The Art of Being Obstinate

I wasn’t much of an artist back in grade school. I didn’t make any real attempt at that until I was a little older. I liked to doodle and make designs or other marks on the paper but as far as drawing something, anything, that anyone could view as art, that wasn’t happening. I didn’t have time for such things.

But that didn’t stop my teachers from insisting that I needed to at least TRY to draw. Of course, I resisted.

One day, the assignment was to draw a house—simple enough. But always ready and willing to be cantankerous, I decided to make things easy on myself and I drew a teepee. My drawing consisted of about five lines; that was it. I was fully prepared to argue that a teepee was indeed a house. She hadn’t specified what kind of house, after all. Still, I knew she wouldn’t be amused.

Thing is, about half of the students at the school I attended were Indians. And as I discovered, it wasn’t too difficult to convince a few of my classmates to join me in my stubborn sidestep of the assignment. They actually thought it was a great idea. Me, I just figured if I wasn’t alone, the teacher might not be so hard on me.

My theory must have worked because she didn’t really say anything; just gave me, and the rest of my brave cohorts, a disapproving look.

But, toward the end of the school year, after a few more such antics by me, she finally voiced her discontentment. Surprisingly, she wasn’t really upset by my behavior. Rather, she was concerned because I never took things seriously enough. She said a few other things too, most of which I didn’t hear because, well, I wasn’t listening. But one thing I did hear was that I would probably never be an artist. But that was okay, she said, not everyone can be an artist.

A couple of years later, once I’d gotten serious about giving my creative side a chance, I drew the picture below. I’d like to think it was perhaps partly inspired by my teacher. And although, I’m not into naming my artwork, if I were, I think I’d call this piece, A Tribute To The Teacher Who Said I’d Never Be An Artist! ~

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books, including: Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey, Miscarriage Of Justice, The Lana Denae Mysteries, and The Wynn Garrett Series. Available in ebook at www.amazon.com/Bruce-A.-Borders/e/B006SOLWQS and paperback on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Books-a-Million. Bruce A. Borders is a proud member of Rave Reviews Book Club.

Falling Star

They say things you’re taught in school, even grade school, will stay with you for life. That could be good or bad, depending on what you were taught. For me, I guess it was both.

Saw a falling star tonight, or a shooting star, if you prefer. That’s not really too unusual. I drive in the desert, at night, so it’s more out of the ordinary when I do not see a falling star. What made this sighting noteworthy is, it didn’t fizzle out in mid-air like many of them do. I watched it all the way to the horizon and then saw a sudden glow like there was an explosion on impact with the ground. Probably just a little fire and not an actual explosion but from my vantage point it looked massive.

The incident reminded me of a teacher from school who told us falling stars, or any other objects falling from space, NEVER make it to the Earth. The objects burn up in the atmosphere, she said. And those craters we see, they’re a naturally occurring phenomenon.

I may have only been in grade school, but I had several problems with her theory. A theory that she stated as fact. First, that a teacher, supposedly a “science” teacher didn’t know that a falling star is actually a meteor was a little odd. Equally perplexing was that she didn’t know a meteor becomes known as a meteorite when it impacts the Earth. That should be a clue that some things falling from space DO make it to the ground. And as for the craters, yes they are naturally occurring—because it’s quite natural for a crater to form when a meteor strikes the ground!

Sometimes, a guy should just stay quiet. I know this; I just never could seem to do it. I’ve always felt compelled to point it out when someone is “teaching” something that obviously they know little about. So, of course, I spoke up. I figured if a grade school kid knew about meteors and meteorites, the teacher probably should. I considered it my duty to enlighten her!

As I’m sure you have guessed, it didn’t go well. My help was not exactly appreciated. At the time, I wasn’t quite so cynical or stubborn as I am these days, so I didn’t argue the point any further.

Looking back now, I suppose the saying is true; things you’re taught in school do last a lifetime. All these years later, I think of this teacher nearly every time I see a falling star. But as it turns out, our little disagreement was not a complete waste of time. This and other like conflicts, made me learn to question what I was being taught and not just blindly accept everything—a practice I followed for the rest of my schooling and even to this day. I guess you could say when my teacher crashed and burned with her divergent theory, it had a lasting impact on me.

___________________

RAVE REVIEWS BOOK CLUB

Current Reads

Beem Weeks

Jazz Baby

Rhani D’Chae

Shadow Of The Drill

Suzy Turner

Forever Fredless

SPOTLIGHT Author

Traci Sanders

When Darkness Breaks

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books, including: Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey, Miscarriage Of Justice, and The Wynn Garrett Series. Available in ebook and paperback on iTunes, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Diesel Books, and Smashwords, or at www.bruceabordersbooks.weebly.com. Amazon Profile - http://www.amazon.com/Bruce-A.-Borders/e/B006SOLWQS Bruce A. Borders also serves as the Vice President of Rave Reviews Book Club http://ravereviewsbynonniejules.wordpress.com

That Depends

Let me say upfront that I’m glad I wasn’t my teacher in school. (Impossible, I know. Still, I’m glad). School for me was rather monotonous so, I always tried to make it more interesting. For some reason, my humor and extra effort weren’t always appreciated.

There are many instances that I could use to illustrate my point; the following is one of my favorites.

Grade school. A Science test. The state of matter. One section of the test listed ten or twelve substances, things like; gasoline, plastic, granite, helium, milk, etc. In the blank beside each one, I was supposed to write either liquid, solid, or gas. That seemed far too mundane to me, so instead I printed in very neat letters, “Depends on the temperature.” Imagine my “surprise” when the test was returned with every one of them marked wrong!

If this had been a few years later, I would have gotten away with it. My high school teacher had a sense of humor - or appreciated mine. Unfortunately, my fourth grade teacher did not. As far as he was concerned, my answers were incorrect.

Of course, I argued. After all, the test hadn’t specified what temperature I was supposed to use. If cold enough everything can be a solid - even if you have to go all the way to absolute zero (the theoretical temperature at which no heat is present in any particle, approximately –460°F in case anyone is wondering). And obviously, thanks to Newton’s Third Law of Thermodynamics, the equal and opposite must be true; if hot enough, everything can be a gas.

After several more minutes of discussion, which involved the whole class, the teacher gave up. Although he would not concede that I was right, he agreed to not mark my answers wrong. Same thing to me. However, he did go on and on about how in the future I should recognize when something is implied and form my answers accordingly.

Yeah, sure. I never did seem to learn that. To this day, when someone asks how long it takes to drive from one town to another - a question I get a lot, being a truck driver - I say, “Depends on how fast you drive.”

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books. Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey, Miscarriage Of Justice, and other titles, are available as ebooks on Apple I-Pad®, Amazon Kindle®, Barnes & Noble Nook® and Sony Reader®, Kobo, Diesel Books, and Smashwords. His books are also available in paperback at most online retailers or at www.bruceabordersbooks.weebly.com. The popular Wynn Garrett Series Books are now available on Barnes And Noble® at http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/?series_id=867526 See Bruce’s Smashwords Profile at www.smashwords.com/profile/view/BruceABorders?ref=BruceABorders  #BruceABorders

Follow The Money

Back in grade school, we watched a film on the journey of a dollar. A camera crew followed a dollar around as it made its way through a little town from one business to the next, from one person to another. Starting with a boy spending the dollar for a toy, people paid bills, or got paid, deposited money in the bank, withdrew money, and bought things at the store. At the end of the movie, the dollar ended up right back with the little boy who had spent it that morning. The same dollar.

The purpose of the film was to teach us about the economy. It did that very well. But I wasn’t concerned with economics - I wanted to try out this idea that I could get the same dollar back later. So, I marked up a few dollar bills and spent them. And then I did some more. And then more.

I patiently waited for my dollar bills to return. And then not so patiently. I started going to the store, purposefully using five and ten dollar bills to get as many ones as I could in change. After a year or so, I decided the film had been faked - and I was never going to get any of my dollars back.

Then we moved to another town and being older, I forgot all about my little project. That is, until I went to the bank one day to cash my paycheck. The teller counted out the money, placing a single dollar on the top of the larger bills. I couldn’t believe what I saw! There on the bill was my name! (That was how I’d marked the bills - by writing my name on them. Apparently, I wanted to make it extremely easy for the government to determine who was defacing the currency).

It had taken more than eight years but my experiment had finally worked! I was pretty excited and hopeful that more of “my” money would show up. Nope. No such luck. And to make matters worse, though I put the dollar away to keep from spending it, I lost it.

Out of the hundred or so bills I marked, that’s the only one I ever got back. So, a little help would be appreciated. If you happen to see any dollars with my name, feel free to send them to me!

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books. Over My Dead Body, The Journey, and Miscarriage Of Justice, and other titles, are available as ebooks on Apple I-Pad®, Amazon Kindle®, Barnes & Noble Nook® and Sony Reader®, Kobo, Diesel Books, and Smashwords. His books are also available in print at most online retailers or at www.bruceabordersbooks.weebly.com. The popular Wynn Garrett Series Books are now available on Barnes And Noble® at http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/?series_id=867526 See Bruce’s Smashwords Profile at www.smashwords.com/profile/view/BruceABorders #MiscarriageOfJustice #BruceABorders

Strangely Normal

People sometimes think I’m a little strange and – well, I’ll neither confirm nor deny it. But, if I am, I think I have a pretty good idea why. My teachers. Not all of them, but enough. It’s a wonder I’m sane at all considering the odd behavior of some of them.

I’ll describe a few – without names of course. See? I can a be nice guy.

Grade school. One of my teachers was a particularly grouchy lady, who made a habit of not paying attention to much of anything. She continually gave us erroneous facts and information and “corrected” our supposed mistakes. Then, she’d get really cranky when anyone (me) pointed it out. A quick example: I had to write a report on a family summer activity, and I chose our vacation to Missouri. In my report, I mentioned several towns we’d visited, including Flat River and Zalma. When my graded report was returned, both of those towns were circled in red with a note that said Zalma was spelled with an ‘e’ on the end and it was the Platte River, not Flat River. However, had she actually read the report, she would have noticed that Flat River was indeed a town and not a river. As for the spelling of Zalma, a quick check of a map would have told her it was correct. (My parents helped set her straight). This scenario was repeated throughout the year, with me, as well as other students.

Then, there was the teacher who had severe anger issues. The slightest little thing would set him off. His face would turn beet-red, he’d yell and cuss at us, and throw things. A couple of years after I was in his class, he finally lost it and threw a javelin through a kid’s neck. For some reason, they didn’t let him teach after that.

Another of my teachers used to spend more time in the Kindergarten class and the teacher’s lounge than in his own classroom. It seems he was rather fond of the Kindergarten teacher and his wife wouldn’t let him bring her home. To be fair, that only lasted a couple of years – until the divorce.

While these may seem a bit odd, they weren’t the worst. That distinction belongs to another grade school teacher, a woman we called Mrs. Wacky Wafer. Now, before you start thinking we were being disrespectful or rude, let me just say we had a good reason for giving her that name. The very old lady, who should have retired long before I reached her class, was – well, eccentric. (That does sound better than saying she was crazy, doesn’t it?) She routinely forgot our names, and her name, assigned us the same homework two or more days in a row, and sometimes even forgot which classroom was ours after recess. One day, shortly after lunch, she announced that she had to go talk with the principal for a few minutes – and never came back!

The great part was it usually was easy to convince her that we hadn’t had recess yet. In fact, it was pretty simple to convince her of just about anything. And those times when she’d re-assign us the previous day’s homework - I just turned in the same paper again! Once, my grade even improved!

After writing this, I’m wondering how I managed to get any education in grade school. And, now that I think about it, I’ve decided that I’m not the least bit strange after all. Just a normal guy. And, in light of some of the teachers I had, that is definitely strange.

Bruce A. Borders, author and songwriter has over 500 songs and more than a dozen books. Over My Dead Body, The Journey, and Miscarriage Of Justice, his latest books, are available on Apple I-Pad®, Amazon Kindle®, Barnes & Noble Nook® and Sony Reader®, Kobo, Diesel Books, and Smashwords. For more information, visit www.bruceaborders.com. See Bruce’s Amazon Author Page at www.amazon.com/author/bruceaborders or view his Smashwords Profile at www.smashwords.com/profile/view/BruceABorders