~and if you could read this~

     Yesterday seemed like the perfect day to start filling the pirate's treasure chest, the one that I bought a couple of weeks back at Grand Junction when we were shopping for school things up there.  I'd seen online that Toni, my good friend and coworker at Olathe Elementary, was having a garage sale at her home not all that far from mine.  So with money in my pocket, off I went and sure enough right smack dab in the middle of a table I found it.  A "gold mine" of sorts, a box filled with the personal treasures of a little boy who no longer needed them.  I had a great time sorting through them as I fished out one cool thing after another for use as incentives in my classroom come this fall.  Pirate guys and super heroes, dinosaurs and animals all found their way into the bottom of my black shopping bag.  It felt kind of strange to even be buying them.  Long ago when my two sons were little,  they would have loved to fill a bag with them too.

     So I brought them home, placed them into the sink and gave them a little bath and I realize now that it wasn't because they needed it.  They would have been fine to just go into the chest as they were.  I did it because the 9-year old that is still very much alive and well in me told me to. It was actually kind of fun to make some soapy water and swish them around inside the sink basin.  It was interesting to feel the different textures and to really notice all the tiny details that go into making plastic creatures such as these.  In the adjacent basin they all were put to swim around awhile in clear water as the soap suds came off.  Then I laid them all out on an old beach towel to dry in the warmth of the Colorado sun that was coming through the kitchen window.  When everything was dry, I stood them all up in one giant mob scene and took the photo above.  There is a smile on my face for a reason and the reason is a good one.  Just for 15 minutes of time yesterday, I "checked out" from being an adult and enjoyed the beautiful world that children live in and you know what?  We all should do that a whole lot more often.  

     Hey, I had so much fun scavenging through that box of discarded toys yesterday that I plan to go out and find another garage sale or two this morning to do the very same thing.  When school starts now about a month from today, I want to have plenty of these on hand to give out on Fridays when my little first grade students cash in the "chips" they have earned throughout the week for showing their "AARGH" Olathe Elementary School pirate traits.  The way I have always have looked at it is that any money spent for a child's well being, any time given on their behalf is both time AND money well spent.  

     I announced my retirement from teaching in May of 2010 and that managed to last all of 5 months.  I returned to the classroom for another 3 years as a Title I teacher at Lincoln Elementary.  When Mike and I got married on the last day of school in May of 2013, I said that I was retiring for "good" this time and starting a different kind of life on the Western Slopes of Colorado.  That second retirement lasted for just 8 weeks as I found a new home and special purpose for being a teacher.  Olathe Elementary School, just up the road from Montrose a bit, needed a teacher in one of their fourth grade classrooms and with a grateful heart I accepted the position there.  This coming school year I am going to return to take a classroom in another hallway and do I ever look forward to the first day soon.  It would appear that God has a mighty plan in place for me here, a definite reason for being.  For whatever that would be, I go forth with faith that all will be as it should.  

     As for me, I love being a teacher.  I will never get rich financially from it but I don't know any teacher who chooses to do this with that ultimate goal in mind.  I am paid over and over again in the "bonus checks" that being an educator provides.  I could have made other choices as to what my life's profession would be but as I stop to think about it, I'm not sure what any of those options would have been in the first place.  I was born to be a teacher.

     Have a great weekend family and friends out there and remember, if you could read this blog post be sure to say "thank you" to a teacher.  

Ready to begin year number 37 and very proud to be an Olathe Pirate :)