~in a place like Randlett~

I come from a small town in Kansas where I was raised up with the help of many different people.  I'm proud of my small town heritage and the memories that it provided for me during all of my growing up years.  Although many of my friends and family live in large cities and absolutely love it, I could never do that.

Not even for a million dollars.
And that's the truth, too!

In 39 years of teaching now, 29 of those years have been spent in small towns.  From Yoder, Kansas to Olathe, Colorado and from Petrolia, Texas to Randlett, Oklahoma I have met many good and fine folks who stood by me, through good times and bad.  There is something different about small town people that is very appealing to me.  It's not that big city people aren't good people too.  They just live in a different place, one that really isn't for me.

Tonight Mike and I had the chance to head to Randlett for a benefit hamburger fry that was done to help with the medical expenses of one of our own.  It was held at the local fire station and sponsored by the firefighters of the area.  Lots of people came to help out with many of them being people I knew from school or the outlying communities.  How heartwarming it was to see them all come through the line, dig deep into their pockets, and press that money into the cashier's hands.  

Don't listen to what you hear on the news, that the world is filled with bad people.
Folks are honorable, benevolent, good and kind and they live in places just like Randlett, Oklahoma.

As we sat there watching the crowd while we ate, it was so apparent that people in the Randlett community are there for one another.  There was a lot of hugging, handshaking, teasing, and talking going on all over the inside of the fire station.  When we left about 5:45 an entirely new crowd of people was waiting to step inside and do the very same thing we had just done.  We have high hopes that the night's proceeds will be of great worth.  Money raised will be given to someone who, if not for their being the recipient this time, would do all they could for anyone else in need.  You know, you have to love a small town.  If you are looking for one to enjoy, I have a thought for you.

Why not choose a place like Randlett? 

I spend my days with these guys!  I'm very blessed to be at Big Pasture School this year.

These dear children spent their days with me at Olathe Elementary in Colorado.

Although I only knew them for one year, these Petrolia Pirates were much loved by me.

~as I find my father~

My father died in early December of 1982, a victim of lung cancer.  He was diagnosed, treated through radiation, and then passed away from it all in the span of 18 months.  As cancer patients go, he didn't get much time.  I miss him.

Today I am going to find him.

For over a quarter of a century, John Scott was a custom cutter.  From early May when the wheat harvest season started in southern Oklahoma to early fall when the harvest season was over in central North Dakota, my father was on the road.  His journey took him and his crew of workers up and down the Great Plains states with stops not only in Oklahoma but Kansas, Nebraska, and both of the Dakotas.  In the fall, he would return home once again but only long enough to prepare himself for the milo harvest here in the far western part of the great state of Texas.

He loved that life.

I have a special connection to this area of the world that we live in now.  From time to time, my father would haul crops into the elevator here in Burkburnett.  Sometimes I drive by that elevator and look up to it and remember him.  It doesn't make me sad, but rather it gives me peace to know that once he looked up at it as well.

This old photo is wearing with age but I love it because it shows my dad at his happiest.  I laugh every time I see the brown stains on the upper part of the door.  He never was very good at spitting out his tobacco juice.  I am now 8 years older than he was when this picture was taken and that always remains a sobering thought to me.

Two small towns that my father used to cut in year after year are located within an hour's drive from us here in our home along the Red River.  I have seen the directional signs for Davidson and Frederick, Oklahoma many times as I've drive either to Altus or to the doctor in Grandfield.  I always said that it would be nice to see them once again but never did anything about it in the nearly two years that Mike and I have lived here.

Today it will be different.
Today we are going to go there.

Although my father has been gone for nearly 35 years, I still find him in the strangest of places. I have seen him as I painfully watched the first wheat harvests without him back in my home state of Kansas.  I have felt his presence when the milo fields around this part of the state were harvested last year.  He's been in the bright and sparkling eyes of my three children when they have spoken to me of their dreams and hopes for the future.  Whenever I have told my students about him and his life, I have felt him deeply still within my heart.  Sometimes a tear wells up in my eye, but I never let it fall.  I smile and tell the kids everything that I remember about him.

Perhaps you are like me and your father is now gone from this earth.  Maybe you too experience the sadness from time to time as you miss them in your life.  If you are as I am, you hope that you have grown to be the kind of person that they wished you would be all along.  

It's how I am.
It's how I will always be.

I'm not sure how I will feel when we drive into those two towns this morning.  There might be a tinge of sadness but my guess is that I will only feel joy at seeing his old stomping grounds once again and oh, one other thing.

It will be nice to see my father once again.

I'm always glad that I have as many pictures as I have of him.  Here are some of us meeting up with him on a break from the cutting near Kinsley, Kansas.  The very young girl on the right hand side is me.  The following year after this picture was taken would be my father's last run. I was fortunate to go along with him that year from start to finish.  My journey put my college graduation date back a year but it was worth everything to be going along.

I love a picture of a good elevator.  This one is back in my hometown of Haven, Kansas.

~just like the man in the third aisle over~

I was the recipient of a simple act of human kindness this morning, certainly one that has been shown to me before not once, but many times.  For some reason today it meant something different, indeed something more to me this time around.  I have thought about it off and on since it happened.

Mike and I had run to the local supermarket here.  He returned a movie and I was looking for a bag of cough drops.  Normally speaking I come in for more than one item, but luckily this trip I only needed one thing.  It was with great anticipation that I thought I would get in and out in record time.  I grabbed the bag of them quickly from the pharmacy section and headed towards the check out counter, and then it happened.

There were only 3 lines opened up, with two of them being quite busy and occupied.  I made my way over to the farthest one thinking there wasn't much of a crowd waiting.  A gentleman coming from the opposite way was headed there as well, and because he was much closer to it than I was, he made it there first. It only took him a second to turn around and notice that I had one item while he had a small basketful of things.  Then he said to me the most simple of sentences, but one that stuck with me even after I walked out of the store.

"Hey, have you only got one thing?  Please go ahead of me."

At first I couldn't quite imagine what he was saying and then it dawned on me that he had just shown me a wonderful gesture.  Normally speaking, I try to do that for others as well.  Now it was my turn to be on the receiving end.  I could have declined his nice offer, realizing of course that most of the world operates on the "first come, first served" basis.  Instead of saying no to him, I replied with the most simple of words.

"Really?  Hey, thank you."

It didn't take all that long for me to check out and before I knew it the cashier was handing me my change back.  I turned to the man who had let me cut in front of him and wished him a very good day. I told him that I would pay it forward some day on his behalf.  He just smiled and said it was ok.

It was a simple, basic act of human kindness yet it made an impression upon me this morning. Perhaps it is still nice to believe and realize that there are very good people in this world who sincerely care about doing what is right and good.  Even when the times might indicate that it is "every man for himself", one lone man in a checkout line in Burkburnett, Texas was practicing just the opposite.

I took one last look at his face before turning to leave.  The man had a smile that made me believe that he felt good about helping someone.  The crazy thing is that had we not exchanged those polite acts of kindness, I might not have even said a word to him. Most other times, I would have never made eye contact with him.

Yet this time I did.

You know, I'm going to tell this story to the kids at school tomorrow.  It sounds like a good life lesson to teach right before I ask them to line up at the door to go to lunch or to a restroom break.  I want them to know that there all kinds of good folks out there, ones that show they care about humanity. When the news is filled with all types of bad things that people are doing these days, I want all 20 of them to know to always look for people who are doing the good. They are out there.  You just have to find them.

Just like that man in the third aisle over this morning at the supermarket.

This little group of 80+ kids meant the world to me in the year of my official "retirement".  I taught them the same kind of life lessons that I enjoy teaching today.

~and life goes on~

~and life goes on~

To look at the calendar and realize that the month of January is nearly over is a very sobering realization. You know how it goes.  The older we get, the faster time passes by.  I feel like I am in a race against the passage of the years that remain for me.  So much yet that I wish to do gives credence to the thought of living each day that you receive to the fullest.

I intend so to do.

As I was working at school today, for some reason I thought of my mom and what she was like at the age I am now.  I don't know why my mom came into my mind but surely she did.  I was scurrying down the hallway between my classroom and the copy machine, counting and recounting what I had run off and pushing the copy button to start the whole process again.  All of a sudden, there she was.

It was like, "Hey, where did that thought come from?"

My mom was my age 35 years ago.  It's kind of hard for me to imagine her like that.  In 1982, she was a newly widowed woman trying to survive on her own after my father passed from cancer. Mom had worked for most of her life and found herself on the brink of needing another job, not only for the financial security it could provide but also for a means to keep herself busy.  I remember the day that she asked me to help her get her high school transcript in order that she could enroll at the local community college.  She had made the decision to get her home health aide license and to do so meant taking the night classes offered there.  

It wasn't as hard to secure a 1938 high school transcript as I had thought it would be.  Within a few days it came and she went right down to the college to enroll and get started.  It was strange for me as her daughter and an educator as well to see my mom studying at the dining room table to be able to pass the course.  Once she let me "quiz" her over the things she would be tested on and she did very well. I was proud of her when she passed the course with an "A" and watched in awe of her as she provided home health services to folks around the county for well over 5 years.  

Mom would be 96 if she were still here today and sometimes I wonder what she would be like.  I look in the mirror each day and see her staring back at me.  I don't how that happens but it does.  I used to be bothered by it, not because I didn't want to look like her, but rather because it reminded me that she was no longer here.  Now I am kind of used to it and when I want to imagine what I might look like in the years to come, I just look at her pictures and smile.

She is me.

I can't remember my mom saying that she thought time was passing by too quickly but I am sure she must have felt the same way.  I wonder in my mind if she experienced the same thoughts that I now do. Did my mom have the feeling that she too was racing towards the end of her life?  Did she have things that she wanted to do yet, just like me, before her life was over?  

I have to feel like maybe, just maybe she did.

I don't know if my mom accomplished everything she intended to but I figure that she packed a whole lot into the remaining 26 years of her life.  Lois Scott didn't waste a moment of the time that was given to her.  For sure, one thing would be true.

She would intend for me to do the same.
~and life goes on.~

Mom's 65th birthday in 1985~I miss her.  I hadn't finished growing up yet when she passed away in 2007.  No matter how old you are, you still need your mom and dad around from time to time.

                     We all stood for this picture about 6 years before she passed away.  

~they call it the human one~

     I regret sometimes that my life in education will sooner or later have to come to an end. After doing this for so many years now, it is hard to imagine me doing anything else.  I think about it from time to time now, realizing of course that I cannot go on forever.  I have taught 7 years past my original retirement back in Kansas, and many times I have asked myself why I even retired in the first place. 

     I am not sure that I will ever know the answer to that.

     I think of all the children who have come in and out my classroom as well as in and out of my life. With a happy heart, I recall the many interactions with them and the different ways that I used to teach them.  I cannot recall one year that I wished for something else to do with my life. There was no class of children, never a group of parents, nor a single administrator that I encountered who ever made me feel like it was time to quit.  

     After almost 40 years, I think I can call that a pretty decent record.

     Once about 20 years back, I had entertained the notion of writing a book about all of my experiences in the classroom.  People encouraged me to do something such as that. It was amazing to think that 2 decades of service in the field of education would be enough fodder for a best selling book.  Yet, I felt that it was.  Little did I know how much more I would learn in the 20 years that would follow.

     In my mind, I believe I have become a better teacher post retirement.  I guess I always thought of myself as a decent educator, but in the past 7 years I feel like I became the teacher that I was really meant to be.  I go forward each day with even more confidence that what I am doing has the chance to make a difference for someone each day.  

     If I could go back in time, which I cannot, I'd kind of like to see the young woman who I was in the early years of being a teacher.  My guess is that I was pretty much naive, definitely a rookie, but still a person determined to do my best in the classroom.  Oh how times have changed since 1979!  During the early days, teachers weren't allowed to wear pants or jeans to school.  My first couple of years found me with a closet full of dresses to choose from each day. Now I don't own even one of them.   I would come home each day with hands the color of purple from making things on the mimeograph machine.  Now I get upset if the copier gets jammed up, especially when I really need the things that are stuck inside of it.  The early days had no state standards and extremely little testing.  In 2017 my days are driven by what children need to know to pass the state assessments each spring.    

     Change was inevitable.

     I do not know when I will quit teaching although I am asked that question on a pretty regular basis.  I always felt like when it was really time to say it is done, I would know for sure in my heart.  At this present time, that feeling is not with me and for that I really am glad.  

     You know, it feels good to be needed.  It feels honorable to go to school each day and work with children whose minds are like sponges that soak up every little bit of knowledge that they can.  It feels wonderful to spend my days with children who look past my faults and weaknesses, realizing of course one thing that is most crucial.

     They know that I belong to the same race that they do.
     And they call it the "human" one.

As a teacher, every day has been a new one for me.  By the same token, it has also been a new day for my students as well.  It's been good to be able to dismiss the bad things that could take place during any given school day and replace them with a chance for a "do over" for all concerned.   (a sunrise from July of 2011 on Eales Road in Reno County, Kanas)

From the school year 2006-2007 back home in Hutchinson, Kansas~
10 years have passed by me now.  The woman that I used to be is now 10 years farther along life's path.  She had no clue, even at age 51, what would lie ahead for her.  Probably a good thing that she didn't.  

~and what a gift that is~

     In the early afternoon hours I returned home today.  The trip back from south central Kansas was a little bit on the long side and every once in a while I found myself getting tired of the drive.  I've learned after spending so much time on the road in the past 4 or 5 years that it's a good idea to stop and get out when you find your eyelids getting heavy.  The last 100 miles got a bit much.  

     I was surely glad to get the chance to return to my home state and spend time with my family as well as dear friends.  I never cease to be amazed at the way Hutch changes and yet stays the same as I remembered it.  One thing that makes me feel good is this.

     It is nice to be able to go home again.  

     Lots of memories have a way of rushing back at me when I return to Reno County.  99.9% of them are always good ones.  The ones that are not so good will never take up room in my heart or my thoughts. I choose to remember the many blessings I have been given rather than the heartache.  I am finding that it works out much better for me that way.

     It's strange the way life turns out, you know?  It seems we are constantly on a path that takes us from one place in time to the next.  Sometimes the road is a little on the bumpy side and other times you get lost along the way.  Sooner or later you find yourself, leastwise it's the way it has worked out for me.  What a beautiful thing it is on life's journey to cross paths with just the right people at just the right time in life.   Sometimes it takes a while for that to happen, but when the time is perfect, they meet up with you along the way.

     And what a gift that is.

Good night to sweet Kansas and all of the people that I call family and friends back there.

      

~and it would be a nice thing to look forward to~

From Kansas, a place I still call home~

This afternoon was a great time, the perfect time in fact, to take a trip to Laurel Cemetery near my hometown of Haven, Kansas.  How often I have gone there and walked amongst the graves of many dear friends from the "land of long ago, and far, far away".  Many of the grave markers that I came across belong to folks that were known to me throughout my childhood and growing up years as a small town, Kansas farm girl.  They were the people who helped to raise me up and to them all, I am beholden.

I actually came out twice this afternoon.  It was nice to look around and to find the peace that only a cemetery can offer someone.  Laurel's setting is a very pastoral one, surrounded by fields that grow wheat, hay, and milo.  It's just enough off of the beaten path to be fairly quiet, even though the traffic that flows along Highway 96 is only a stone's throw away from it all.

I love it there.

I cannot tell you how many times I have visited this old country burial ground.  Dozens upon dozens of them more than likely~  I don't know what it is about cemeteries, especially this one, that calls to me in a certain way. I was taught early on to show respect to the graves of those who had died.  I even learned the importance of cleaning off the graves and paying attention to the words inscribed upon the markers. There is a wealth of history there if you are willing to take the time to walk the rows of graves and read the final messages given on their behalf.  

I stopped to visit the graves of two young men from my childhood who gave up their lives in the jungles of Vietnam, only two weeks apart from one another in the summer of 1967.  Henry Fisher and Sergio Albert are two soldiers forever frozen in time as the young people they surely were.  I don't think there has been a time that I've gone there and not stopped by their graves. I was only twelve when they were killed in southeast Asia but I remember with sadness the time of their passing.  I am 61 years old now and they both would be nearly 70 years of age and beyond.  It's hard to imagine what might have been for them if not for a call to be a soldier in a war that was extremely unpopular.  They were called to serve their country and they didn't hesitate.

Yet they died.

I went back out the second time this afternoon to scout around for a place to choose for myself when my own time comes in the future.  I had originally planned to be buried elsewhere, as a matter of fact I had already purchased a plot in the little Quaker cemetery near the town of Halstead, Kansas.  Yet the more I have thought of it, the more I realize where I truly prefer to be and that is Laurel Cemetery.  

I am much closer to the end of my life than I am to the beginning.  I hope to have plenty of good days that remain ahead of me, yet I look at it realistically and acknowledge the fact that all of our days are surely numbered.  So when that time comes for me, I take a whole lot of solace knowing that is where I will be.  Maybe, just maybe, there shall be someone who cares enough for me to stop and visit my grave once in a while, to brush off the leaves and grass, and to say "hello". 

I believe that simple act would be a nice thing to look forward to.

~for those who pray me there and back again~

In the early summer of 2012, I took a trip to Maine all by myself.  I had wanted to see a lighthouse and through the advice of a good friend, I chose the Portland Headlight in Cape Elizabeth, Maine.  It was a journey of about 4,000 miles round trip and I made it all in the span of 5 days time.  I loved every minute of the journey and never once got sleepy driving until the last 20 miles coming back to my home in Kansas.  Not once did I have trouble, never got lost even though there was that crazy switchback road in Massachusetts, and although I was by myself I really never felt that all alone for some reason.

I'm convinced now that I never felt alone because of the all the people back home in Kansas that were praying me there and back.  It happens to me all of the time.

It took a little bit of courage for me to tackle a trip like that one on my own.  I'd never done anything like that before but I really wanted to see that lighthouse and since it wasn't going to come to me in Kansas, I had to go to it in Maine.  I had zero regrets when I got back home again.  It was a trip well worth it to me.

The year following became the year of driving back and forth to the mountains of southwestern Colorado to visit Mike at his house back there.  I really didn't tell all that many people where I was going that first time out, although my good friend LeRoy began to figure things out rather quickly.  The last thing I wanted was for anyone to start worrying about me, so I was mostly quiet about where I was going.  Turns out they might have had a dang good reason to fret over what I was doing.  Crossing over the pass at Monarch Mountain my first time out and in the dark of the early morning hours that winter morning was not the smartest of things to do.  I figured that out rather quickly when in the dark, I saw the road maintainer getting ready to go and clear all of the snow from the road.  

It was just him and me the entire way from the bottom to the top and down to the other side again.

I led the way.

Even I might have considered myself crazy.

People all over the place took it upon themselves to pray me back and forth from Hutchinson, Kansas to Montrose, Colorado for nearly 2 1/2 years of time.  I think I logged about 14 trips back to Kansas during the time we lived there, first to visit Mike and then to make sure that my house was taken care of back in Kansas.  I knew the front range cities and towns along 50 Highway by heart and western Kansas became all too familiar to me.  Once again, I never felt really alone because I knew somewhere out there was a dear, sweet, and precious friend who was praying for me to be ok.

It was a comforting feeling, to be sure.

In just a couple of hours more I am heading out once again.  I waited out the ice storms that hit the states of Oklahoma and Kansas to be sure the roads were safe.  I've got a very important little family to visit back home and I intend to get there safe and sound.  The road is mostly familiar to me and I will more than likely be just fine.  I want to make the most of the little time that I have available to me this week.  I am grateful, really grateful for the chance to make this journey.  I won't feel alone though because just like always~

Someone out there will be praying me there and back once again.

My dear and beloved Kansas, see you very soon.

I cut my "driving teeth" with the journey to Maine.  Oh how I loved the sounds, smells, and sights of the sea.  Before I die, I hope to make this journey once more.  If you have never been to Maine, make it a point to go there for a visit.  It's the most beautiful state.

Although I have only flown there, I have enjoyed so much my trips to the Puget Sound area of Washington state.  I believe it has been a journey each year since 2013.  For a person who was always afraid of drowning in the water when I was a little girl, I love being around the water now.

It was the greatest of sights to see each time I went back to Kansas from Colorado.  Way up in the distance is the tiny little town Coolidge.  I haven't been on that leg of the journey since 2015 and our move to Texas.  Some day I want to go back that way once again.  Western Kansas is filled with good folks who have cared so much about my safety and well being.

~and it will be their time to show what they know~

~from Burkburnett~

The fire is roaring in the fireplace this afternoon as the skies outside remain in a perpetual state of gray.  We have so far escaped much of the ice storm that our friends and family to the north of us have endured.  I've never been a big fan of ice and the accompanying misery that it sometimes brings with it and then leaves behind.  The worst ice storm that I can personally remember was in 1984 back home in Reno County, Kansas.  We were without power at our house in the country south of Hutchinson for 6 1/2 days.  My Ricky was only 4 at the time and doesn't remember it.  If he did, it would be the recollection of a week long campout right inside of his own home.  I never did forget it.  It took some pretty ingenious thinking to cook on an old wood burning stove for the better part of the week, take a semi-lukewarm bath, and entertain ourselves with one game of scrabble after another.  Hey and on a positive note, it was during that stay inside of the house that I learned "Q U A" really was a word that had the possibility of scoring a lot of points and I always remembered that.

It wasn't fun, that's for sure, but we made it. Amazing what you can do when you have to.

I'm heading home to Kansas for a visit on Monday and pray the ice will have been gone by that time.  I'll be away from the kids at school for a couple of days and so we've been spending the last couple of weeks going over procedures and expectations while I am gone.  Lesson plans have been completed and laid out on my desk with hopes that the substitute will have no problems following them.  

You know, sometimes you just have to be gone.

In nearly 4 decades of being in education, I have learned many valuable lessons. One of them is this.  

Kids need the opportunity to show you what they can do when you are not there.  It's a lesson in integrity.

My 20 students are fixing to get that special opportunity this week upcoming.

There are many lessons to teach children these days.  Everything is state assessment driven, not only in Oklahoma but in every other state out there.  Children must be proficient at reading and mathematics.  They need to know about social studies and science as well as knowing how to present their thoughts in written form.  Third graders today are learning much of what I never saw until the 5th grade and beyond.  It's a sign of the times.

Yet even in all of this, regardless of the fact that I realize the importance of being test ready, I much more prefer to teach children the lessons of life.  One of those lessons is that your teacher is not always going to be with you, whether it be during the school year or ten years from now. The fine art of fending for oneself and showing what it is that you know is a critical one to learn.

My being gone for a few days presents them with the chance to practice what it is that I always preach to them, and you know what?

I think they will do just fine.

When I was a little girl their age, I used to love to play inside this little milk house at our farm in the Sandhills of Harvey County.  I got the chance to visit it back in 2011 and what memories it brought back to me.  This was the first time I had been there since we moved to Haven in 1963.  The happy times of living there are still tucked deep into my heart.

~and the porch on 14th Street was one of them~

     My mom used to love to sit on her front porch and watch life travel by her.  It was a great place with a wonderful vantage point to see all of the car and foot traffic that went by on East 14th Street back in Hutchinson.  Sometimes I would stop by for a visit and that is where I would find her, most generally with a nice smile on her face.  She would tell the story of all the college and high school kids going by in their cars.  Mom got really tickled with this one little blonde haired boy that habitually came by each school morning, swinging his back pack all along the way.  If he wasn't swinging it, then he was dragging it.  It was entertaining for Mom and she loved it.

     Years later I bought her house.  I began to enjoy doing just what she had done.  Every morning I found myself out there, often just before the sunrise as I waited for the world on 14th Street to awaken.  I started to notice the same pattern of people every single day from the guy down the street who daily walked his two dogs to the teenager who seemed oblivious to the world around him as he listened to his favorite music through headphones.  Every morning I waited for them. Then I realized it.

     I had become my mom.

      Before I moved to Colorado in 2013, I sold, put into storage, or gave away much of what I had.  There's a limit to what a person can pack into a rental truck and with 611 miles and one huge mountain to climb over, it seemed the best idea.  The porch furniture actually went first with many of the beautiful plants that were growing given to friends. Soon the porch became empty with nothing left but remembrances of a lovely life.  The times and memories of that old front porch went with me and I kept them tucked deep into my heart.  When I sold the house in 2015, I stood right there for a moment, saying good-bye to a place that had been like a lifelong friend.  It wasn't all that easy.  I remember a tear rolling down my face.

     There are some places in life that I have just felt really comfortable and safe in.  When I was a little kid, it was my Grandmother Brown's basement on Locust Street.  Growing up as a teenager in Haven, Kansas it was in my upstairs bedroom in my folks' house south of town.  As an adult, a mother with three children of her own, I found peace anywhere my children were. Now that I am older, perhaps the place I feel the most at ease with is where all the wonderful and precious memories are tucked safely into. 

     My heart.

     From 2005 until 2015, that house was mine.  It was like a shelter from the storms of life.  I found peace there and recognized it as the sanctuary that it truly was.  I can remember no sad times there, only happy ones.  During my last trip back to Hutchinson a month or so ago, I decided to drive by once again.  No one lives there now it would appear and it looks kind of lonely.  
     
     There are some places in life that I have just felt comfortable in.

     The porch on 14th street was one of them. 

~and if our paths should cross again~

     I got an email a couple of weeks ago from a former student of mine back in Kansas.  I hadn't seen that kid since I taught him in the second grade nearly 35 years ago.  Somehow or another, he tracked me down and just wanted to let me know that he was thinking of me and appreciated the fact that I was his teacher.  

     It was a sweet remembrance of a little boy who had now grown to be a 42-year old man with 4 children of his own.  I played only a small part in his life as second grade came and went that year.  But to be remembered by him meant so much to me.  My heart was happy.  He wanted me to know that he lived back home in Hutchinson once more and that any time I was back there, I should definitely let him know.  He wanted his wife and children to meet me.

     I told him I would and was looking forward to a chance to see him once again.  Funny how our paths had crossed once more, even after those many years.

     I have met so many people in my lifetime.  Some have come and stayed forever while others have come and then gone away, never to be seen again.  Every once in a while there will be someone who is there, goes away, and then returns again.  And then when they return, it is as if they never went away in the first place.  You just pick the conversation back up where you once left off.  Those are rare moments, nearly a miracle in my book.  Yet they do happen and perhaps you will be lucky enough to be a witness to it yourself.

     I have been.

     I was going through pictures this weekend, as I often do, and couldn't help but to notice just how many photos of former students I have.  Sometimes it was one taken during the regular school year and other times, it was in the summer school setting.  I have pictures of kids going way back in time and how happy I am that they were taken.  I even have pictures now of "reunions" of sort with children I once had who have now reconnected with me as an adult.  All of those memories are priceless to me and ones that I wouldn't trade for anything in this world.  

     I wonder how they are all doing.  I wonder if they are now in college, or married, or even around the area any longer.  Sadly I would have to admit that after nearly 40 years of doing this, I have forgotten a few of their names.  Yet I never forget their faces and the times that we crossed paths.  

     Sometimes people make their way back in life.  Cherish the moments that it happens.

     You won't regret it if you do.  You might regret it if you don't.

Little Nori is one of those people.  She called me "teacher" in the first grade.  

She and her classmates (Holly, Valerie, and Kim) surprised me one December day in 2010.  I hadn't seen them all since they were little tiny girls who all called me their teacher.  For the record, I am sure that I didn't teach them to do "bunny ears" during picture taking times.

This kid showed up at my classroom door the day before he graduated from high school.  He wanted to know if I remembered him.  John was a dear little boy who was in the very first class I taught at Lincoln Elementary back in 1999.  I hadn't seen him since then.  It made me proud to see the young man that he grew up to be.  

     

~I am glad that I get to enter it~

Kids are way smarter than we give them credit for.

I was reminded of that lesson today at school.

It is time for us to begin science this semester in our classroom.  Our first module is on motion and force.  We wanted to do a little experiment to see what the effect of force was on toy cars that were running down an incline.  It had been my hope to bring things from home that the kids could make ramps out of.  It's been a crazy week and when I got to school this morning, I realized I had brought nothing from home for them to use.

What could I do?

I decided to tell the kids that they had to scour the classroom to look for anything they could find which they could use to build their ramps.  I wasn't sure what they would come up with. My only directions were to not take anything that belonged to me personally but the rest was up for grabs.

It was sweet to hear a little voice say something about the framed snowflake I have in my room.

"Ok guys, remember no one gets to use the snowflake that Mrs. Renfro's father made when he was our age. That's personal."

And so they were off.

They had a time limit of 25 minutes in which to hunt up the materials they would use and then make their ramps.  After the ramps were made, they were to use the toy cars that kids had brought to see what would happen.  What kinds of surfaces and inclines would make the best ramp?  Would a car go faster down the incline if someone pushed it or if it was left to go on its own accord? 

I couldn't believe the way that they gathered stuff up.  They were as busy as could be, going throughout the room and pulling things off the shelves and tables that would be good materials for them to use.  Library books, crates, tissue boxes, tape dispensers, rulers, an old packing box, and a gazillion other things were strewn about the room.  No one was fighting about who got what.  They made it work and I was so happy.

I listened to them (something I need to do more often) as they worked within their small groups. By the sounds of their conversation, I could tell one thing for sure.

Learning was happening and not one bit of it was coming from inside of a book or out of their teacher's mouth.  It was generated from a place far better than some text book would ever be.  It came from their minds, their thinking caps.  I should be doing this kind of thing way more regularly than I do.

It seems very strange to admit it, but after nearly 40 years of being in the classroom, I have never taught science before.  My experience as a third grader with science was a dismal one.  I really didn't like it and the truth be told, I'm not sure why that was.  Perhaps I could not connect what I was learning to anything I would need to know in real life.  I struggled through it  to receive a passing grade, but just barely.

I am a lifelong learner, one who readily admits that I don't know everything.  In fact, some days I feel like I don't know anything.  Perhaps I feel like I am relearning science through the eyes of my own students.  Once again, maybe they will teach me more than I will teach them.

All things considered, that's probably not a bad thing.

The world of children is a pretty good place.  I'm glad that I get to enter into it every single day.

~Perhaps that is the reason why I love the sunrise.~

The fire is burning in the fireplace tonight.  We are looking at a couple of days of cold temperatures ahead of us.  Burkburnett, Texas is not the only place on earth where it is not "flip flop" weather.  As a matter of fact, compared to the Dakotas and the northeastern part of the U.S., we are sitting pretty well right here in northern Texas.  

This morning I looked outside the school and noticed that the daylight was trying to break along the eastern horizon of the sky.  It was cold, very cold but I determined I would take a picture of it anyways.  I hurried out to take it without even putting my coat on.  I didn't want to miss it.  The photo was not the best one I have taken, yet still I considered it to be a beautiful one. It wasn't so much for the colors or even the clarity of the picture, but rather it was because of how it made me feel when I took it.

I love sunrises.
They make me very happy.

I have captured some of the very best sunrises in the middle of winter.  There is just something about the colors that are splayed across the sky when the temperature dances below freezing. They seem more vivid, more alive than they usually do. 

Some of my favorite ones have been taken in Colorado where Mike and I lived before we came here.  I would sit at the kitchen table, usually in the early morning hours, as I typed a blogpost.  From my vantage point, it was so easy to see the sky begin to lighten up and then the majestic display of its colors.  The Black Canyon of the Gunnison and old Silverjack Mountain provided the perfect  backdrop  for any picture that I managed to take.  

Ones like this one.

During the first 3 months or so of living in Colorado, I suffered some pretty serious homesickness.  It felt sad to live so far away from Kansas and my old home there.  I wasn't sure how I could make it.  Then one day a friend of mine, a dear young man who used to call me "teacher" back in Kansas, left me a message.  It was a message of hope to me and I always remembered it.  Bless his heart, he always calls me by the name he knew me to have when I was his teacher and he was my student.  I guess that shall always be the way.

He said,

"You know, Mrs. Miller take a look at the sky tonight.  The moon should be shining pretty brightly.  Just remember that everyone you miss will be looking up at that same moon from wherever they are.  Maybe then you won't feel so bad. Maybe then you won't miss us so much."

And that boy, now a very grown up adult, was right.

Perhaps that is the reason why I love the sunrise so very much.  Maybe it helps to remind me of the very precious people that I know and love who I left behind not only in Kansas, but in Colorado as well.  If I remember they see the same sunrise as I do,  then it doesn't seem like I am so far away from them at all.  That simple thought makes me happy.

I think I have enough sunrise pictures to make a picture book of them, but that won't deter me from taking others.  Every sunrise is different and no two people really see it the same anyways.  
Most folks see them with their eyes.
I see them with my heart.

             Sunrise in the Joshua Tree, near Twentynine Palms, California~summer '16