You have such a lovely family.
Because of my many connections to teachers, I'm always delighted to see class mates who went into the field, and especially in elementary education where it is so critical to grab the children's attention and imbue them with a love of learning and a wonder of reading. I can't thin k off the top of my head who our 2nd grade teacher was ... I can't remember the 1st grade teacher, but I do remember the time (Mrs Solon) had us color a Christmas stocking from a mimeographed template and our black male classmate liked his so much, he cut it out off the page with scissors. Mrs Solon held him up to be derided for not following orders, and I think took his stocking away. I went home, and the first thing I did was to cut out the Christmast stocking. Perhaps, for an elementary school teacher, it is not necessary to inspire, but merely to keep from dousing the flames of curiousity and learning.
I still think kindergarten was best - I loved the nap period. Any reason why schooll starts (for teen agers) betwee 7:30 and 8:00 most places, when this is precisely the time our teen-aged hormone raged children ought to be sleeping? Wouldn't an 11 a.m. starting time make more sense?
And, why do we give kids the summers off and only go to school 180 days a year (more or less)? so the kids can plough the fields and work the farm in the summer time? Seems like a trimester schedule, like most colleges, makes more sense - fall-winter, winter-spring, spring-summer with 10 'normal' holidays plus two weeks between terms .. let's see, would be 210 days a year.
And why make public education compulsory to age 18? One of the reason so many kids drop out is because they are bored with their schooling; it is not relevant for what they want to do (and there really ought to be a vocational track for 8th grade - 10th) and a more traditional liberal arts track; this world needs road builders and it needs grade school teachers.
You can rightfully be SO proud of your children - both so highly educated and both USING their education and applying it to their lifes work. That's such an excellent matching of talents and ambitions with career - I am sure they are both quite well-adjusted and happy!
My own career train got derailed way early on because I didn't have my brother's desire, ambition, or courage to face the unknown ... John withdrew from U. of I. after his freshman year and eventually went on to New york City without a job offer in to his name, and became a Broadway Theatre actor, appearing in all 743 performances of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.
My youngest sister Marianne did what she always wanted to do - went to a trade school (and she was a brilliant academic student - but she loves so much working with wood - comes from her Grandfather Dale Hockett, who was a whittler). At the trade school, they learned how to make and repair violins. After they make the first violin, the teacher looks at it, gives it a blessing, and then smashes (quite abruptly, and unexpectedly), returns it to the pupil with the simple instruction "Now, fix it."
My sister Gay was always the poet, and she continues to write poetry, did a masterful job of raising their only son, Scott David Offutt, who never had a job until this past September (when he turned 24) and took a graduate teaching assistant assignment at Washington State University in Pullman, WA, just 8 miles away from the Idaho border (very secluded - there are few of the "big city" temptations there for him - but he is a most serious scholar! He will be heading a Blake seminar (the English mystic poet) in Trenton NJ later in May.
My own son, Adam James Ganzer was labeled ADD (what a crock) - innatentive subtype - which means - he wasn't a problem, but they could feed him ritalin anyway! and lasted about 30 days his freshman year, plus 10 days less than a semester his junior year (sophomore he went to a one-on-one school in town - to which my former Assistant Principal, who left the Asst P business so he could teach high school English again also sent his son; at that 1-on-1 school, Randy Nolde, the Russian teacher, refused to believe that Adam James Ganzer was Mark Ganzer's son (knowing that I was not the marrying kind) and John Ganzer's nephew. Well, eventually Randy came around .. rofl.
Adam approaced me, just before his jr year mid-term finals to say, "Markus, I have decided to withdraw from high school. I have more in common with my teachers than my classmates, and I am going to enroll in Harper to study for the GSE's." Which he did do, and he passed them all, 1st time around, even got 99% in SCIENCE (one of my two worst fields of study, although a distant 2nd to PHILOSOPHY). Adam is now a fully licensed and certified phlebotomist, a 1st degree black belt in tae kwon do, a youth leader / catechism teacher, and praise band drummer for both his own church, Holy Family of Inverness and my parents chruch - Lutheran Church of the Atonement. At Holy family, he has made over $100,000 the past 10 years as their paid drummer!! Which is more money than I have made over the last 10 years.
Which is about to change, since I am now in the process of beginning my REAL work on earth, to play the piano and sing for people - playing 50's, 60's, 70's and hymnal music. Will be doing a criss-cross country fund raising tour to raise money for 1st responders and inner city public school teachers (hell, why inner city only - I must show more imagination than that!!) and am presently involved in starting a Sunday afternoon concert series here at the local GINORMOUS golf course with a banquet room which seats up to 600. The idea is to have a church outreach for the 18-30 crowd by having 4 bands performing songs of worship and praise (not necessarily contemporary Christian or hymnal - e.g. It Ain't necessarily So - But who call dat livin' when no woman will give in to no man what's 900 years?"''
We;ll hold the concert from 1 pm until 5 pm - each group gets an hour, charge a nominal $5 adults, $3 children 12 & under, which entitles you to all the coffee / tea / soft drinks / lemonade you can drink. The funds will be raised, for the various sponsoring churches, via the sales of DVDs because we will have a couple of videographers focusing on filming the crowd, while recording the music in the back ground. I am very excited about this project which will kick off in June.
Be well my dear and beloved friend. Know that God is forever watching over us, and guiding us, his sheep to be.
I'm also going through some interesting times on the spiritual front - I converted to Islam in January, 2007, but rarely go to the mosque - transportation issues, I lost my driver's license in 1986 and found I did not miss it and thus, if I can't bike, walk, run, crawl, get a buddy to drive me, or take public transporation to somewhere, I simply won't go.
But I love the Koran (indeed, Holy, inspired Words From God). I also attend two church services each Sunday here in Barrington - At St. Anne Roman Catholic Church (7:15 a.m. - I am always up then, so why not go to church - besides, the head preist, Father Bishop, who one day I believe will be Arch-bishop Bishop .. rofl, is a confirmed chain smoker, as I still am. And I was going to St Paul's U.C.C. - (they are like Lutherans without the hemorhoids, and, yes, you may quote me) where Pastor Jana gives the best sermons preached anywhere.
The church in which I was confirmed has banished me from their doors, which is quite strange, because as recently as January of this year, I recorded 5 CD's plus a DVD there! Something about me always being up and about during worship (found out I had not only an upper respiratory infection but also a calf, ankle, foot infection which caused me constant whooping cough mucus spewing fits; and me singing too high and too loud while the praise band sung (thought I was making aoyful noise unto the Lord, silly me) and also my brother-in-law and son (sigh, sadly, yes, I only see him thrice a year, about 3 hours each time - his b-day, x-mas, my folks' anniversary; he is "concerned" about me (I was labeled bi-polar and have ceased taking my meds, in the process having become a WHOLE lot more energetic and creative) and poor Adam does not know what to do about me. So, he ignores me (ostrich syndrome).
HAPPILY, I am going to adopt a 19-year old kid from Michigan, Bradly Arnold, who NEEDS my help as he settles down to work here (away from Detroit) with his 4-year old daughter (hot damn! I get a grand daughter) and probably live with his soul mate - whom he met with me, only because I decided to take a short cut which cost us our last $10 PLUS added 6 hours to our trip - but, had I not, they would not have met!! ... the Hand of God Guiding again - and she has two daughters, SO, I will get my 3 grand-daughters AFTER ALL (my own son has so many good things going on - and not one of his many friends, good friends, who are girls, have asked him to marry them yet (although Amy Swail from Atonement is perfect for him, and I don't know how much more aggressive you can ask a girl to be than to constantly post to his Facebook saying, "we should get together when I'm home from school break"!
Bradley Sarah, and I (maybe Sarah's friend Rebecca) are going to eventually (September) move to Sullivan, IL, where there is some big company that manufactures hydrolic lifts that is always seeking employment (this we know from a young man living there whom we met at the train station, and who gave Bradley $40 to help him get transportation back to see his grandmother, whom they pulled the life support cord yesterday) and where I, and my dream lady friend Marla Hegel (I'd love to have a serious forever, married relationship with her - but she is homeless now and this complicates things - especially the part about me NOT having her cell phone # ... jeez, call lme a DITZ!!!!) can perhaps teach at Eastern, or do any other number of creative, community supporting endeavors in a part of the world I both love, know, and understand.
SEE ... it only took me THIRTY EIGHT years after graduating college to get down and do the only thing I ever wanted ... as my mom once asked, when I was 20 or so, and she had called me at WIU, and I was drunk and do not remember: "Mark, what do you want to do with your life?"
I want to perform.
Ironically, my brother John went to a famous fortune teller who told him this: "The wrong one of you brothers went into the performing arts."
With the extreme benefit of hind-sight, John's back up plan, had he not had such a beautiful voice, was to have been a high school history teacher. Had he but pursued that path, h;e would not have become infected by the AIDs virus; he would not have had a 6-month period of promiscuity, after which 6 out of his 7 "friends" died from the virus - and, ironically, his 6 month promiscuous period overlapped mine - the first 6 months of my marriage - which is pathetic for a monogamous guy, except ... well, I felt trapped in the marriage, and shouldn't have gone thru with it. Live and learn. It is perfectly acceptable to create a baby out of wedlock, love that child, respect its mother, raise that child together and apart, and not have to get married.
LIVE AND LEARN - we are all teachers; we are all students.
With Love to You and All You Love,
Mark Raymond Ganzer
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