I know it irritates Paul when folks post the same thing on two threads simultaneously. I’m kinda in a conundrum as I am responding to Fisherman and the LRH Thumbnail Sketch thread with stuff that was gonna be part of my “Readers Digest” treatments over here.
Do unto others as you would have done onto you.” Jesus of Nazareth.
“The unexamined life is not worth living.” Socrates of Athens
To distill my personal What and Why re: Scn to compact narrative is not easy but here’s Part One of my go at it.
As I have written earlier on the Apollo ’73 thread, I grew up country, what was then lower middle class or upper lower class. My parents were Born Again, Charismatic, Fundamentalist Christians. They were also verbally, emotionally and physically violent.
From my earliest memory, I have felt “connected” to “something and others” which to this day I cannot describe in words and won’t indulge in here.
I went to a country school and the classes were small with usually 14 to 18 students in each grade K-8. Everything from wealthy Ag families and the Doctors kids to transients and kids from a Catholic orphanage were represented there. It was no secret who or what your family was.
By the time I entered the 3rd grade, I was on my way to “mirroring” the violence and hate that I was growing up around. I was combative, self righteous, angry, often times mean and very much self loathing. I felt trapped and helpless, hopeless.
All around us in this world are truly Angels and Saints, if you will. They are not the big personas, have no shrines in their memory and seek not the riches of the world…my 3rd grade teacher was/is one of them. It was here first year at the school and she was young, probably in her late 20’s-early 30’s. I was the worst, both academically and behaviorally, child in the class. We had reading groups that we worked in and I was the worst reader in the lowest group. During the first few weeks of class it was very clear to her what she had in little Face; a smart mouthed, defiant and troubled little boy that constantly tried to create argument, trouble and pick a fight.
About 3 or 4 weeks into the school year she took me aside and forever changed my life. She told me that I was one of the brightest of children she had seen…that I had no idea of the gifts I had been given…that as long as I was in her class she was not going to allow me to waste what I had been given.
“How do you know that?” I sobbed.
“The question, Mr. Face,” she replied, “is how will you know that?”
“I don’t know how?" I wailed.
“That’s why I am here. I am here to teach you how. I am going to teach you to read.”
“But I can’t read,” I screamed.
“No, Mr. Face…you will not read and that is why you can’t read. I will teach you how and you will read and you will learn,” she answered softly, firmly. “But, the decision is yours. You must, yourself, make this decision and make it now...it is up to you and no one else.”
Ms. “Angel” went on to explain that she had spoken with my parents and told them that she was going return me to 2nd grade unless they, and I, agreed that I would; 1. Stop disrupting the class; 2. Stop fighting; 3. Stay after school for 1 hour a day, 4 days a week for as long as she determined. She went on to tell me that my parents thought I should be sent back a grade to “teach me a lesson” but that it was up me whether or not that was going to happen. I must admit here that the big “driver” for me in taking up Ms. Angel on her offer was that I was defying my parents…I honestly think she knew that from the get go.
Over the next months, Ms. Angel tutored and by Christmas break, I was the best reader in the class and her top student. She taught me so much, not just the three “R”, but about dignity, self esteem…on and on…and, she taught me humility. Every Friday, the 5 levels of reading groups would take their reading book and join Ms. Angel at a table in the room. We would take turns reading out loud and then discuss what we had read. They were children’s books, but, the concept and joy of discussing amongst others what all had read was what she was teaching. Several months into our Lyceum together, Ms. “Angel announced to the class that I was now a member of the green group—the best readers in the class. I was elated, stood up and strutted to the table, receiving my “honor” with an “I’m so cool” gait and sassy “Look at me” grin on my face.
Once we were all seated, Ms. Angel sat down, sweetly smiled and looked me.
“Well, Mr. Face,” she said politely, “I can see that you are off to great start here in the Green Group.”
My heart pounded with pride, my head spun with the exhilaration of self adulation.
“Now,” she said, still ever so politely, “please go back to your desk and put your head down until the Green Group is finished.” Tears welled in my eyes and I looked at her, hurt beyond pain. “You seem to have forgotten why we are here, Mr. Face. You didn’t bring your book,” she finished.
As I sat there with my head down the old hates, loathing and angers consumed me. She had betrayed me. She had made fun of me. After some time, I smiled as the warmth and peace of her lesson washed over me—“Don’t Showboat”.
Over the next four years I read incessantly, at every opportunity… Biographies, Novels, History, Astronomy, Physics and then Encyclopedias, increasing from remedial to Adult. Often, while everyone else in the house was sleeping, I would read late into the night, under the covers, flashlight in hand. When I was in 7th grade, by the grace and providence of Ms. Angel’s gifts to me, one day in the library I found a four volume set of books titled, “The Worlds Great Thinkers” and in those books I found Plato’s Dialogue of Socrates, “Meno”.
I was…we all were…Meno’s slave!
I wept the day I read “Meno” the first time.
Up to and including this day while writing this, as a being, I weep unashamedly when I speak of Ms. Angel.
Face
Thanks for wanting to assist. I am just getting some who want me to do it one way, and other who want me to do just the opposite.
Please see my response to NOT OK, and let me know if I am OK in your eyes now, or I am still not OK.I am still a little bit leery about detailing my experiences with Ron as I feel I went way out gradient in my first posting. However, that being said, I will dive off the board once more.
My first communication occurred about 2 AM in the morning in December of 1967 after I had sent him a letter regarding some OT experiences. Someone, a secretary or communicator came on the line wanting to know if the phone line was secure. I assured her it was, and then Ron came on shocking the hell out of me.
I love you you are, and I will do my best. Love John
Yes I know Steve well. We were together when he was doing events presenting a great alien for us to enjoy. It is part of what got me declared, daring to look at "Another Practice" 
Love john