Prairie View

Friday, March 05, 2010

Doldrums and Diversions

I can hardly believe I had the nerve to do this. When our Sunday School teacher asked me if I would take her place teaching the class for this week, I said no. I actually wanted to say yes. I like to teach, and I like to please people. But I still said no.

I knew it was the week for figuring report card grades, and I knew I would be gone every night of the week from Wed. on, if we went to that "relationships" seminar Nevin and Joann are conducting.

I didn't tell her this, but I also have an odious writing task to finish before Sunday. I am legally required to respond to what I consider a very unreasonable accusation. No, I am not at risk of being carted off to jail or even fined. But I hate being in this position. Let's just say my attitude toward a certain state attorney general needs some adjustment to make it into the neutral or positive range.

On other counts, it's been a strange week at school. One morning several days ago, someone from our natural gas provider came to school and told us the gas would be turned off immediately because a line somewhere had blown, and everything needed to be turned off for several days while repairs were being made. Fifty customers were affected. However, after some initial isolation of the break was accomplished, tanker trucks would be brought in to feed gas into the line at a distribution point close by. After the transition to the gas from the trucks, someone would come back to turn the gas on and light our pilots, etc. So we had no heat for the main part of the school day. The tankers were still there south of Elreka when I went to school this morning.

In another surprising turn of events, we realized at lunch today that there was a glitch in the plans when no one showed up to provide lunch at the usual time. We made a phone call, and reached the husband of the lady whose name was on the lunch schedule for the day. The wife was gone. He swung into action, and about a half hour later showed up with pizza, chips, and pop. Someone else found some ice cream somewhere, and we had ourselves a good lunch. After it was all over, he presumably went home and told his wife (who had by then returned from her walk) that he had just taken care of the hot lunch for the high school today. Kudos to him.

I told my family about this at the supper table, and finished by saying, "But I still hold the record. I've forgotten hot lunch twice. No one else has done this more than once." Dubious distinction, I know.

Choir was the first thing on the schedule at school today. After that we had chapel, which is usually the very first event of the day. This change was an accommodation for Lyle, the music teacher, who wanted to leave on a trip later today.

For most of this week we've had fairly warm, sunny weather, and spring seems like a possibility. True, the gusty wind today reminded us of one thing not to like so much about March. Every time the outside kitchen door opened, the inside door into the learning center slammed shut with a rude crash. Trips to my van to retrieve planting supplies my students wanted to buy were always very immodest affairs, thankfully carried out without an audience.

Also on the bright side, the seeds my food production class students planted, and the resulting seedlings they transplanted this week have thrived, and the whole experience is enormously rewarding. They're learning by leaps and bounds, their knowledge growing as fast as the plants.

No one missed school this week because of illness. That is a great improvement on last week's attendance record.

The sinks in the lab at school have functional drains again, after some very durable obstruction was dislodged by a plumber. I had cautiously mentioned at the last staff meeting that having access to that water supply and those drains would be very nice for the seedstarting we would be doing in that room. But I was surprised when things began to be set right the very next week. I learned though that the impetus for the repair was that when the new furnace was installed recently, the resulting moisture condensation needed to be routed into a drain line. Fortunately the same line that drained the lab sinks was the line they chose to route the furnace moisture into. But first it needed to be unplugged. So someone made it happen, and, ever since, we've been happily running water at the sinks and dumping water into the drains when necessary.

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Shane and Dorcas are considering several short term international ministry opportunities for the coming months. Being in VS through June makes it look a little difficult to make enough money to pay their own way, so they're trying to decide whether saying yes is feasible or not.

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On Wednesday of next week, Joel and Hilda leave for several months in Bangladesh. They plan to return on May 1.

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We're inordinately proud of our guineas at the moment. Today Lowell's flock of goats got out and went cruising through the yard south of the house, taking refuge out of the wind west of the house. When Hiromi went out the back door to check on their whereabouts, they all streamed past the house again on their way to the road. Until they met up with the guineas, who had lined themselves up across the driveway, giving full voice to their displeasure at this disruption of the normal state of things. The goats came to a halt and then turned around and walked back into their pen. Fancy that.

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I hope to plant peas tomorrow. That is, if the odious letter or overnight rain don't prevent it.

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Grant starts landscaping work again next week. He's happy for the opportunity.

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Marian, the miracle worker, is helping me with such jobs as organizing my dresser drawers and cleaning out my closet, etc. I'm so grateful for her help.

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One of the things Marian unearthed was a suit Hiromi wore at least 40 years ago. He took it out tonight and wondered aloud what he would ever do with it. He tried it on, almost having to abandon the effort when the second arm wouldn't go into the sleeve without some twisting around. After it was on, he couldn't connect the two sides of the front. "This coat must have had some really heavy dry cleaning," he announced, in a vain attempt to convince me that the suit had shrunk. "I've really got lots more meat than I used to have. "

"Yeah. Especially in your stomach," I agreed.

"Save it for the grandchildren," he muttered unconvincingly as he stuffed it back into its zippered plastic case. Then, upon further investigation, "Oh look at these pants. They're all bug eaten." He sounded almost jubilant.

"I'm sorry," I said, examining the holes in the seat of the pants.

"I don't think I'm sorry. Now we can throw them away."

"Are they wool?"

"Sure."

"Then they'll make good rug rags. Don't pitch them yet."

So that's the plan: turning them into rugs.

1 Comments:

  • If you need a solution for the attorney general....

    I've been memorizing the Lord's Prayer in a new language recently. When people have annoyed me recently (wild drivers, unhelpful shopkeepers), I've prayed (quietly) on the spot "Lord, in the way that I'm forgiving [that driver, this shopkeeper], please forgive me." It diffuses frustration in many situations!

    Even if it feels like I should speak up about something, I tend to do so in a much more gracious manner. :-)

    By Anonymous Favoring Curry, at 3/06/2010  

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