Memory Monday

  "The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery."
--Mark Van Doren

This is My First Art Class!!

     I have taught for one semester and I learned more in that one semester than in four years of college...at least in the field of education...the actually being in front of a classroom.  According to Mark Van Doren, the guy I quoted above, teaching is the art of assisting discovery.  And I'll have to say, as much I was the teacher, all my students were also MY teachers! I discovered knowing the subject matter is not the most important thing in teaching...getting to know your kids, caring about them, inspiring them, the intangible  things, are of equal or even more importance. 
      Teaching was not all I  was doing that year....this was the first time in my life I was living independently.  so I was also learning to be an adult!  Managing money, taking care of an apartment, being responsible for a car, time management, etc.. The only credit card any of us had then was a gas credit card.  Everything else was paid for by check or cash.  Linda, my roommate, was from a small town not far from Kansas City so she would go home pretty often...but then I would be off with my buddy Beth.
           I don't know if this is true of all first year graduates, but Beth and I missed college.  We still had several friends at Mizzou so we would go back every once in awhile, especially during football season. And to get to my hometown in Illinois I would drive through Columbia, home of Mizzou and would often stop by for a break in my five hour drive.  On one of those trips, I stopped at the Coronado Club...you remember that bar stool that went home with me?  Well, now that I was earning my own money, I felt guilty about being such a thief and wanted to pay for the stool. To my surprise the Coronado Club was closed down!  I couldn't seem to find anyone who was part of the ownership.  But at least I tried! (Now don't tell me...the only reason they closed down is because  of my theft! I think they must have bigger losses than one bar stool!)
         Meantime, Dick has graduated from Basic Training at Lackland and has now moved on to Wichita Falls, Texas to Sheppard AFB for continued training before a more permanent post. He came by to visit me on his way through.  This time he had a a car so we didn't have to spend time at the railroad depot!

Sheppard AFB

       I have been searching the want ads to try to find a puppy of my own.  All the dogs we had at home were bird dogs...setters, pointers, hunting dogs, which was ok with me...I loved all dogs.  But I had a particular interest in German Shepherds because of a television show "Rin Tin Tin"! So when I found an ad for one in the KC Star, I had to go see what they had!  The address was not in a very good part of Kansas City so my roommate went with me and a guy friend of hers!  The couple who had the mother were a very young, sweet couple with several small kids and this German Shepherd female who had just had a litter of nine puppies! I could see why they would want to sell them off...their living conditions were far from perfect.  The guy told me the mother and father were both registered with the AKC which I found hard to believe but went along with him.

My adorable German Shepherd puppy!

      I picked out the runt of the litter!  She was so cute!  The first thing I did the next day was to take her to the vet to get her shots and get her checked out.  The only thing wrong with her was that she needed a good bath! I wanted to give her a German name so I christened her Dagmar!  Linda's dog, who was about five, tolerated the invasion of a new puppy in her life, but she made it known that she was the Alpha dog and even though Dagmar grew by leaps and bounds and overtook her in size, Linda's dog still ruled the roost!! And I did send in the papers to see if she was a registered dog, and sure enough, she really was! I was in no position to breed dogs or planned to show her so that didn't mean anything to me so I did go ahead and have her spaded.