I promised multiple stories. Here is Story #2. The first story is HERE.
I was a music teacher in the system from 2005-2020 (retired). This happened during that time…not sure the year.
$ $ $ $ $
Word came to the instrumental dept that one of our two contracted summer sessions would be cut from the budget and band parents could take over funding to keep both sessions functioning.
I was tasked with making our case before the board. The “conversation” went something like this…..
Me: Our FIRST summer session starts before the end of the Spring semester when we start integrating incoming students and preparing for the local June parade. Do you want the band to represent the school in the HD parade?
Board: Of course, the band MUST march in the parade.
Me: Our SECOND summer session starts a few weeks before the Fall semester and is when the band learns music, marching fundamentals, and the performance show for football games and band competitions. Do you want the band at the football games?
Board: Absolutely, the band MUST be at the football games.
Result: Funding continued for both summer sessions.
I am so angry about the gift card stories we’re learning about that I’m going to, in multiple posts, share some of my stories that happened before, during, and after…
I was a music teacher for HCCSC from 2005-2020 (retired).
Story #1: At a time when hundreds of thousands were misused, the music teachers were mandated to submit time sheets for summer hours worked, so the corporation could ensure we were putting in the hours contracted for. (Guess what the time sheets proved.) Each sheet had to be signed, and approved by the department head, the principal….and then they went on to the corporate office for additional approvals. Sometimes, once we documented the contracted hours, we stopped submitting the sheets as it was clear we were not going to get paid for any additional. Gotta watch those teachers, ya know.
March is both “Women’s History” and “Disabilities Awareness” month. My hero, in both those categories, was my polio-inflicted mother.
Beulah McCormick was born in 1922 in a house (not a hospital) with an outside toilet. Her dad was a mean, verbally and physically abusive Irishman (McCormick) who was in the trenches of France during World War I. Growing up during the great depression, one of Mom’s journal entries stated, “There were no toys”.
At 12 yrs old, she was inflicted with one of the most cruel diseases ever…..polio.
In a 1935 pic taken 1 year after her infection, you can see that her legs are different sizes. She is likely bracing herself with her left arm (good arm).
Iron lungs enabling many polio survivors to breathe
She wasn’t as bad as some, who had to spend the rest of their lives in “iron lungs“, but her body was infected as if there were a vertical divide between left and right. Her right arm and leg were smaller, shorter, and weaker than her left. She had to buy two pairs of shoes because her feet were different sizes. She could write right-handed but picked things up with her left.
She refused to allow her disability to handicap life, evidenced by her high school class of 1940 1/2 voting her “most athletic”.
Hobbies included hunting, fishing, horseback riding, swimming, and gardening. She was a proficient typist and avid reader. She walked with a significant limp until her last four years when her back and knees just couldn’t do it anymore.
Her teenage friendship with Betty Swindler was so strong the Swindler family wanted to pay Mom’s way to go to college, but the proud papa wouldn’t allow it.
She thrived despite her parents.
Her childhood included going with parents (no choice) to area saloons to watch them drink and dance.
Somehow she got involved in a local church where she met her future husband. They had 5 children before divorcing affecting siblings from age 1 to 12.
So how does a divorced, polio survivor without a car, find a job and raise five children?
She was qualified, but never accepted welfare. Eventually, she took a job and spent about 25 yrs as an Activities Director at the Nursing Home she would retire from, move in to, and die in …. only two blocks from our house so she (and we) could walk to and from. I used to tease her for getting paid to play games all day.
My sisters had to experience daycare in a home nearby. Mom cried about that.
Life was plain, but she didn’t complain.
She paid her debts. Thankfully, the pediatrician allowed her to make $5/month payments.
We walked two blocks to a small neighborhood church my father’s parents helped start. She put a dollar in the plate and, when someone complained about the six of us for her dollar a week, swallowed her pride so we could have a better upbringing than she did. Kudos to the church for installing a handrail on the two steps going into the sanctuary. They did try.
She encouraged us to sell lemonade to the golfers at the course down the street. Those lemonade sales paid for a bicycle I wanted and then for my part of a new clarinet.
Sometimes she got some extra sugar for her lemonade. Mom’s Aunt Georgia passed away and I distinctly remember walking with her and her uncle to the kitchen door that went into their garage.
“Beulah. Georgia wanted you to have her car. Here are the keys.”
Chores were a reality. She organized us in rotations for dish washing, providing a step stool until we were each tall enough to reach into the sink. Until I left for college, it was mostly my job to push the non-motorized mower, and I was not always the compliant, cooperative teen.
There was one episode where she was following me back and forth over the lawn convincing me with her belt that I should continue.
Another job I loathed was cleaning the dog pen. Grass and hedge trimming, leaf raking, and garbage taking were regular chores. The Christmas decorations weren’t so bad and I liked putting the flag out….but had to take it down at night.
As much as we didn’t have, Mom always helped us understand that there were other people worse off and that they needed our help. At Christmastime, she would ask us to give up a toy to be donated to a “needy” family.
When someone would knock at our back door asking for food, she would fix a fried egg or peanut butter sandwich.
Both parents were hunters, and when dad left, she kept her little (she couldn’t hold a full-sized rifle) “over/under” gun; a combination 22 rifle and 410 shotgun. I got to watch her use it once. There was a bad flood and the water from the river about a mile away covered the golf course, came up over the 4-foot wall at the end of our street and stopped about two houses from ours. In the aftermath, there was a terrible, thankfully temporary neighborhood rat infestation. She instructed us to get into the house when she saw a huge rat on our side yard sidewalk. From the bedroom window, we heard the ‘pop’ and saw the rat briefly stand up on its hind legs before tottering over.
Good shot, Mom.
I’m not sure how I got started in 5th-grade band. With all the other bills, I have no idea how Mom managed to pay off that rent-to-own clarinet that I played at Tenth District School. Seems the band teacher, James Copenhaver, in his very first year of teaching, convinced her that my aural testing was so high that she really needed to get me involved in band.
Another of her favorite stories was during my high school band time. Watching the end of a rehearsal, she heard Mr. Copenhaver say, “Gardner, you march like a cow.” She went up to him afterward and went, “Moooooo” and then identified herself with, “I’m the cow’s mother.”
Mom who taught me to drive, to shave, to do my laundry (for college), to polish my shoes, and to type. She made me take piano lessons, allowed me to take clarinet lessons and somehow managed to be there for most major events. She taught me conservation techniques; the thermostat seldom went above 60 in the winter. There was no air conditioning and the summer window fan had to be turned off before bedtime.
I learned the difference between a need and a want. She took care of my needs.
She wasn’t able to buy many gifts. One year, I had asked for a clock-radio. To make the gift opening last longer, she hid it and placed clues all around the property to help me find it. Like most teens, I wanted a car….so on my 16th birthday, she gave me a little battery operated VW bug and made it clear that would be the only car she would ever buy me.
There was an extended episode where her back was really messed up from her years of walking with legs of different lengths. There was a really hard-core brace that she had to wear for a while and I had to help her get it on and off every day. By the grace of God, she improved and was able to get rid of it. She confessed years later that she was afraid she was losing her ability to walk, which would have cost her the job she had….and she feared not being able to raise us.
We didn’t wear the latest fashions, but always had something respectable to wear.
My brothers always got my hand-me-downs. Sorry. We were all in band and had instruments and everything we needed for that. Three of us used my beginning clarinet and the pro-level horn I bought in high school.
Grandpa McCormick moved in for several of his later years. After living alone for several years (Grandma Mamie died my high school freshman year), he married a lady who stole nearly everything he owned. Terrified and trounced, he came to live with Mom.
So after all the terrible things she had endured over the years, she would be his care-provider.
I was off to college and then away, so I didn’t have to deal with him much. On visits, at least, he seemed to have mellowed, although he could still unleash a verbal barrage on occasion. I hope he paid some rent to help with the finances, but I never heard and never asked.
Mom did well raising the five of us. No one is rich, but all five are self-sufficient and raising (or raised) a pretty good next generation.
Mom paid for all of her wedding because her parents would not.
In a 2001, handwritten letter, she wrote,
“my life has been very fulfilling and rewarding. Sometimes I am confined to “cell 423” (house number), but this week I went to the Reds ballgame (via radio) and “watched a horse race (TV) at Churchill Downs, tearing at the playing of ‘My Old Kentucky Home and ended in a “musical production in Branson, Missouri, where I had no parking hassels and had the best seat in the house.”
That was Mom, always finding the best in everybody, finding good in her situations and being thankful for what she did have instead of complaining about what she didn’t.
She used life’s sour lemons to make the best, sweetest lemonade.
Love you and miss you Mom…..and will see you soon.
PS Over the last several years, Mom always accused me of bringing the cold, nasty weather of Northern Indiana with me when I would come to visit. She would have said that again about her own funeral with the dismal driving rain that prevented the graveside ceremony.
“I know, Mom….. but I wanted you to know I was there.”
Beulah celebrating her 85th birthday, the last she would celebrate at her Baltimore Ave home.
Online banking is convenient, easy, and problem-free….most of the time. I use it to pay credit cards, utilities, insurances, and a list of other local and long-distance service providers. We seldom write a check and enjoy excellent online record-keeping.
Never had an issue. …. well, until now.
Two (maybe one) innocent mistakes, but neither were the bank’s. The bank did the right thing and worked with me to fix everything, which is why I’ve been with them +40yrs.
I used online bill-pay to set up a new vendor and issue a significant (to me) 4-digit check as a deposit for some contractor work. I had a problem entering the address and took the blame for the delay. I thought I had it right. Apparently, I did.
After 7 days, vendor calls me asking about the check. Called the bank, they said it was mailed to ME! I didn’t have it either. So….. I handwrote a replacement check to the vendor and put it in his hand. Asked him not to cash both if the other happened to show up.
Called the bank and stopped payment on their bill-pay check, since we didn’t know where it went. No charge.
The bank’s bill-pay check eventually arrived at vendor’s addr and the totally innocent wife did what she normally does and deposited all the checks received…..including both the bank’s printed and the hand-written duplicate. YIKES!
I check online. BOTH checks were deposited and BOTH were rejected.
Called again. Rejection was because of the duplicate of a check that size.
Fixed.
This vendor will probably not allow me to use Bill-Pay for the balances of the two (soon to be three) projects on his schedule.
Civil Rights ===> Affirmative Action ===> DEI vs Meritocracy
There were injustices, such as Segregation among other things, that needed to change. The Civil Rights movement introduced well-meaning programs and policies such as Affirmative Action (AA), which was to help minorities, females, the disabled and others.
All positive.
Bussing for School Integration was also a good thing in many respects. For equality at the college level, Quotas became popular. According to the US Department of Labor, AA was mostly about numbers. Now mostly ended, the Supreme Court struck down AA as a tool for college admissions because, among other things, AA was discriminating against qualified whites and Asians (mostly) to satisfy quotas without regard to merit.
The current emphasis pits DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) against merit-based Meritocracy.
Diversity: The presence and participation of individuals with varying backgrounds and perspectives, including those who have been traditionally underrepresented
Gender
Race
Age
Sexual orientation
Equity: Equal access to opportunities and fair, just, and impartial treatment
Equal opportunities
Fair compensation
Balanced training and educational opportunities
Inclusion: A sense of belonging in an environment where all feel welcomed, accepted, and respected
The opposite of DEI seems to be Meritocracy (is that like Aristocracy??). The Cambridge Dictionary defines Meritocracy as
“DEI is a gun pointed directly at the heart of the meritocracy”.
DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) sounds great. Diversity IS a good thing. Equity (feeling of belonging) IS a good thing. And, of course, we want Inclusion vs Exclusion. All components of DEI sound (and are) good, until they are used to inflict the bias they are supposed to end.
I am completely in favor of meritocracy, i.e. “merit” based vs anything else; race, gender, ethnicity, financial….).
My mother, a polio survivor raising 5 kids as a single mom and no car, never utilized government assistance based on her handicap or income. She did use a ‘handicapped’ placard in her car. Her graduating class voted her “most athletic” because she did not let her handicap hold her back. I learned from my mama.
My band director pulled me aside freshman year when he understood I wanted to be a band director. His advice went something like this,
“If you want to be a band director, you’re going to have to go to college. You’re intelligent, but you’re not going to get academic scholarships. You’re not athletic. You ARE decent on that clarinet…. so I want to tell you that your best chance of getting to college to become a band director will be to use these next four years to become good enough on that clarinet that colleges will pay you to come.”
I did. They did. That was meritocracy.
When I needed a new clarinet, my Dad said, “You raise the first 50% of the cost of that new clarinet, and I’ll pay the rest.” I don’t consider that welfare. It was assistance, but the goal required work and commitment. The music store would not give me that clarinet so I could experience equity and inclusion.
My high school clarinet teacher, who I couldn’t afford, made a deal with me that allowed me to do yard work for him in return for lessons. He said he would provide me those 1-1 clarinet lessons….
“until the day you show up here unprepared.”
That deal had nothing to do with DEI, it was all about merit.
I did get some financial aid for summer camps and college, offered because they wanted me.
I’m okay with programs that help everyone have a chance. I experienced poverty.
My “Tenth District” Elementary School (two blocks from the city line opposite downtown) was 100% white while “Third District” (Downtown) was nearly all non-white. Because there was only one high school in the city, diversity was automatic.
I am in favor of helping those with genuine need or who are disadvantaged in a real way. I’m in the “help-those-who-are-willing-to-work-to-help-themselves” camp.
But when it comes to getting the job or the position, I favor merit-based decisions. The world works on meritocracy.
Professional athletes aren’t chosen to satisfy a quota — if you’re good enough, you can earn the spot. Also, professional musicians (especially in orchestral settings) are chosen by audition and the best person gets the job.
A recent podcaster interviewed a DEI advocate for pilots who was pushing a “from the tarmac to the cockpit” program. I watch (too many) video shorts of plane take-offs and landings….many with all female and/or ethnic crews from around the world. Recently I watched an Arab airline with a hijab-wearing female working with a male co-pilot. I would like to think that each of them studied and earned their way. Would you want your pilot to be a DEI (‘Affirmative Action’ is out of style now) or “from the tarmac to the cockpit” placement?
Show me a MLB, NBA, or NFL team put together with DEI and, if I gambled, I’d bet against them.
It gets trickier in business where historical biases can harm or prevent merit-based success. Yes. Fix that….. but not by quotas, AA, or DEI.
According to the 4-digit serial number, my Selmer/Paris Series 10 clarinet was manufactured in 1967. In 1968, my hs band director told my mother I had to get one. Not optional. He might as well have told her I needed a Mercedes for my first car. Dad made me a 50/50 deal, and after selling lemonade to golfers and hanging ad papers on doors … I got it.
I used it all through hs. It got me Solo/Ensemble medals, traveled with me and Holmes Band to KMEA and MENC, to Murfreesboro, TN and Virginia Beach, VA…. to All-State Orchestra, to band clinic and select bands, to summer music camps at Eastern Kentucky and Morehead State Universities, and followed me to Europe/U.S.S.R. with the United States Collegiate Wind Band in the summer between hs and college. I had to replace it at UK bc the clarinet prof kept saying things like,
“That was awful. I can’t tell if it was you or that crappy clarinet.”
Anyway, I just opened packages of cleaning supplies, including swabs, key and bore oil, silver polish, swabs, disinfectant and more….. I want to see if it still has all the notes and speed it once did. Students have heard me talk about instruments with “speed buttons”.
Oh, working on my 1973-ish Buffet R-13 also. Both are considered “vintage” at this point.
Just listened to a podcast from dailywire.com, that included a segment on insurance rates.
“Avg” car INSURANCE is now $212/MONTH.
I pay $29.33.
“26% increase this year = biggest in 50 yrs”.
I have an older car, but what does a new one do that makes it worth an additional $2100+/yr to insure? Hope you’re below avg in that regard. I’ll keep driving my 10-year-old Camry with its mid-80K miles. Oh, my car payment is $0, btw.
Curious to hear what you pay.
Avg homeowners insurance is $1700, up 46% since pre-covid. That’s a lotta percentage.
I pay $1100, which was closer to avg that I expected, given home prices in places like NY, CA, etc. They told me I’m at recommended, which is double average. I feel better already. ???
Because of the sue-crazy world we live in, I carry an UMBRELLA policy that is not as expensive as you might think.
BUT….the foundation work we’re having done is NOT covered…..unless I can “prove a specific event” that caused that problem.
No organized Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem this year, according to an NPR reporter who signed of as “in Israeli Occupied West Bank”. A Lutheran church in Bethlehem has set up a Nativity inside the church depicting baby Jesus in Palestinian swaddling clothes and on a pile of rubble — to symbolize the babies who have died in Gaza.
Not the first time scripture has been adjusted to fit politics.
Last Christmas, we purchased an Epson Eco-Tank printer and I ordered extra ink from LD Products. I’ve worked with LD for years and have always had good products and, when necessary, good customer service.
So impressed with the ink usage. Finally, after a full year, which included printing a dozen or so copies of a multi-hundred page memoir (2-sided in color)…. we FINALLY had to replace the black ink. Note, the rest of the colors are only half used in a full year — and these cartridges are well under $10ea. Much more economical and efficient than the cartridges we dealt with for years prior.
Only now, however, did I discover how messed up our order was, including bottles that didn’t fit, one that was sealed without a nozzle, one where the nozzle stayed in the lid and ALL the color cartridges were the wrong number for the box.
I had to prove what I had, so sent this pic to LD. I’m confident they will take care of me.
The good news is that I was able to get one bottle to work and fill the black (with still more left in the bottle for next time).
Bottom line — and I knew this from my years in business:
1) Assume Nothing, and 2) Check your order when it is received.
I was a music teacher in the system from 2005-2020 (retired). This happened during that time…not sure the year.
Online banking is convenient, easy, and problem-free….most of the time. I use it to pay credit cards, utilities, insurances, and a list of other local and long-distance service providers. We seldom write a check and enjoy excellent online record-keeping.
According to the 4-digit serial number, my Selmer/Paris Series 10 clarinet was manufactured in 1967. In 1968, my hs band director told my mother I had to get one. Not optional. He might as well have told her I needed a Mercedes for my first car. Dad made me a 50/50 deal, and after selling lemonade to golfers and hanging ad papers on doors … I got it.
Anyway, I just opened packages of cleaning supplies, including swabs, key and bore oil, silver polish, swabs, disinfectant and more….. I want to see if it still has all the notes and speed it once did. Students have heard me talk about instruments with “speed buttons”.
Just listened to a podcast from 
Last Christmas, we purchased an Epson Eco-Tank printer and I ordered extra ink from 