01.19.09
Playing Opossum
Interesting thoughts can come at interesting times. When going to let the dogs out last night, I was fortunent enough to notice movement in the shadows by the house. It was a opossum, and as the little ankle-bitters (still inside) went ballistic, the creature came right out in front of the doorway. Just a glass door pane (and sunroom walls) dividing about a three foot space between us and it. Of course, I went for my phone (and the camera specifically) but it was scared off by the dogs and gone by my return.
Then came the fun of getting my lantern and a good flashlight to search around the backyard in the dark to be certain it was well away before letting out the dogs.
It was an interesting situation, one that reminded me that often times things that are, in fact, constantly around us develop a strong ‘out of sight, out of mind’ opinion. I know there’s opossums around. And coons, deer, coyotes, and who knows what else. But I don’t see them, so that awareness is in the background and all but ignored until a situation awakens it.
I think that this experience is one that can also be related to teaching. Events exist, students have lives outside of the classroom that affects them, that exist and are very real, but are out of sight of the teacher. As a future teacher, I need to learn to become consciously aware of the things that I am not a part of, by being aware of the surroundings around me to identify the consequences.
After all, if I hadn’t noticed the motion in the shadow, the dogs probably wouldn’t have won.
