Worked on the base today.

Got a pass to drive on Ft. Hood yesterday afternoon and worked as a librarian at an elementary school on base today. Again, I had a great time, learning all kinds of new things and meeting new people. That's become the standard operating procedure with this substitute teaching gig.

Part of my duties included sitting in a nice big rocking chair and reading a book to a few classes of kindergartners who were sprawled out on a rug in front of me. I've done that before, back when I spent two and a half weeks as a kindergarten aide at another school.



The book I read was a cute little story called Muncha! Muncha! Muncha! It's about a guy who decides to build a vegetable garden so he can eat all the veggies, and then ends up with endless trouble from rabbits. They sneak into his garden every night, no matter what he does. He builds a low wire fence, but the bunnies just jump over it. He builds a taller wooden fence, but it doesn't do any good. He builds a friggin' MOAT around the wooden fence, but the bunnies swim it, climb the wooden fence and eat his carrots anyway. Muncha! Muncha! Muncha!



In the end, he builds a jail around his carrots, with razor wire and spot lights. The bunnies can't get in, so they trick the guy. They climb into his basket when he's not looking and he ends up taking them in himself. So, the story ends with the gardener giving up, sitting down with the bunnies and sharing the carrots. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, seems to be the moral of the story. Weeell, after my second reading, to the second group of kindergartners, I was just DYIN' to freestyle my own ending to the story. Somethin' about a pump action .22, or better yet...

"Hey kiddies, do you know why the gardener is having so much trouble with those pesky bunnies? Well, boys and girls, the reason he's having so much trouble, waistin' all that time and energy buildin' moats and runnin razor wire... It's because he's a CITY BOY! That's right boys and girls, country folks know how to deal with pesky little bunnies who try to steal food they haven't worked for."

"Do you know how the country folks deal with the pesky bunnies boys and girls? That's right, it's called a LEG TRAP! Set out a few of those spring-loaded little wonders boys and girls, and Snap! Snap! Snap! The bunnies would end up gutted and skinned, cooked up nice so the farmer has something else to go with his carrots."

"And what's the moral of the story," I'd continue. "That's right boys and girls, don't steal shit from country folks!

Anyway, I was just thinkin'. But it would'a been hilarious to hear them all squeal.

"Snap! Snap! Snap!" Aaaahahahahahaha!

Oh, and Mushy, no Ferdinand in the school library. The other librarian said she'd heard of it. Remembered reading it as a kid, but it's not in their catalog. I looked. Cheers!

Another full day today.

2nd graders. The teacher had them do a writing assignment early on. "What's your most valuable possession?" I look over one kids shoulder and he's written "PS2, my family, my skateboard."

I wanted to sit them all down and tell 'em "Hey, pay attention. The toys and stuff you guys are all thinkin' of are nothing. The most valuable thing you own, the only real thing you own is YOURSELF!" But that would'a gone right over their heads. It's the kind of stuff I used to hit the high school kids with back in the day.

But to see the one kid include his family in with his PlayStation 2 and his skateboard, I though that was pretty cool for a 2nd grader.

First off...

My Wednesday night pool team won the tournament last night. We went from last place to third, and now head go to the City tournament. If we win there, we go to Vegas to play. Wouldn't that be a hoot?



Secondly, two of my Juniors down in Florence won the state Class 2A Tennis Championships Tuesday. That's Ashee Brunson there on the cover of the local sports page. She and Kasey Button won the Girls Doubles title, 7-5, 6-3. I'm proud as hell of these kids.



Finally, my sister drove into town from Oklahoma Wednesday to visit mom and get some stuff from her storage locker. I went over in the afternoon and took these two of my women out to eat at BJs.



We started out with drinks and appetizers. Tater skins and Santa Fe Spring Rolls. Mmmm, good. Mom ended up having two Margaritas, while sis killed three Bloody Marys. I was the piker here, enjoying just one Blue Moon. But I was driving.



My meal of choice was the BBQ chicken sandwich, with Applewood smoked bacon. Again... Mmmm, good. After the appetizers, I only ate half the sandwich. Yea, I know. I must be slipping. But I wanted to bring the other half home to Denise, who was at work and couldn't be there. Yea, I'm such a sweet guy. Pffft.

After the visit I drove back home, and in time, Denise and I headed for the pool hall. It was a fun night. Two cigars. I'm really proud of my teammates. They all played really well. I hope we can keep it up in a few weeks at City.

As I've already told you, Denise and I fly out to Nashville this afternoon. We'll rent a car there and drive up to Bowling Green, where much of Denise's family is gathering to see her youngest walk the stage to get her Masters Degree. It should be a fun trip. We'll fly home Sunday, and I'm sure I'll have pictures to show you.

I hope you all have a great weekend too. Cheers.

The rest of the weekend.

We slept in Saturday, resting after a very long and busy week. That's our routine. The weekends are for recharging the batteries, unless there's a trip to take or a concert to go to.



When Denise got up and went out back to see about layin' out in the sun in the yard, she noticed that the vines we'd planted a while back had finally begun to bloom.



I had only a few seeds left from an original stash of hundreds, harvested over many years of growing these vines. The pot of seeds had been ruined when I let them sit out there and get soaked with rain water. I was lucky I'd found a few pods that hadn't been ruined.

As the flowers grow and then wilt on those stalks, the seed pods grow and after they've dried you can harvest the seeds for next years crop. You can even eat them while they're still green, but you won't catch me doin' that.



You can see the little seed pods growing along side the flowers in this shot.

They're called Purple Hyacinth Bean Vines. But they're also known as Indian Bean, Egyptian Bean, Dolichos lablab, Lablab purpureus, Bonavist, Chinese Flowering Bean and Pharoah Bean. They're widely grown in Africa, India and Asia for use as food for both humans and livestock. The Hyacinth Bean Vine's most prestigious growing spot in the United States has been in the gardens of Thomas Jefferson's historic farm, Monticello. Now they're in mine too. Makes me feel all special!

I got my first seeds some time in the mid-1990s, from one of the houses down the alley from my folks house in Temple. They had them growing over their fence. I got some dried seed pods and grew the vines in planters on the second floor balcony of my apartment. The sliding door faced the setting sun each day, so I grew enough of these to shade the door, just as these shade one of my bedroom windows. The leaves provided so much shade that it ended up saving me money on my electric bill.



Our Canna Lilies are also blooming and looking green. Considering the drought, and how seldom I seem to remember to water them, I'm amazed they're doing this well.



The flowers are just beautiful. They were all transplanted from my mother's garden this last spring and early summer. They'd become overgrown and crowded there, so she dug up about eight or ten plants and gave them to me. I planted them in the corner of this planter that I'd constructed out of railroad ties, and they seem to have taken off. We've supplemented them with a few different varieties of Lilies, purchased from the local Lowe's, but mom's are still the tallest and prettiest.

Speaking of Mom, she teased me last Friday by mentioning that she might fry me some chicken if I wanted to come over again and have dinner. Silly question! Denise and I went over Sunday night.



Denise had the job of making the drinks. Strawberry Daiquiris all around, thank you.



By the time the last thighs came out of the oil, I'd fixed out potatoes with pepper, butter, sour cream and grated cheese, and Denise had mixed the salad with mom's special home made dressing. It had all been pre-cut and just needed tossing with a few forks.



After that, there was a little ice cream, with chocolate sauce dripped over it. And there was a good long talk about lots of things going on in mom's side of the family. There a lot of drama these days, but I won't go into it. Not now anyway.

I know, you always leave this place hungry. Well hell, eat before you get here. I can't help it.

After that, Denise and I drove home and hit the sack early. I killed off about two chapters of the book I'm reading and the next thing I knew it was 6:30 and the alarm was goin' off.

That's my life these days. I guess I'm workin' hard to make it better, so that when I'm as broke down as some folks I can sit back and relax on a cool porch. It's somethin' to shoot for. Cheers!

Friday afternoon, and I'm back in the library in San Saba.

Nope, there won't be any Friday dinner with Mom this week. In stead, I'm sitting in my regular seat at computer number two (one of seven here at the library, but one of only two that has Firefox downloaded to it), toiling away at the usual shit. I've got posts to set up so you folks will have somethin' to do while I'm away next week. More on that later.

Oh, everything is cool here. My three jobs have steadily wound down to one. I'm really looking forward to the next four weeks of working only here in Saba (well, one week of fishing and three of teaching), followed by another five weeks of total freedom... meaning five weeks of payed vacation from everyone. Oh, it's gonna cost me. My salary will go down to about half or two thirds of what it normally is, but it'll be worth it to have the freedom and relaxation.

My Ft. Hood classes ended the Thursday before last, and the classes in Florence fizzled out this week. I had to go down there yesterday to finalize the grades and sign some paperwork, but other than that it's over. The Principal asked me a while back if I was gonna be coming back in the Fall. I told him I was torn. The money's OK, and It's steady, easy work, but if I stopped comin' I get to sleep in every day until about 10:30 and have Fridays off. Three-day weekends would be nice to have. But I told him I'd be back. I can't turn down the money just yet. Soon though, and it'll be really nice when it does happen.

To tell the truth though, I think I'd miss it if I stopped teachin' these classes. I've gotten used to it all... bein' back in high school again. I went in last Tuesday to finish grading things and take roll. It was the last time I'd see most of those kids. They've been in my classes for two years now, but I've been teaching down there as long as they've been in High School. Four years. You remember how long those four years were when you were in school? I though they'd never end. but these have flown by.

A few of the Seniors asked me if I'd be going to their graduation, which takes place today. They really sounded disappointed when I told them I couldn't. I usually do attend, and I've always enjoyed it. I went to the last few, when some of their older brothers or sisters graduated. But I've got plans for next week, taking three days off from the jail to go fishing in Canada with my cousin and a few other guys. So I've had to come out here to San Saba to make up for a class I'll be missing next Wednesday.

I guess I'm surprised how much it upsets me not to be able to go to that Graduation today. It's always an emotional time. I'll never forget the first time I went to a CTC graduation on Ft. Hood. Lots of my former students were getting their Associates Degrees. It was fun to recognize people from my classes and see them in their caps and gowns. It was even nicer when a few of them came up to me after and thanked me. It made me feel like what I do really is important. You forget that, getting used to the routine of it all. It's nice to remember it from time to time.

One of the kids in Florence asked me something as the class ended Tuesday. Something about life. She was jokin' around, making light of the fact that we wouldn't see one another again. I told her to live as full a life as she could, "but don't be stupid about it." We both laughed, but I repeated the words again as she was trailing off down the hall.

I figured out a while back that the best thing about teaching high school kids is the chance it gives me to try to pass on what little wisdom i think I've managed to cobble together in 48 years. I pick my moments carefully, finding part of a lecture where I can pontificate a bit. Ether that or I just jump in when I find them talking about a relevant topic.

A while back, a few of the bright ones were talking about their English teacher. She'd given them some Robert Frost to read. You know... The road less traveled, etc., etc.. One of the kids asked me what it was all about, and that was all it took. I told him that Frost was saying that sometimes it's better to take a path in life that takes you in a different direction. It takes courage to go a different way than everyone else. It takes you away from the crowd, and maybe in a getter direction. Of course, sometimes you'll find that path is less traveled for a good reason, but you will have gained a level of wisdom from the traveling. i told them that life was meant to be lived! That they shouldn't settle for just existing.

I told him I thought there was a better poem that said the same thing in a better way, clicked on YouTube and showed them this. It's Bono reciting a poem by Charles Bukowski called "Roll The Dice". You've seen it here before.



That poem always tares me up. I've been such an idiot in my life, wasting most of the last thirty years just existing. I guess, when it comes to being a teacher, I feel like I personify the old joke about "Those who can't do...".

For whatever reason, whether it was my upbringing or my own internal wiring, or maybe a combination of the two, I never had the guts to roll those dice. I've never felt the freedom or the confidence in my own decision making to take that other path that Frost wrote about. Hell, I never even took the well worn path, being to afraid for tripping and looking foolish to all the other walkers. I just sat in my room watching television, were it was safe. I've spent my whole life sitting back and watching others turn down that path, watching as they had a great adventure and envying them, but I never had the courage to go there myself.

Oh, I've had my fun. I've been around the world and seen lots of cool things. But even then, when I saw people going out to live it up, I always stayed behind. So, seeing these kids off into the world, there's a HUGE part of me that wishes I could trade places with them. I'm so envious, seeing the freedom in them. They're so much less tied down than I was. They're like so many of the kids I went to school with, most of whom went on from high school to live full lives.

I started living, really living, just a while ago. I guess I got to the point (with the help of a great set of friends) where the desire to live overpowered the fear of dying. So now, looking back, I see all the things that came my way over the last three decades... all the stuff I passed up, and I let it get to me.

Mostly, I realize that I'm still that scared kid. I still really don't have the courage to take that mysterious path. Don't get me wrong. I'm NOT the scared kid I used to be. But deep down inside, I still prefer the known to the unknown. I still don't trust myself when it comes to knowing the right things to do. The confidence just isn't there.

Oh, when I'm in class, like I will be in just a while, sitting in front of a room full of convicts, I own that fuckin' room. It's mine. I know my stuff and I run things. So I know that I can be confident. I guess I just never developed that level of confidence when it comes to other things. Maybe it's because, at 48, I'm only still just a beginner at life while I've had 18 years to learn how to own that classroom. Yea, that's the ticket. maybe, if I live another twenty years, I'll get to the point where I feel as confident in my personal life as I do in a classroom. Lets hope so. I've got a lot of catching up to do.

Like I said, I'm going fishing next week. Denise and I will go to a gun show Saturday in Belton and then spend the rest of the weekend doing yard work. I'll teach class here in San Saba Monday, but then Tuesday I'll fly out of Austin, headed for Syracuse New York. My cousin Bob and a few other guys will drive by there from Williamsport Pennsylvania Wednesday morning and we'll all head up to Gananoque, Ontario Canada for four days of rest and relaxation (go here for pictures from past trips). I'll fly back to Austin with a camera load of shots on Sunday, and then the grind, though seriously reduced, will begin again the next day when I head back here to San Saba to pick up where I left off.

So, let's all give a toast to the graduating Seniors down in Florence (or wherever) as they step off into the world, and maybe toss another back for those of us who are still stumbling along, tryin' to find our way on this journey. Lets wish them all the best, and that they find the courage to live life to it's fullest, but that they manage not to be too stupid about it. Cheers!