Mr. Koss:What's next? The bottom of this page is a long way down there if anyone else would like to jump in.
In your letter to Kimit Muston re his piece "Teenage Dopes" , you decry the "elites" who put together the curricula, and the sorry state of education among todays "yoots" (I just love that word, from "My Cousin Vinny"). But then you wrote this:
"It may sound corny to paraphrase the saying that it's important to understand history, because if we don't, we're destined to repeat it. I really believe that. There is another dark side to this trend. This lack of knowledge and apathy toward not knowing. "
Pardon me, but isn't "apathy toward not knowing" actually a hunger for learning? It's called a double negative. Perhaps the education system in your time wasn't all it was cracked up to be, either,sir??? I kid.
Seriously, the education system in the USA, since it's inception, has been wept over and torn shirted about and denounced. When I was in school, the "yoots" were "running amok and dropping out and ill-behaved, ignorant little heathens!" and the schools "were train wrecks of liberalism and pinko commie teachers!"
Let me tell you a story: a father stayed up all night, waiting for his teen aged son to come home, which the lad did, but with the sun and in through a back door. The father was furious, cuffed the kid in the head, demanding to know where he'd been all night. The kid, with a straight face, declared "I've been here all night!" (Little liar!) The father finally gets out of the boy that he'd been out with friends, drinking and carousing.
This little tale was inscribed on a wall in an excavated stone hovel of ancient Mesopotamia.
And, what with generation after generation after generation of dolts and idiots and dopes and teenaged liars, we still manage to get up in the morning and get on with the business of things. regards (and don't worry so much!)
That invite was taken up by our favourite Tennessee writer, Rosemary Bowery, who spoke thus:
July 15, 2001,
Subject: Teenage dopes.
Dear Bill
Re- Kimit wrote it, Dick responded, Samantha responded. Who's next?
I don't have a response except to say, I do enjoy an exchange of ideas and opinions among learned indivduals. That is one thing that makes 'The Inditer' so enjoyable.
With that we say "thank you kindly" to Rosemary Bowery.
If you haven't used the Inditer.com 'Vox Populi', get started! Send in your comments and critique on writers work. Inditer.com is a community of like minded writers.Inditer dot Com Index - - - Inditer dot Com Main Page
Each wants and deserves the help of the other.
Do it! It won't cost a dime! You'll be glad you helped!
