When I got out of the Air Force the question was not Where to Go (I'm a native Texan, no question there) but instead What to Do? Susan was already finishing up getting a teaching certificate so I decided I would use the GI Bill money to get one also and we would both be Elementary school teachers. The counselors said that would be great, I could specialize in Grades 4-6 and Susan would be Grades 1-3 and it would make employment easy.
They were right, it was easy. I hadn't even finished the program before Susan and I were offered a team teaching job exactly as we had specialized, with the added bonus of free housing. The only hitch was that it was in McKinney, Texas, and the best way to describe McKinney is that it is 50 miles from a tree. We declined.
Susan taught for about half a semester and always says teachers are drastically underpaid. I never taught but that is another story for another day. Preview: It involves Arlo snarling in a kitty cage.
Backing up to school, the certification program required all sorts of Elementary eduction courses in order to give prospective teachers a broad background. We referred to them as Kiddie Lit, Kiddie PE, Kiddie Math, etc.
And of course there was Kiddie Art. My final project in that course was this wall hanging. Susan taught me the wavey stitch and I improvised the rest. The Kiddie Art class was taught in the art building where all the real art students were and of course they sneered at us amateurs. They were really ticked off when my piece was selected to be in the annual Art Student show.
Don, that's a great story and I love your sewing skills.
ReplyDeleteSome people think kiddie literature isn't real writing either, their loss along with kiddie art.
ReplyDeleteI'm impressed! You really ought to have been an artist from the start.(BTW, I really enjoyed reading your snippets in The Pulse and LOVED your art pieces). How big is the wall hanging, Don ?
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