Welcome, Dear Reader, to 2025!

How strange that date will seem for the first few days or weeks of the year. As with most things, the “new” will wear off the new year quickly, returning us to the same rituals and rote responsibilities from which we have had somewhat of a reprieve during the holidays.

Hopefully you and I will not feel it necessary to turn to therapy to help us cope with life in 2025. Regrettably, not all people are as fortunate as others, and there are those who find therapy and counseling necessary to navigate the stresses life can bring.

I read an email a few months ago in which the writer (I’ll call him Smith) was discussing how much therapy had benefitted him, going so far as to call it “life changing.” Smith shared how much someone (I’ll call her Jones) was causing him frustration. There were things Jones would/wouldn’t do/ways she’d behave that caused Smith to have little or no patience when having to interact with her.

The situation got to the point that Smith discussed it with a therapist. The therapist asked, “… these things you want Jones to do, or what you want her to say, have you expressed those to her? Is it a clear expectation you have with Jones, or is it just a desire of yours of which Jones may not be aware?”

Smith was stunned, having never considered this question. Smith realized that he had never set out expectations for the relationship with Jones, whatever the nature of it might have been. (Interestingly, Smith did stipulate that it was not a marital situation.) Smith realized that he was getting frustrated because Jones could not read his mind.

I do realize, however, that my desires are not the desires of others. When I was teaching, I desired all my students to be well-behaved and learn a lot. There were rules to communicate these expectations, particularly the well-behaved part.

When I was a college student, I had to take a course called “Classroom Behavior Management.” That class taught theories about how to psychologically guide students into appropriate behavior. Theory always falls short when it comes to practice, something that every new teacher learns quickly. There are many brilliant people who cannot teach because they cannot control a classroom.

One thing we were taught was to keep “expectations” (don’t call them “rules”) to a minimum, always stating them in positive rather than negative terms (“do this” rather than “don’t do this”).

Well, I reflected, I do believe God stated the ten commandments that he handed to Moses in “Thou Shalt Not” terms.

When classroom expectations failed to be met (and the theorists recognized and communicated that this would happen), there were “consequences” (not “punishments”). These consequences were never ever to include “corporal punishment” (known as “paddling” in my day).

Well, I again reflected, my first-grade teacher Hazel Butcher must not have taken this course, as I can still to this day feel that flyswatter hitting my shinbones. I don’t think my fifth-grade teacher Polly Dyer ever had that course. Ms. Polly once popped my rear end with a bolo paddle as I passed by her desk after making a loud noise in class after lunch with a push-up container. I know that Horace Maynard High School Principal Joe Day had never taken that course when he favored my behind with two painful licks for acting up in bus wait. I’d have jumped through his office window to get away from him right then if I could have fit through it.

My Classroom Behavior Management course spoke of children receiving the “logical consequences” of their actions. Examples would include: not doing class-/homework, failing to study for tests, and poor attendance would result in failing grades; damaging school property would require parents to pay for repair/replacement; violence to others would result in isolation, expulsion or legal prosecution. It was admitted that logical consequences did take some time to come into evidence.

The consequences I received when I was a student were pretty immediate. It didn’t take Ms. Hazel long to swat my shins when I didn’t do what she told me, it didn’t take Ms. Polly long to pop my behind after making that inappropriate noise, and it didn’t take Joe Day long to give me a choice of two licks or three days, and less than one minute after choosing the two licks that the “Board of Education” was applied.

The resulting desired change in my behavior was quick to come. Those were dishes for which I had no appetite for a second helping.

Though I completed my Classroom Behavior Management course in the 1980s, it was nothing new. I had a history instructor at Lincoln Memorial University at about the same time I took the behavior management course. Ms. Audrey Coulter was a fine lady who had taught public elementary school in Campbell County for a number of years. She told me that during her teacher training several years earlier, a lady had come in to teach the prospective educators how to deal with children. Ms. Coulter said the lady demonstrated with a pointer, which she called a “wand.” She said something like, “Now, children, I’m going to wave my magic wand over you, and you’re all going to quietly do your work and be good little boys and girls.”

Ms. Coulter said one of her classmates asked, “Ord-ree, when you get your own school, are you going to wave your magic wand?” Ms. Coulter said that she replied, “If they don’t do what I tell them I’ll wave a hickory stick across their britches!”

Corporal punishment is no longer very much accepted as a means to discipline students in the classroom, even as both the expectations for teacher performance and the problems students bring to the classroom have escalated over the past few decades. Under these conditions, a successful classroom teacher is a marvel and wonder, almost an enigma. May I express my highest regard for those successful teachers who enter the battlefield of public education every day and emerge victorious, not only for themselves but for those with whom they are entrusted.

Perhaps Smith was a teacher and Jones was a student. Smith said from that point of revelation during his therapy he stopped and took inventory to see if his personal emotions were tied to expectations that had been set with Jones or if they were just personal desires. Smith realized that uncommunicated personal desires were completely on him, and had nothing to do with Jones.

Smith went on to apply this with his interactions with others. He said when he felt “let down” by others, he reflected to see if his emotions were tied to expectations he’d set “with” them or if it was just a personal desire of his. Smith realized if he set no expectations for his interactions with others, outcomes were completely on him.

Smith ended his article with the hope this his realization opened the eyes of his readers, just as his were opened.

Well, hopefully, Dear Reader, both you and I can benefit from Smith’s wise counsel. As we go into 2025, each of us has desires, even if we do not state them either verbally or in writing as formal “New Year’s Resolutions.” Remember, Dear Reader, our personal happiness is a choice that is dependent upon ourselves—it is not the prerogative of the rest of the world to make us happy.

May you choose happiness during 2025, Dear Reader.

Answer to question of the week # 43
Why is there no need for politicians to trace their family trees? (Answer: Their opponents do it for free.)

Question of the week # 44
A woman once said that the hardest part of becoming a married adult was doing something for her husband every single night for the rest of her life. What is it? (See next week’s article in historicunioncounty.com for the answer.)

Happy Thoughts
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If you don't learn to laugh at trouble, you won't have anything to laugh at when you’re old. ― Will Rogers
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If we got one-tenth of what was promised to us in these State of the Union speeches, there wouldn't be any inducement to go to heaven. ― Will Rogers