“Teaching the Poor,” by Doug Johnson

Dedicated educator Doug Johnson inspires us with these thoughts. –JGR __________________________ The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference.The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference, and the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.— Elie Wiesel Teaching the poor, like any other human…

Sunflower Journal Led Me to Sunflower Festival

Sunflowers grace the front of my journal and now that I’ve come and gone from the Mountainaire sunflower festival I notice this correspondence. The Heritage House sitting room/parlor. Silver tea set on oval tea table. Golden light filtered through curtains. parquet floor.A sense of peace, contentment and fulfillment, satisfaction from completing my New Mexico visit….

Hi, Honey! I’m Home! …as Civil Rights Dreaming Comes Into Its Own

And, what a homecoming it is…with the athletic olympics ending and the political olympics getting more heightened with the conventions in full gear. On this day in 1963, 200,000 people participated in a peaceful civil rights rally in Washington, D.C., where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech in front…

Parents Transfer Country Upbringing to City Life

I talked to a 6-year old girl after watching TV. She said, “TV sucks my brains out.” I talked to parents who grew up in the country and small towns. They told me: 1) They’d identified core values they received through their country and small town childhoods. 2)They committed to transferring those values 3) They’d…

From Floods to Flames…series on Mississippi Floodstage starts tomorrow just as I go towards the firestorms.

For those of you who know your geography and follow the news, you know that for the past month we’ve had flooding here in Missouri and Southwestern Illinois. Some of you have emailed me asking for updates since I haven’t posted about the flooding on Riehlife. My feeling was that I wanted to wait until…