After our week in the glass house in the mountains near Ramona (which was magical!) we headed up towards San Francisco through central California. Michael and I use as few highways as possible so that we really get to see the country. Ramona to San Francisco is about a 6 or 7 hour drive but for us that really means 9 or 10 hours because we love to take side trips!
Sometimes we just want to stop and do nothing for a few days or even a week (which really means check the bank account, pay the bills, do laundry and some home cooking, read, paint, computer stuff, watch movies…you know…“normal” living). So we booked a week in Bakersfield, which is an old oil industry town, half way up to SF.
We were there over the Valentine’s day weekend and we visited their surprisingly nice art museum and had dinner in their grand old hotel, The Padre. Otherwise, this town was uneventful…sort of....
The best part about our stops in these uneventful places (and there have been quite a few) is getting to see the ignored, the forgotten, the aged or broken towns in our America. It’s not beautiful everywhere but that doesn’t mean they aren’t worth the time to stop and smell their roses, infused with ‘colors' I have not seen before. It has altered my perspective about where we choose to stop. People and their stories are so interesting no matter where or how they live. Michael and I spend many hours in discussion with and about people and how they choose to live their lives. Conversely, people love hearing our story, too! These are the pieces of our trip that educate us.
Last night, Michael and I stopped for a drink and met up with two fellows whom we wound up talking to for two hours. One of them was in jeans with a plaid flannel shirt and rather large beard, kind of like a duck dynasty guy and we were in a small town in wine country, north of SF. Well, I’m not really interested in talking to duck dynasty guys (although they have their own stories too, like they all live in beverly hills mansions and never had a beard before they became a REALITY star…HA!). But I digress.
It turns out that they are both from a public school system in an eastern rural CA town. The bearded guy is a high school special ed teacher and the other fellow is high school administrator and were in town for staff development. Can I say “don’t judge a book by its cover!”
We had a great conversation about education in America! These two fellows, one about 50 & the other maybe late 30’s, were so enthusiastic about what they need to do to educate their students within the demographics of their community, which is 50% low socio economics and 50% retirees. We talked about core curriculum, home schooling, charter schools, taxes, the elderly, the kids, merit pay, different school boards and so much more.
It’s so interesting the way people open, too. The bearded special ed teacher has four children under 9 and his wife home schools them. She “farms them out”, his words not mine, to other home school groupings for things she isn’t strong in such as the sciences. She home schools them because she is a very devoted Christian and feels the public schools are not for her children. Bearded Special ed teacher (sorry, never got their names) is an agnostic. There’s his problem. He is trying to figure out how to teach his own children the two sides but the wife won’t let him. He told us it causes great problems in their marriage. That’s sad. But that conversation took us to talking about religions throughout the world.
Life, just life, plain and simple or large and complicated, is to be experienced. Had I not taken this long and winding road, I would still be carrying certain stereotypes with me.
When I started teaching, my mother was just a bit older than I am now. She said to me “Oh Patty, I know you’ll hate teaching, you’re not a teacher.” I agreed with her at the time. I needed to work but had children so it blended with my motherly schedule. I grew into teaching and realized how wrong my mother was.
It feels good to teach.
It feels good to learn.
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