin Baconish attractive.     That’s the guy I’ve been compared to.    This positive image I have is not what everyone else see.    For one thing the guy I unconsciously see is in his 20’s.   I am 57.  I never study myself in the mirror because frankly I’ve never liked what I saw.   I look at myself two times a day when I get out of the shower and have to comb my hair and brush  my teeth and at the end of the day when I’m also brushing my teeth.  But I’m focused on the hair and teeth.  And not even there 100% because I’m locked on something that happened yesterday or something that’s going to happen tomorrow.  Once a couple of months ago I happened to look at the whole package in the mirror.   Even  though I’m considered young looking for my age I really saw the face lines and the grey hair.    It was kind of shocking.     I’m not always cool and composed.    Sometimes I’m in my own  world and preoccupied.     The reality is that I look somewhere in between a 20 year old relaxed Kevin Bacon and that DUI photo of Nick Nolte with definite leanings more towards Nolte.    I have never  seen myself not with a nice look on myself because that’s my face when I’m looking in the mirror.   I never have the look  in the mirror when I’m annoyed or angry.    Maybe that’s not a wonderful sight to behold.   

 

          Anyway, this too shall pass.    The cold sore of this former friend will soon be nothing.   Still it bothers me that I have these feelings of separation.    I keep  thinking that one day I won’t have these feelings but maybe that’s wrong too.   They are just sensations.    And sensations are not wrong.  The suffering happens when thoughts give way to conceptual thoughts about the sensations.     They arise and pass away. 

 

Field Trip

166 Sundays to go.

• Malcolm X was assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom near 166th and Broadway in New York City on February 21, 1965.
• U-166 was the only German submarine lost in the Gulf of Mexico.

     This week we had a field trip.    Normally I like field trips.   It’s nice to see the children excited about something new.    Its also not the same old, sometimes drudgery of getting them to pay attention and focus on  something that quite frankly isn’t all  that exciting.   A teacher wants every lesson to be thrilling and captivating but its just not reality.    Its also not practical.   There’s too much curricula and not enough time.     Sometimes and in fact most times its me up in front and them with their hands folded, quiet and listening to  me and quietly  following along in their book or workbook.

      Field trips are fun for the children but stressful for me.   Every day is stressful but this is a different kind of stress.     As soon as we leave the classroom, I  stop caring about if they’re learning and having fun.     A successful field trip is if I come back with the same number of children I left with.    If I leave with 21 and come back with 21 it was a good day.    I don’t even care that I  left with 3 chaperones and now there are only 2.    Maybe I have a stressed out child of the missing chaperone but I can  call home and get someone else to take the child home.   The adult can figure things out and I’m  not going to lose my job if the parent got lost.

       I was responsible for the buses on  this trip as I usually am.      Normally you call the bus, tell them when, where, who and how many and bada-bing-bada-boom you have an email confirmation the next day.   This time I called the bus and was told I had to send an email.    No  problem.   I sent the email and waited but never got the bada-boom.    I sent the email again and again no bada-boom and so I had to call.   Unfortunately the lady who handles the bada-boom was not available until after I  leave so I had to wait for the next day.    I called and found out the reason I never got the confirmation was because there had no more buses available for that day.    Hmmm…O…..K…… how about telling me that?   Now I’m starting to worry.    Another teacher has already booked the hard to get date at the site and we have no way to get there.      So, I scramble around and get another couple of bus service possibilities.    Luckily I get another bus and this time I get a bada-boom for my bada-bing.      We’re set.    I’m a big shot.   I’m Batman.   I took care of business and now I’m a big hero.
A month or so later, another teacher in our grade level  has decided she doesn’t want to go.    She has a horrible class.    It’s her first year and she came in mid year after the children had a string of substitutes.  Its very difficult to establish routines and a behavior modification system midyear.   It happened to me my first year.    The district office knew we weren’t going to have enough teachers for the grade but did  nothing  about it until  October.    They do this every year.  Unfortunately as sometimes happens she also got an unfair share of unmotivated and unmotivatable children with parents who are not involved with their offspring’s education and consider school as that free baby sitting service that takes their children for 7 hours a day.    It happens.   A few were transferred into our classes but you can’t disrupt all the classes by completely re-forming the classes.    Almost every teacher has a horror story or seven about getting an disproportional amount of “challenging” students.

         So, anyway, she does not feel comfortable taking this group of students.    Rightly, she didn’t feel she could adequately control them and couldn’t get enough responsible parents to chaperone.    Just having a parent to chaperone is not enough.    Parents can sometimes not be of much help.    They think they’re on a field trip to have fun.     They aren’t paying attention to their group of 3,4 or 5 students.    If its a small confined area that can be Ok.    But if its a big place and lots of things to see, groups can see more if they go off by themselves to explore at their own  pace.    This was a big place and the teacher didn’t feel she could provide the necessary safety which is a teacher’s primary concern.
I called the bus back to see if we could go with only one bus but was told that we couldn’t fit 40 students and 10 chaperones on   one bus.   We could but it would be really crowded.    Maybe if it was a short trip but we were driving 60 miles and would experience some rush hour traffic.
The morning of the bus arrives and we go out to the bus.   We got on the bus and its raining and the traffic is bad.    We live in a major city and the morning traffic is stop and go.   Halfway into the trip an alarm is going off and no one can figure out what is causing it.    The driver tells me that it means someone has tripped one of the emergency exits and to check them all.    There is nothing obvious with any of the exits so we have to endure a loud buzzing for about 20 minutes until she exits the freeway and pulls over to check.     She finds nothing wrong and we continue to our destination through city streets and a loud buzzing sound.

        Once at the site, she drops us off and tells me that she has been informed that she would not be taking us home because her company wasn’t supposed to be taking us.   She tells me another bus company, the other company I called,  is coming to take us home.  More to worry about.   At the moment we are 60 miles from home and no way to get home.    Who is coming?   How will we know when and where they will be here?   Will we get back before the end of the school day?    Luckily….not luckily like I won the lotto or I got lucky with my wonderful wife….I have the other company in my cell phone.   I call them while we’re waiting to go in and  kids excitedly tugging at my shirt telling me about all the cool things they’re seeing.
Right away I start questioning myself and thinking I made a huge mistake.   I remember trying to get the first bus and asking for confirmations and start convincing myself that, now that I think about it, the confirmation I eventually got was from the first company.    I never cancelled the first bus and I booked two different bus companies for the same trip.    It costs $500 per bus and my school is now on the hook for 2 companies X  2 buses and its all my fault.   I’m feeling terrible and its all I can think  about.    That night I got about 2 hours sleep.
Normally I am pretty emotionally stable and am deeply conscious of the present moment.   I am aware that the past and the future are just thoughts.     Thoughts are not reality and yada-yada-yada…     This time  it wasn’t working.    Instead of realizing I was at home and sleeping, I am in six hours ago thinking about how I screwed up and then 8 hours ahead worried about dancing for my principal trying to explain how I could have two buses going.    I was in none of those places.   I was in my bed and there were no buses, schools, or children anywhere.     I would realize that and begin to breathe deeply but then suddenly I would realize that I was back again in the past or off future tripping for the past minute or so.
The next day I go into the office in the morning to explain my sorry self.    I see the administrative assistant (secretary) and she starts talking to me about the screw up.    She was the one who had to handle the buses.    She tells me the first bus screwed up.      They never confirmed the reservation and our school wouldn’t be giving them a dime.     Pounds of relief drop off of me.    It wasn’t my fault other than I should’ve realized we weren’t getting on the bus with the right name.    But when you’re a teacher and you see a bus, you’re just thrilled the bus showed up.   They said we were going to the place we wanted to go and that was good enough for me.

       And for the moment I was enjoying the present moment again.

I Hate….something

• Utah men knock down  170 million year old rock formation.http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/boy-scout-leaders-topple-utah-rock-formation-from-jurassic-period-then-cheer-video They had a reason but  not a good reason.   You need only to want to do something. That’s all that’s important.    Or be able to make a profit.    Then you’ve really got something.

         “I like reading except for all the words.”   I had a friend’s brother tell me that once.   That’s one of those statements that makes your head spin around your neck like an Eastern Screech Owl.      I’ve got a confession about reading that’ll spin your head.  Wait a minute, let me draw the curtains and turn the volume up on the TV.   Come here a little closer.   I really don’t want anyone to hear this because I’m a public school teacher and I have a reputation to uphold.  The right wing with their penchant for teacher bashing would love to get ahold of this.   Ok, are you ready.   I….wait a minute…are you wearing a wire?    Ok, here it is…. I hate reading books.

      Ok, I said it.  Yes.  There it is in black and white: A teacher of elementary school kids who teaches reading all day long, successfully too,  I might add,  has just said he hates reading books.     That’s like a preacher saying “I hate public speaking.”  A pig saying “I hate mud.”   A Republican politician saying “I hate  rich white males.”          There are some things I enjoy  reading but the problem is that I cannot read for more than 15 minutes without wanting to quit.  I subscribe to several magazines. I enjoy eastern spiritual books, political articles on the internet and the sides of cereal boxes.

       The problem is that I have a really low attention span.    Really low, in fact my attention is so low that I…wait,  how long has that cobweb been up there?   I just vacuumed and dusted in here, how did I miss that?   Hmm, oh well, what was I doing?    Why am I on my blog?   What?   “…like reading except for all the…Eastern Screech Owls…rich,  white males…”  Whaaaaat?!?!?

       Oh, yeah, I have a low attention span.   Its always been  like that.   I think I was ADHD before it was cool.   It could have been career threatening when I was in college.    This may be not be a real big news flash but you have to do a lot of reading in college and that only being able to read for 15 minutes thing was kinda debilitating.   Kinda blew really,  really bad.    But one thing I could do well with my journalism training writing for a few small newspapers was take notes like a demon.   So  I really didn’t have to read everything if I could attend every class and use my Olympic gold medal caliber note taking  ability.    A professor was only going to lecture on what is really important and might show up on  the test.    So I got through on relying on that knowledge alone.

       It doesn’t matter what the subject I’m reading is.   I love non-fiction books on sports, music and history but never seem to be able to finish any of them unless I stay with it for a couple of weeks.    I could be  given a book and told somewhere in this book is where, when and how I will die.   I will still at some point have to look for a bookmark because I’m going to want to remember where I stopped so I don’t have to re-read something I already read.    Who wants to do that?  It’ll still be there when I get back.   I’ll just have to hope that the method of death revealed isn’t that  the house exploded while I was taking a nap with my book resting comfortably on my chest.    That would suck.  But not really because I would be dead.   I wouldn’t know.   I’m dead for crissakes.

       The problem is not hereditary.    Both of my sisters will get a book they like and settle in on the couch and happily go at it until the end.    My stay-at-home mother would go back-to-back-to-back and beyond from the morning she got up till the time she went to bed.    My brother, with a Masters in History, once found out about a small museum curator job interview for the following Monday on the Friday before. He read academic local California history tomes late into the night without a break all weekend, aced his interview and got the job.     I get about 16 pages in and I realize I haven’t a clue of what I read the past 4 because I was thinking how impressive it is that I’ve read this  long.  Then I gotta take a quick glance at the cover to remember what I was reading.

       Please don’t hate me.    Be disgusted, revolted and embarrassed for me.   But please don’t hate me.