Happy New Year

I suppose that not all of you are celebrating this holiday with me. For most of you New Year’s happens in January. Oh, there may be some of you who focus on the "Fiscal Year," which ends in June (I think, thank God I’m not an accountant). Some of you might be asking, "What’s he talking about? The Jewish New Year? I didn’t know he was Jewish? The Chinese New Year? The Muslim New Year?"

No, silly reader, I’m talking, of course about the New School Year, well under way for a week by the time you’re reading this. Just as farmers measure the passage of time by the crops and the seasons, we teachers and students see January only as the middle of the year, the last end of the first Semester. No, for us in "the United States of Academia," the New Year began last week.

"If your New Year starts in August," you may ask, "what year is it?" After all, on your calendar it’s 2002, for Orthodox Jews, its 5760. Well, it depends who you ask. For most students it’s a name, not a number.

"I’m in THIRD grade," they might tell you. Or you might hear a parent tell you "Mary Beth is gonna be a Sophomore this year." It can get confusing, like when you ask a teacher how old a child is, "Well, let’s see, Johnny’s sister is a fifth-grader now, so I think he’s a first grader, isn’t he? No- wait, wait,wait, he’s in Mrs. Browns class, so he must be a second grader this year." Of course they never tell you the child’s age, you’re just supposed to figure out in your head how old you were when you were in second grade and assume that Johnny is about that old, plus-or-minus a year.

For teachers, it’s different. I have a friend for whom this is the year "15," although they’re thinking they may only have three or four left because they’re starting college classes toward a new career. Other’s start counting backwards, "Only two more till the IPERS (pension) kicks in, I’m thinking maybe three more, but I’ll probably still sub after that."

Still other teachers restart their calendar depending on their location or responsibility. I believe our new Superintendent at Boyer Valley was in the year 18 when she became a principal, but then there was a completely different year system as principal and of course now this is only year ONE. Can you imagine? As if the world was just created? How strange, not 2002, but just ONE.

For me this is not just the New Year, it’s the new decade. No, wait, not yet, this is the LAST year of the decade. Just as 2000 wasn’t really the start of the new Millennium, 2001 was. I started teaching in 1993, so this is just the start of year TEN, the second decade won’t start until next August.

Confused? So are History, Math, Science and Accounting teachers, so don’t feel bad. Oh, did you know that on the Chinese calendar, this is the year of the Horse? Well, I don’t know about Charter Oak-Ute, but at Boyer Valley, this is the "year of the Goose." Don’t ask.

Well, whatever year it is for you, make it a good one, full of learning and challenge. Don’t let the anxiety of book reports put your stomach in knots. Enjoy the aromas of pencil shavings, chalk dust, magic markers, teacher’s lounge coffee, hot lunch and gym socks. Think of August as a time of renewal, of fresh starts and second chances. If you’ve broken all your resolutions

City mice visit country mice

Last week some very dear friends visited us from the Thousand Oaks area in California. When we first met John and Diane D'Agostin, their tiny apartment was literally in the shadow of the Warner Brother's Studio complex in Burbank, around the hill from the Hollywood Bowl and down the street from Disney and NBC. This summer they flew to Minneapolis to see other friends and decided that rather than having us drive up, they wanted to experience what real-life farming and small town life was like.

I'm not sure what was more fun, seeing things through their LA native eyes, or the eyes of four little girls, our 8 month and 3 year-olds and their 2 and 4 year olds.

We actually have a lot in common. Both in LA and Charter Oak, one puts the word "the" before naming a major freeway. In Southern California, they have "the 5, the 405, the 101 and the 210. In Charter Oak we have "the Ricketts Highway, the Dunlap Highway, and the Ute Highway."

What was probably the most foreign to them was listening to public service announcements on the radio warning listeners to be careful where they dig in their back yards so as to avoid power lines. Diane marveled at the lack of concrete and congestion. She thought that it would be unnerving to be isolated on a farm place, at least living in a town, you're around people. She compared it to an island in a sea of rolling prairie.

I was proud to introduce them to some of the greatest joys of late summer; thick Iowa pork chops, home grown tomatoes and cucumbers from the neighbors, Dad's sweet corn, home made ice cream, and of course, Grandma Laura's fresh baked bread and cinnamon rolls.

Devin, our four-year-old goddaughter, was startled by a grasshopper on her car door. Of course as she stood and told her dad about it, she was oblivious to the dozens more bouncing back and forth above her head.

We took them for a field trip to see Uncle Melvin Neddermeyer's hog operation. "Peee-uuuw!" complained little Devin, long before the car door opened. Our friends think that every city-dweller should have to come see how much hard work is put into raising the food they so easily take for granted. They asked us about how many uses there are for corn and soy, like feed, plastics, and ethanol.

The girls all enjoyed a ride on Grandpa Allan's John Deere, but they probably enjoyed the ride in the wagon pulled by the rider mower just as much. They saw goats and ducks and chickens at Dan North's house up the hill. We opted for the Zoo rather than the State Fair, because it was a shorter drive and we thought it would be more child-friendly, but they got a kick out of the nightly fair highlights on IPTV.

As a transplant from the city myself, their visit really reinforced for me how blessed we are to live in a community where people wave when they drive by, as opposed to one where all they'll wave is the finger. Iowa is a great place to visit, but I'd rather live here.

What I did on my Summer Vacation

Last May, as summer was getting closer, I started thinking about finding a summer job. Lots of teachers do. Last year, I helped a contractor strip and re-paint coolers in the Farmland for a few weeks. It was hard work. Unfortunately, the contractor had jobs lined up this year that would put his operation in Illinois most of the summer. Not that Farmland is in a position to use him right now anyway.

I remembered advice that my Aunt Rene' gave me years ago; "do something that will help you in your field." Rene' was a college academic and career counselor, after all.

So, since I'm the yearbook advisor for Boyer Valley High School, it made sense to look for work taking pictures, writing stories, and designing layouts.

When she was in high school, my wife Bethany had worked for Mike and Barb Lyon at the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and the Mapleton PRESS. So, I knocked on Mike's door (actually it was an email). I felt that I had to convince him that I was far more competent than I was as a college kid when Bethany and I worked for him on the Charter Oak Centennial Edition the summer before we got married. To my surprise, he gave me a chance.

What a great job! I had three goals when I started; to get to know more people in and more about the community, to hone my skills so that I'd become a better Journalism teacher in the Fall, and to give back as to the people who have given so much to me and my family.

What I got was to live out a boyhood fantasy. Other guys dream about winning the Daytona 500 or playing quarterback in the Rose Bowl. As editor of my school newspaper at Shadow Mountain High School in Phoenix, Arizona I planned on pasting-up copy at a major metropolitan daily. My best-case scenario had me either as the political cartoonist or a political columnist for the Chicago Sun Times.

This summer I not only had to ask the Crawford County Democratic party chairman on line one to "please hold," so that I could answer a call from the Republican party chairman on line two- I actually got to sit in the boss' chair and layout the front page. More importantly, I got to meet and know more about some wonderful people- you.

So, I must say thank you to Mike and Barb for giving me this opportunity and to you, gentle readers, for your gracious encouragement and support. If teaching, coaching, Church youth group, and helping raise two little girls will allow it- I hope to freelance some stories, commentary, and maybe even some comics for you throughout the year. We need your input too. Please give us your feedback and ideas. Email us your opinions, story ideas and reactions to what we run. This is your paper; participate with us in serving our communities.