Don't Sweat the Small Stuff

The mid-term election looms over us and I felt compelled to write about something politicians must know a lot about, stress. Can you imagine the stress involved in spending millions of dollars on getting elected to “higher” office only to find you are not worthy or wanted? To put your soul, mind and body into the effort, expose family, friends and pets to today’s scrutiny only to be rejected by the voters who, by now, are very familiar with everything from your last colonoscopy to your favorite Dancing with the Stars contestant. By the time you read this many will be feeling the pain of rejection, some rightfully so; others will feel the stress of taking on a new job and for the first termers, one for which there may be no means of preparation.

 

But stress seems to be different things to different people. Stress to a politician these days would have to be wondering when and where he’ll be when someone digs up enough dirt to make sure he doesn’t win again. And speaking of digging, stress to a dog would have to be a flea, small, insignificant but the dog never knows when one will bite and so you see that worried look on the poor pooch’s face when he’s got a flea (female dogs probably don’t have fleas). Then, when the bite does come, the dog goes nuts and begins biting itself to find and kill the rascal that bit him. I’ve noticed that my boy Hercules will sit with that worried look on his face if he has just the one flea but if he’s got a bunch of fleas, he just gives up and sleeps in a state of depression. It seems that when we have a lot of stressors in our lives we do tend to “give up” and just let things happen. I suppose Ol’ Herky feels like he might have a shot at the one flea but when he’s got ten, who cares! I would buy him one of those stress balls but he’d just stress out trying to figure out how to hold the thing.

 

Folks with a lot of kids don’t seem to stress out as much if one “goes astray” so to speak, whereas my wife and I spend days worrying about our one daughter, who keeps telling us she’s perfect. I can’t refer to her as a stressor so I just call her “small stuff”, as in “don’t sweat the small stuff”. “Small stuff” got to me the other day so I tried listening to music. Found one of Beethoven’s sonatas, No. 6 it was, and of course found myself thinking of the out of doors, the farm, cows and such. That brought to mind the time I was visiting my Uncle Melvin in Sevierville, Tennessee, walking the land as it were and stepped in a cow paddy, then tracked the stuff into his house. I turned off Beethoven, put on some country music and poured myself a strong one.

 

Stress is most times where you find it and it can be found anywhere. I still think of sitting on my brother-in-law’s porch in the N.C. mountains, enjoying a Danish and watching the squirrels wreck havoc on his bird feeder until the quiet was interrupted by the sound of his twenty-two echoing through the woods as he blasted away at his stressors. I guess those squirrels were his “small stuff” but the boom of that 22 was large stuff to me as I choked on breakfast. Still, finding out what the “small stuff” is in your life is not easy and without knowledge of that you might as well be pouring Drano down a manhole. I’m looking forward to Tuesday night when we see the results of months of work and some new faces on the political horizon. Let’s all hope they don’t continue pouring our tax dollars down the D.C. manhole that ain’t no “small stuff”.

The Popcorn Tree

It was a clear fall morning and dad and I were sitting on the porch enjoying the sun in his and mom’s rocking chairs. We had the football games to look forward to and other than that, nothing going on. I had no idea what happened next would mean so much over the next few years. She was walking past the front porch hauling a basket full of small plants in a carrier. She looked to be about dad’s age, stooped from osteoporosis and breathing hard when dad hollered from the porch, “hey, whatcha got there?” “Oh, nothing much, just a few popcorn trees” she replied. “Well, lemme take a look, we been needin some trees on this lot.” And with that he gingerly got up and walked to the street. Dad was known for saying the first thing that came into his head, like it or not and so out came, “Shoot, that ain’t nothing but a weed.” “Nope, it’s a popcorn tree” she said. Put one in the ground and see what happens.” Dad was also known for his frugality so his next question came easy. “How much?” When he heard, “No charge” he was sold and took one of the small “weeds” back to the porch. He and mom planted it later that day. Dad could be a stubborn kind of fellow and for the next ten years or so he called these plants, there were now four, everything from roots to vines but never trees. They stand about thirty feet tall now and I never heard him call them a tree but each year, about this time, the yard is full of beautiful shade, and these little white balls that cover the ground to remind mom of the love of her life, dad. He left us about this time last year.

 

Several years ago I brought one of the roots of those trees back and planted it in my front yard. It’s about twenty feet now and as it continues to grow, it reminds me that things are not always as they appear, nor are we. It stands as a reminder that we can all look like weeds at some point but when placed in the right soil, grow and flourish. Dad took a chance that day, took that elderly, stooped over woman at her word, “it’s a popcorn tree” and he planted. He watered, watched and nourished that “weed” out of curiosity really, just to see what would happen. One thing he didn’t do was give up. Now the fact that he never really called them trees is moot. Like it or not, the man spent many an afternoon in the shade of something growing from the ground. I know we sometimes look at our children and think, “Lord have mercy, will this thing ever become a tree?” But one has to remember, some plants need more than others, more food, sun, water. That first popcorn tree would have died in the ground had dad not provided for its needs. Our children are no different and there is no statute of limitations on love. When I read about the tragedies involving the children of Macon and other areas, I think about the popcorn tree. Someone saw a weed too soon and simply gave up or were afraid to give it the water and food it may have needed to survive. Another way of thinking about it is our children may or may not provide us with “shade” as we get older. Some may leave us in the desert of despair and rightfully so, for we failed to help them become the shade trees of our future.

American Education

I was relieved to hear both Nathan Deal and Roy Barnes tell PAGE how important public education is to the state of Georgia, but they were, as they say, all over the page on how to fix the thing. Mr. Deal comes from a background loaded with educators (wife, parents) and sympathizes with the teachers’ as they take work home to be done for the next day, referring to them as “unseen servants”. Mr. Barnes credits his father with taking him to UGA, in a pickup truck and dropping him off to begin college. Great stories from two guys who place a lot of importance on education and there were some really good ideas expressed by both. Whether to make better use of resources (Deal) or stress professional development and stipends for those teaching math, science, foreign language and special education (Barnes). Deal stressed the idea of taking the micromanagement aspect out of the classroom and restoring the joy of teaching to those in the profession while Barnes talked about extending the school day fifteen minutes in the morning and fifteen in the evening. They agreed on many points during most of the discussion such as making sure a child can read on grade level by grade three. So how do we get there?  If, as the former governor said, “you turn SATs around by making sure a child is reading on grade level by grade three”, how do educators ensure that will happen?  Years ago in a county near here, there was a young lady who began to hang around the gym to watch the girls’ varsity basketball team practice.                                                                                                      

The coach noticed her for about a week and then asked her if she would like to join the team. She said she would and became the tenth member of the squad, having no experience and in grade eleven. She never missed a practice and became a defensive player because there just wasn’t enough time to learn how to shoot. A day came when the coach noticed her still in the gym quite a while after practice and she said she needed a ride home so off they went. She lived several miles out in the country and it was dark when they drove down a winding dirt road finally arriving at a run-down shack of a house in a clearing. No lights were on, only the faint glow of candles in the window and he watched as she washed her hands in the pump at the end of the dirt driveway. It was then he realized why this child had wanted to play basketball. It was to keep from going home. She went on to graduate and enter college, majoring in psychology. I hope she’s doing well.

You see, education is not about money. It’s more about caring. Most of our teachers began their careers with no thought to what they would make, only that it would be enough. They learned about the intrinsic value of some things in life. They loved a subject and they loved the kids and wanted to put the two together. The truth is teachers today need help. Not the kind that comes from a stipend or incentive pay, although those are worthy offerings. No, the help they need comes from home in the form of parents or guardians, grandparents or stepparents or whoever has major influence over the child. The person who can say, “Yes, it is important to learn how to read, to write, to think, so you can communicate and tell others what it was like to be you.” There has to be collaboration between home and the school or even the most effective teacher is going to have difficulty. When you think about it, what did it cost you to learn how to read? Nothing really…A mother or father, grandmother or maybe just someone who cared enough to see it happen.

Oops!

Dad always said, “son, don’t ever hit anybody in the rear when you’re driving cause it’s gonna be your fault.” He was right of course but I just had to test the theory, having driven for forty-five years and not actually experienced a rear-ender from the giving side. I was a receiver once…some woman in a Cadillac hit the trailer hitch on my old truck but when I pulled over to see what damage had been done to her car…she just waved and kept on truckin. I guess she thought I was going to sue or something but my back felt ok and I couldn’t catch her anyway. When you get hit in the rear it’s always a good idea to be holding your back when you get out of your car…just in case.

The other day, it was a perfect morning; I was sitting in the right lane with cars to my left and an old beat up government car in front of me. I assumed whoever the driver was must be on his way to wherever they take old government cars when they retire. I was wrong. Someone had given me this nice little pen and notepad set and I was looking at it when the cars to the left started moving. So, I pulled my foot off the brake and bumped into the piece of junk sitting in front of me. Remember the old Bill Cosby album about the surgeon who makes a mistake and the patience hears him say, “oops and then asks, did you just say oops?” I went oops.

It was a tap for Pete’s sake! I got out, walked up to the beat up ol’ government vehicle and this guy in the driver’s seat rolls down his window and, I’m not making this up folks, says, “what happened?” “I think I bumped you”, I said. He says, “Oh” but I am reading his mind and what I read is, you mean like, from the rear! As in, payday! I asked if he was ok and he says yes and we pulled over to a parking lot to check the vehicles. My truck has not a scratch. It was a tap, for Pete’s sake!

The beat up ol’ government vehicle has so many cuts and bruises he can’t figure out which one I may have put there but, by golly there’s got to be one somewhere cause, I’m feeling mighty lucky this morning and this pain in my back came from your truck. So I stand there as he makes a thorough inspection of this hunk of junkyard refuse walking all around to make sure me “plowing” into him didn’t cause any frame damage or whatever.

I notice a slight limp developing about the time he hits the passenger side door but I go through the motions and say, “well, looks like we’re ok here, sorry this happened, have a nice day, let me get the heck out of here before you need CPR and an ambulance. “Uh, I think we need to call the police”. Christmas has arrived!” “My ship has come in!” “Time for that little Bermuda cruise, after I have my back looked at of course.” Now we’ve got the local police involved and because this was a government vehicle that looked like a piece of Swiss cheese, he wants to call the GSP! Mr. GSP makes another thorough inspection of the car from hell, asks if we’re ok then says, “well, looks like we’re done here I’ve got a serious call to get to across town.” Whew! Glad that’s over, could have been worse, the driver of the future parts on wheels could have been seriously injured, I thought. The next week I get a call from, you guessed it, my insurance company. “Oops”. Seems Dad was right all along, “son, don’t ever hit anyone in the rear unless you’re willing to pay for a cruise to Bermuda.”