#97. Give props to a teacher

There have been many ‘teacher’s' that I give credit to leading me on the straight and narrow. Some have led by example, others have shown me how to overcome bumps in the road and some have straight out shown me what NOT to do!

I’ll give ‘props’ to my Aunt Kim. She is only 10 years older than me, the youngest aunt I have, and therefore the coolest. She was always two steps ahead but not too far that I didn’t take note as to what she was doing. She got an education, followed her heart, got a good job, got married, bought a house, and travelled. When her life wasn’t going as planned she divorced, sold the house, moved across the country, got a new job, a new house, and a new boyfriend. She’s done everything in her life on her terms and I respect that.

When my twenties began I was working a few jobs one of them being grounds crew at a golf course. In a male dominated line of work my bosses were two women – twin sisters Jodi & Julie. They worked outside day in and day out with their hands cutting grass, fixing lawn mowers and tractors, putting in extremely long hours. They wanted an all-female grounds crew as “women pay particular attention to detail”. The two of them worked hard and the course was exceptionally beautiful, yet they still had time to sit and relax and laugh about things that had happened. The women taught me how to independently be successful and good at something without the help of men others.

An actual teacher that I would give ‘props’ to would be my third grade teacher – Mrs. Lidstone. She was more like a grandmother than a teacher. She encouraged creativity and reading and writing. She was soft spoken, rarely cross with the exception of one incident involving a pair of spandex shorts (not mine!). I don’t remember a lot from her class other than spending a large majority of time writing and illustrating books that I still have and look back at and laugh. I’ll give credit to Mrs. Lidstone for my passion of bringing creativity into everything that I can and my passion of reading.

Have you noticed the theme of all female teachers? Me too. I’m not sure why that is, and I’m sure if I let the list go on and on, a male would pop onto the list somewhere. But those women are my top three. I credit them for who I am today. Sadly, I’ve never told any of them this, maybe I’ll get on that?!