Monday, September 2, 2019

A grand weather day for Labor Day 2019 AND a sibling birthday at that!

Joan has a birthday today.  I need not say how old she is but she is older than Dave, Helen and I!  I will take a short time to say that my siblings are special and in MANY ways.  It would not be fair for me to single out any one or any trait but "for sure" Joan, Dave and Helen are all special in many ways.  Among the things that they have done or are doing are being:
  • a great professional
  • a super mom
  • being a great dad
  • exceeding the standards for being a wife and husband
  • caring for children, grand children and great grand children
  • showing others how to be a special friend 
  • having so so many skills in life 
  • showing and expressing love to all
  • AND the list could go on
  • I should add that ALL are great at having fun!
A happy birthday to sister Joan and of course to Helen and Dave as well as their birthdays were in August and June--I know I am late with them!

Being Labor Day my thoughts go back to the many many years (38) I sat at home on this day thinking about tomorrow, the first day of students.  Some of the most memorable ones are:
  • Perhaps the most vivid is the Labor Day of 1969.  I was getting ready for my very first class which was a 4th grade at the School for the Deaf in Devils Lake.  I did not know if Superintendent Hayek wanted to test me early or if he had something against me because he had given me a class, of mostly boys, who had almost driven the teacher the year before crazy.  After I had experienced being chased with a compass, dealt with going to the bathroom on the floor, dealing with our plants in the window that were destroyed and on and on I knew what the deal was.  He did not like Me!!!  That is not true but it certainly was a year to remember for many reasons.
  • The next most vivid year was 37 years later, my last year of teaching.  I knew it would be my last year and again it turned out to be memorable in many ways.
  • Perhaps I can fit in another first day which was not the day after Labor Day.  It was Monday, October 3 of 1977.  We were moving to St. Paul and I had come down 2 weeks early to start teaching.  I walked into my room at Ramsey Junior High not knowing a thing about what had happened the first 4 weeks of school.  I did not know the schedule, the kids, the textbooks I was supposed to use, fellow teachers or anything.  If one has every heard of "going in cold' or baptism under fire" that was me.  It was a FIRST day that lingers in the mind forever.
  • I could go on and on but I will say the first day was usually one of anticipation, hope and plans.  It seems I always had a sense of excitement as it usually was new students, often a new room and on and on.  I should mention the first day of school in 1999.  At the last minute they put me in a room that had been used as a storage room the year before.  I guess they felt the deaf kids were not that important.  I walked into a room with no desks, only tables and some chairs.  Along the wall were stacked boxes high to the ceiling and on and on.  NOT a good start to say the least.
So I sit here this morning thinking about the past, deciding about today and wondering about the future.  Here I am twelve years removed from "the first day" thing.  It is a good thing but then I wonder if it is so good to be 72!  Well I can think of MANY other things that could be worse!  Of course I am thankful for being alive and have a wonderful life.

I just poured the last of the FP so it may be time to move on for the day.

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