Reunion Photos

Family Reunion Photos

If you follow the above link to my photo pages, look for the first links at the top. They read Stricklett Reunion 1 of 3, 2 of 3, and 3 of 3.

Page 3 has several more photos of butterflys.

I am going to bed for now. I will eventually get to the things rattling around in my head and write about them.

I want to talk about the family reunion and share a heart warming story that took place on my flight up.

Stay tuned.

Until the next time
John Strain

Stricklett Reunion 2005

Even after 40 years, I am still on the front row on the ground. The reunion was a good time of catching up and seeing people I had not seen for 20 years. I have more photos to post and certainly more thoughts to express. More to come.

Until the next time
John Strain

Stricklett Family Reunion: Blair, Nebraska

That's me in the front with the coke bottle glasses. I was about 9 or 10 at the time. To my right in the plaid shirt is my brother George. My sister Becky is the second from the right on the front row. My mom and dad are on the back row. Dad is the second man from the left on the back row. Mom is to his right. I am guessing this photo is from 1966.

In the center of the photo is my great grandmother Esther Stricklett. She has long since passed on and others in this photo have followed her. Family reunions have slowed down as the family has scattered to the four winds, but this coming Saturday, August 20, Grandma Stricklett's birthday, we are having another one.

I have not been to Blair, NE (a small east Nebraska town on the banks of the Missouri River) since 1985. It will be good to see people I have not seen in 20 years.

As an added bonus, I checked the weather and the lows will be in the 50's. Sunday AM I have to run 20 miles. The cool weather will be wonderful. Here in Covington, the weather has been oppressive for distance runners. I run early and the temp ranges from 76 at the beginning of the runs to 80 or 90 by the time I finish. I am looking forward to cool fall weather to say the least.

Friday early, I fly from New Orleans to Atlanta. All flights go through Atlanta it seems in the south. There is a saying that when you die, you will have to go through Atlanta on your way to heaven. From Atlanta, I go to Kansas City. My mother, Rocky, George, and hopefully my sister Becky will meet me at the airport and we will drive the remaining 4 hours to Blair, Nebraska.

Saturday is the reunion at the park. Sunday I get up early and run 20 miles, ride back to KC, fly back to Atlanta, and eventually get back to New Orleans around 10 PM. Monday is back to work.

Next week, I may have some photos updated 40 years from the one above.

OK, it is time to get to the morning run. 12 miles easy today.

Until the next time
John Strain

Education

Monday on the Today Show, some guest was talking about her program to tutor 4 year olds so they would be ready for kindergarten. The segment was the classic argument about how to educate children. One point of view was to pump little minds full of facts and expose them to the world ASAP. The other point of view says you cannot rush development. Children learn better if it comes through discovery and exploration, and too much emphasis on education only puts pressure on them and sours them on learning in the long run.

If you cannot guess my point of view, it is the latter of the two. I have seen it with my own son. There were tasks I tried unsuccessfully to teach him. I got aggravated and aggravated him, then it seemed, overnight he would just start doing it. I realized that just because a three year old could tie a shoe does not make a 5 year old who cannot tie a shoe a moron. By age 10 everyone can tie their shoes, even kids who do not have arms. This is an example of development and how you cannot rush it.

We all develop at our own pace. We develop physically, emotionally, socially, spiritually, intellectually, and in many other ways. The teens who develop physically, but lag mentally are the stereotypical dumb jock. The scrawny smart kid is the classic nerd. By age 20 or so, things begin to level off.

Back to my rant, these days and for some time, children are segregated. Not racially, that would be bad, but, so-called gifted children are pulled out of regular classes along with behavior disordered and learning disabled. They all have special classes, while the left over kids are considered the average Joes.

Studies have shown how children live up or down to their expectations. Here is an example. A group of children with similar educational abilities were divided into two categories. One group went to a teacher who was told that the children were gifted. The other group of children went to a teacher who was instructed the children were learning disabled. After a time of instruction, the perceived gifted kids did well, as expected and the perceived slow learners did poorly, as expected. In spite of this research, we continue to segregate and have expectations.

I think the whole gifted thing is more about the parents wanting to have bragging rights in their circles than it has to do with education. On the other hand, separating out the bad kids can be about giving up on difficult kids or an excuse for not getting creative. Both instances are not about the kids, they are about the adults taking care of them.

Another thing I don't like about the term "gifted" is that it implies some kids have it and some do not. My thinking is we are all gifted. It is much more important what we do with what we have than it is to glorify what we have. In other words, someone with an IQ of 130 may be intelligent, but it does not necessarily predict how successful they will be. A kid with a 100 IQ who works hard can easily out perform a lazy person with the IQ of 130.

My concern is that message is not being sent. The gifted kids already feel like they have arrived by virtue of their label. Average kids are not encouraged to reach for the stars and the bad kids slip farther and farther behind the pack. Jail awaits them almost certainly.

Now, I know there are good teachers out there who work their tails off. They spend their own money on their kids and lie awake nights worrying about how to get through to them. I also know that what I described above exists all too much.

I would advocate keeping the mix of kids together. If junior is so smart, then why deprive the dumb kids of his brilliant comments in class discussions? Maybe they will be leaders or inspirations to others. Maybe one of the mid packers will get the attention of the gifted children when they see how hard they work to learn.

I would like to see parents lighten up. Children do not need tutors and flash cards as much as they need their parents to spend time with them. They need their grandparents too. History is much better learned from eyewitnesses.

Do you remember the movie "Baby Boom." The whole point of the movie was to lighten up and not be so anal about education. Some people feel their kid is ruined if they aren't accepted into the in vogue day care.

Educators debate about the path of education, but we all seem to do just fine no matter which path we took. This brings us back to an earlier point. Somehow, we all know that 2 + 2 = 4 and that George Washington was the first President. Do we really need to know it at age 3 or 4?

Until the next time
John Strain

Testosterone

Few things make a man feel like a man more than walking through Lowe's with some lumber, throwing it in the back of a pickup truck, going home while listening to country music, and building something with said lumber.

John needed a desk for his new apartment. After some unsuccessful shopping expeditions, he sketched out what he wanted and we built the darn thing. It was funny, in the process of building the desk, I got a phone call from my friend Calvin. He said, "What the hell are you building?" He was watching my webcam. I forgot it was on and had no idea we were acting out an episode of "This Old House."

Speaking of Lowe's, I had to detour to the little boys room while there. After doing my business (number one) I flushed the urinal then went to the sink to wash up. I fumbled with a big silver knob for a while, but no water. I then realized it was one of those automatic sinks. I held my hands under the faucet for a moment, and then the water flowed. Next stop was the hand dryer. I hate hand dryers. I don't have the patience for them and usually end up wiping my hands on my pants anyway.

Well, I held my hands under the dryer, but no hot air. All this told me was I was not in Washington DC. Eventually, I noticed a big silver knob. I pushed it and nothing. Then I moved to a different dryer, pushed the button, let the thing blow for a few moments, and then wiped my hands on my pants.

To recap, I had to flush the toilet, the sink was automatic, but the hand dryers were manual. This stuff gets confusing. I wish they would keep a consistent motif, either automatic or manual. All the questions: Do I flush the commode? How do I get water out of the sink? and How the heck do those hand dryers work?

One time I went into the bathroom at the Superdome and some guy was peeing in the sink. It was one of those big round sinks where water sprays out from the center. Stepping on a lever turns it on. Well, I couldn't resist, so as he was peeing, I stepped on the water lever and washed my hands. I think he was embarrassed.

Speaking of automatic things, I once used the bathroom at an airport. When I stood up to pull up my pants, the auto flush engaged and it sounded like the Colorado River running through the Grand Canyon there was so much force. It would have scared the crap out of me, but I had just taken care of that little detail only moments earlier.

Maybe it is just me, but flushing a can and turning on a sink isn't that big of a deal. I would just as soon keep it all manual. Now if they came up with an automatic lawn mower, I might be interested.

Until the next time
John Strain