Bird Droppings April 2, 2025
Pondering early in the morning, in my search for wisdom, while looking for a sunrise on a cloudy day

I started my day by having some green tea and heading out to look for a sunrise. The sky was beautiful in a strange sort of way. Using overexposure, I got several nice images early in the morning before sunrise, of the clouds moving in. By the time the sun came up, the clouds were filling the sky, and there was no color for sunrise this morning.  I walked out, checked the outside ambient temperature and air, cleaned the kitchen, took a shower, and got ready for a day of yard work. Four years ago, around this time, I was becoming fatigued from simply going upstairs to my writing area or after just a few minutes of work in the yard. Every few minutes of work outside, I have to rest. Pat wanted me to rule out heart issues since I had some blockage a few years back. After extensive testing of every organ in my body, my heart rate has returned to normal. My cardiologist recommended a pacemaker. Now I am enjoying my time, and my heart rate is, most of the time, right at 60 beats per minute, a far better rate than when it drops to 28.  

I was somewhat out of sync when I retired from full-time teaching and transitioned to part-time work. I am getting into a routine of enjoying part-time teaching. I am now ready to get started on yard work, writing, and completing several pieces of my research, as I have been procrastinating. I had planned on picking up a few plants to work on in our carnivorous garden, and it seems I will put them off till tomorrow. I sent out a few emails and posted on social media, and it was almost time to head out.  

I forget not all people live by my sunrise-to-sunset standard. Later, I will go to my favorite store, Kroger, or maybe Publix, to pick up supper materials. Hopefully, between shopping for my grandson and running to Kroger, I can get serious about my computer work today.  

On the front page of today’s paper, the lead story reported that high school graduates are not adequately prepared for college. Right next to it was an article on an assistant principal who is still being investigated in a past Atlanta school system cheating scandal. She claimed she did not know they were cheating, only cleaning up eraser marks so testing machines would not err. One comment was essentially that in Georgia, twenty-five percent of college graduates must take remedial courses. As I pondered this, I recalled that I, too, took a remedial language arts course during my first year in college. I took it twice since the first time, as I did not attend class very often. How valid is taking a remedial class in terms of academic success?

Why did I have to take a remedial college course, yet I was accepted into all three colleges to which I applied? My SAT score was a few points too low for the school I applied to for the verbal portion, and yet today, it would be more than enough to get into any college without remedial classes. As I think about my days in High School Literature, except for maybe one or two years, I hated it and could not understand why we needed to listen to a teacher’s opinion on why Herman Melville wrote Moby Dick. As I reflect, I was not fond of Math classes, Spanish classes, and most science classes. Considering we had math, literature, and science all four years of High School, I was not too fond of high school, and perhaps my GPA reflected this. Although my SAT scores were what got me into college, and conversely, into a remedial class, my saving grace in education was standardized tests, on which I always seemed to perform well. My first set of SAT scores, in today’s terms, was close to 1400 for verbal and Math, which would have gotten me into most undergraduate schools, except for the Ivy League, today.

The second time I took the SAT, I decided to see how quickly I could complete the test. In twenty-three minutes, I finished the SAT and scored only a few points lower than my previous score. So, where am I wandering today? The conclusion I came to after reflecting on my own High School experience and that of many kids I talked to in high school today is that we are teaching subjects that many consider irrelevant to them, including those going to college. Some students will strive to achieve high grades, seemingly acquiring the content provided so they can pass the end-of-course tests and perform well. However, as I examined high school subject matter and the photo used to illustrate the deficiency of students today in Math, I noticed the problem on the board behind the teacher being interviewed. In real life, shy of pursuing physics or math as a career, you will rarely encounter that material.

Real learning is what is missing from education today. It is about that desire to learn and making it relevant to students who more than likely do not even want to be in that class. So, how do we get teachers who have been brought up in the same system on board? We have taken the passion out of learning. We have stripped learning of imagination and creativity.

“The awakened sages call a person wise when all his undertakings are free from anxiety about results; all his selfish desires have been consumed in the fire of knowledge. The wise, ever satisfied, have abandoned all external supports. Their security is unaffected by the results of their action; even while acting, they really do nothing at all. Free from expectations and all sense of possession, with mind and body firmly controlled by the Self, they do not incur sin through the performance of physical actions. Bhagavad Gita 4:19-21

I can easily substitute learning and wisdom as I read through this ancient passage from a Hindu holy text. It is a matter of who you are with, when, and how you have been told. Is this learning? However, as I read this passage, which is many years old, I realized that a person is wise when what they do is done without anxiety about the results. You are not concerned about your grade or which college has the highest GPA. We sadly live in a competitive world where being number one is even a marketing tool for advertisers. I often wonder if politicians get stressed out, aside from around election time, over what they do. I always thought of my grandmother as wise for her understanding of life. As a small child, perhaps, I saw only that her knowledge was what she needed to know to raise her children justly and correctly, and how to make good Grandma Seitz’s chocolate chip cookies. As I grew up, I developed a deeper understanding of her profound faith and wisdom; perhaps one day, I can come close, too.

“This we can all bear witness to, living as we do, plagued by unremitting anxiety…. It becomes increasingly imperative that the life of the spirit be acknowledged as the firmest basis upon which to establish happiness and peace. The Dalai Lama

As a society, we seem to encourage anxiety and stress, often at the expense of our children and grandchildren. Our previously elected government sought to spread democracy through numerous wars, and our current government has continued and added a war or two to the mix, which has caused tension and insecurity among our children, according to Progressive Curriculum Theorist Henry Giroux. Is it evolving into a deeper meaning, a spiritual center as “the only firm base,” as the Dalai Lama states?

If I have been of service, if I have gained a deeper understanding of nature and the essence of ultimate well-being, if I am inspired to reach wider horizons of thought and action, and if I am at peace with myself, it has been a successful day. Alex Noble

How many of us take this approach to life? I often use the term ‘ searcher’ because I am always searching. When walking in the forest, I have the urge to check under rocks, which could be the unrelenting herpetologist in me searching for a snake or lizard. As I sit or stand in the hallway at school, observing, searching for faces, listening, empathizing, and trying to understand, I feel a similar urge.

To understand reality is not the same as knowing about outward events. It is to perceive the essential nature of things. The best-informed man is not necessarily the wisest. Indeed, there is a danger that precisely in the multiplicity of his knowledge, he will lose sight of what is essential. However, on the other hand, knowledge of a trivial detail often makes it possible to see into the depths of things. And so the wise man will seek to acquire the best possible knowledge about events, but always without becoming dependent upon this knowledge. To recognize the significance of facts is wisdom. Dietrich Bonhoeffer

I used a statement several weeks back about seeing the bubble in a thousand clear oceans. Bonhoeffer addresses that same issue here. In education, it is about context, not content, that is, being able to apply the knowledge we have, which can be more significant than an encyclopedia of information.

“I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding which bringeth peace.” Helen Keller

Often, I sit and think about the people I would like to meet. My biological grandfather on my mother’s side is one, Gandhi is another, and Ralph Waldo Emerson is yet another. If I were allowed a fourth, it would be Helen Keller. Few people have overcome such insurmountable odds and then accomplished what she did. The title of the book about her life does not do justice to the real-life situation, The Miracle Worker.

“It is characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.” Henry David Thoreau

I need to be more cautious in my writing. The other day, Thoreau was searching for calm rather than calm. Spell check does not read minds as of yet. But Thoreau echoes back to that thousand-plus-year-old statement from the Bhagavad Gita, “when all his undertakings are free from anxiety about results.” Being wise is being in tune, so to speak, with all around, and borrowing another word, perhaps ‘harmony’ could be used.

“Science is organized knowledge. Wisdom is organized life.” Immanuel Kant

In education, there are Common Core Standards and points of reference for each subject to attain or to have knowledge of. We in Georgia had a system in place of Performance Standards, and previously, the Quality Core Curriculum, which encompassed every aspect of what the educational committee deemed important in that subject. Teachers were teaching QCCs, and the instruction was almost purely content-based. There was excitement as new standards were released, and the school administration’s curriculum team took hold of them and unpacked them. Now we have curriculum maps and curriculum pacing, and what was to be wonderful has become a monster. The heart and soul have been stripped away, and in their place, there is organizational overload.

“Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in eliminating non-essentials. Lin Yutang

I have used my example of a liter bottle several times, and I have three gallons to fill it with. How do we do it? A funnel still only fills to a liter, and the rest spills out. I use this illustration to educate children with special needs, and I believe it applies to all children and adults. It has been a few months since my last trip to Mountain City and the Foxfire property. I am heading up in a week or so. If you are in Mountain City, Georgia, take a look. It is well worth the drive up the mountain. The museum will provide a guide to take you around. I recall the late Robert Murray and the numerous walks we took around the property; here and there, he would pick a leaf or two or three, telling us about what it could do and what it could be used for.

As he goes from building to building, explaining mountain life, he eventually comes to a shed with a large copper coil-like device and asks, “So, what is it?” and answers run the gamut. Finally, laughing, he explains that it is a condenser for making moonshine. If you have watched the miniseries Hatfield and McCoys,’ you will know. So, how do we fill a liter bottle? We condense and synthesize, much like making cane syrup, by boiling the cane juice to extract the good stuff. Wisdom is knowing what the good stuff is and being able to transcend the frills and extras.

The perfection of wisdom and the end of true philosophy is to proportion our wants to our possessions, our ambitions to our capacities; we will then be happy and virtuous people. Mark Twain

Make that number five on my list of people whom I would like to meet; somehow, Mark Twain could always have the right words and thoughts. As I wander about today, searching for books and ideas, tilling my garden, and planting plants, I will end with a line from a founding father and one that perhaps our current in-power folks should read.

I hope our wisdom will grow in tandem with our power, teaching us that the less we use it, the greater it will become. Thomas Jefferson

I hope we will listen to Jefferson. Please keep all those in harm’s way on your mind and in your hearts and always give thanks. namaste.

My family and friends, I do not say this lightly,

Mitakuye Oyasin

(We are all related)

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