Friday, April 21, 2006

Imagining Kindergarten

My granddaughter is in kindergarten now, and most days she likes the place a lot, which is good news. I also like the fact that her teachers routinely send home reports about her activities and development, and have regular conferences with her parents about how Darrah’s doing, both socially and academically.

Obviously, kindergarten had not been invented back when I was five years old, so that’s a chapter of life I’ll never experience. When I was five, dirt was a brand-new commodity. But paper and ink were still in the developmental stage, so I doubt that many written reports would have been sent home with me about my deportment.

I suspect I would have gotten good marks in the “Plays well with others” category, though, because I’m a peaceful sort by nature and I pride myself on being able to get along with anybody whose social skills rank somewhere above the level of ax-murderer.

Where I would not have gotten good marks, I feel sure, is in “Follows instructions.” It’s not that I try to be cranky on purpose. It’s just that I’m such a square peg in a round hole that any generalized advice or common wisdom almost never works out well for me.

Take writing, for example.

Please.

(Note to readers under the age of 50: that’s a reference to an old Henny Youngman joke, which would take longer to explain than it’s worth, which is just another symptom of what I’m talking about, if you catch my drift.)

If I had taken seriously the advice I was given in most of my writing classes, I would have ended up in another career.

The most common advice that writing teachers give is “Write what you know.” Problem is, the kind of stuff that I know is not even interesting to me, and I sure wouldn’t expect anybody else to pay money to read it.

An example? Okay.

Do you know where the word “avocado” comes from? Well, the Aztec word for the green fruit was “ahucatl,” which Spanish explorers mistook for the Spanish word “abogado,” which means “lawyer,” and though the explorers had no idea what avocados had to do with legal matters they split the difference in pronunciation and the fruit would ever after be referred to as “avocado.”

On a related note: the Aztecs were also fond of making dipping sauces out of their fruits and vegetables, and the Aztec word for sauce was “molli.” Hence, avocado sauce was “ahucatl-molli,” which sounded close enough to “guacamole” for government work, and so another word was born.

You can imagine how well this stuff works as cocktail-party conversation, which is not at all. Folks who start off listening with feigned interest gradually drift away with the excuse that they’ve got to put money in the parking meters outside, and it’s a good while after they’ve been gone that I realize I didn’t recall seeing any parking meters outside.

Anyway.

The second most frequent advice I received from writing teachers was, “Before you begin writing, take a few minutes to organize your thoughts.”

This is like telling me to take a few minutes to levitate, or split an atom, or build a sports car out of a box of toothpicks and a tube of epoxy.

It ain’t gonna happen.

If I could organize my thoughts, I would be rich. Or a danger to society. Or both.

But that’s a subject for another day.

For now, I’ll just keep missing my granddaughter and trying to imagine what it’s like to spend a day in kindergarten.

Wait. Good news! I just looked at my watch. And where Darrah is, it’s nap time.

That’s the one kind of instruction I’m good at.

4 Comments:

At 5:59 PM, Blogger Rick Watson said...

Hey Dale,
I loved this one. The picture is great too.
You do good work.
Rick

 
At 5:05 PM, Blogger Dale said...

Hey, Rick! I appreciate the encouraging words. I'm going to be headed to Wyoming in a few weeks to visit that little darling, and I'm looking forward to it. Now that we've made the leap to a digital camera, your Colorado posts have inspired me to try photo-blogging from the road.

I continue to enjoy Life 101, too. I think my favorite post lately is "Rain." The descriptions reminded me of growing up in Shanghi, Alabama, with linoleum floors, a tin roof, and a coal-burning heater, with the occasional trip to Dora and the famous Randy's Creme Cone. "Rain" brought it all back.

Keep up the great work,

Dale

 
At 8:46 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Nice one, Dale! I linked this post at Chicken Spaghetti, my blog.

 
At 7:59 PM, Blogger Dale said...

Hi, Susan: Thanks for the neat plug over on Chicken Spaghetti! Gave my site traffic an immediate uptick. My granddaughter has already benefitted from your great book suggestions, and will continue to, I'm sure.

Dale

 

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