Learning how to be grateful

Continuing last week’s abjuration of politics, I’d like to continue on the topic of gratitude — an overlooked act of holy obligation.

Friends and friendly acquaintances over the past several decades helped shape me, for better or worse, into the person I am today. Many of those friendly acquaintances were my teachers.

In the epoch between grade school and universities, I was blessed with a host of brilliant instructors who took their pedagogical obligations seriously.

I came of age when teachers taught by opening doors of knowledge and cracking windows of talent and critical inquiry. No politics, no ideology. Just the facts. The most controversial thing I experienced was a teacher recommending the class watch movies and miniseries of some social significance with their families. No sensible viewer of the time could be offended by “Roots,” “Sounder,” and “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman,” because each of these “entertainments” provided messages mostly aligned with the Christian faith in which I was raised.

My sixth-grade teacher encouraged my love of music, including bringing in his Johnny Cash albums to play for class on days when it was too cold to play outside. Recognizing I was the geeky kid in class who seemed to appreciate Johnny’s music more than the others, he mentioned as an aside I should check out the debut of Cash’s new variety program on television. I begged my parents to allow me to stay up past my bedtime to watch it, and not only saw Johnny and Carl Perkins, but as well his guest Bob Dylan.

A week or so later, I was introduced to Eric Clapton, at the time a member of Derek and the Dominoes. Add this to the music and variety programs my family already listened to and watched and … boy howdy, was it an embarrassment of riches.

From there, I was well on my way, so by the time my high school English teacher hit me with Thoreau and Whitman, “Thanatopsis,” and Emily Dickinson, I was also primed to listen to his Lovin’ Spoonful, The Band, the Stills-young Band, and Dylan albums before and after school. We’d listen to Dylan’s “Desire” again and again, discussing the lyrics, melodies, and musicianship. He encouraged me to put my thoughts down on paper as well as how to express my feelings in my own lyrical compositions.

When it came time to submit my first theater review for the Daily Times News, I must confess I hit a brick wall. I had many notes, phrases, thoughts, and even a headline. But I’d be darned if I could pull it all together and, in the words of Ezra Pound, make it cohere. I desperately needed help, and so I call my teacher — we met outside at a picnic table where he went through my notes, making edits and offering suggestions. When we had it polished, I retyped the whole thing and submitted the manuscript. It appeared in print the next day.

It was the first and last time I availed myself of his editing abilities, but he did such a great job advising me I never forgot how valuable the editing process is even to this very day. Every burgeoning writer should be so lucky.

Thirty-some years ago, I looked him up. He had abandoned teaching many years prior but was still living in Michigan. I found his phone number and called him to thank him for all his help, assistance, and encouragement. And, as well, to thank him for turning me on to all sorts of great music and literature. I answered in the affirmative when he asked me if I was still writing poetry and criticism, the hobbies I picked up with his encouragement.

So, thank you, teachers! Enjoy your summer vacation. A lot of you earned it.