My Week

Brrr it's cold.  Sure it was colder the first week of January with below zero temps but now we have 9 degrees and lots of wind makes it feel just as bad if not worse.  Really hard to leave the house in weather like this.  That is the benefit to retirement.  The dread of having to leave in snow and cold.  However, I still must.  Erands cannot wait and the class I had enrolled in demands it.  I am grateful for whomever pulled my trash bin toward the house in the wind.  I pulled one out of the road while walking my dogs.  I wasn't sure who's it was so I leaned it near a tree.

As part of a NAI certification class, I was invited to this optional pre-course evening Wednesday:
 

A Slave Owner’s Story:  Interpreting Uncomfortable History

Helping people understand the complexities of a less than comfortable story involves some careful planning. Nothing is ever a simple matter of black and white…not even the institution of slavery and the war fought to end it.  Hear a unique presentation and the other side of the story from a slave owner. Afterwards, be a part of the discussion with the interpreter and explore the power of telling the whole story.

Instructor: Grady Manus, Certified Interpretive Trainer (CIT)

Grady did an excellent job with his impression of Jed Hancock from Jackson, MO.  He described in depth the that as God would take care of his needs, just as a slave owner he was responsible for Henry whom he grew up with, Betty, Jim and Moses.  He told us that the constitution protected his "property" rights.  Regarding slavery, "we have the wolf by the ear and feel the danger of either holding or letting him loose."
- Thomas Jefferson 
He even He surprised audiences telling them that Daniel Boone had slaves and it was the norm.  We tend to picture Daniel Boone in the Disney role without slaves.
 He would give a different response if asked the question "did you ever force yourself on a slave girl?" vs "did you ever have sex with her?"
Many of the post-war slave interviews were that they found "freedom" to be difficult.  Many did not even understand the word, "Free".  
In conclusion, Grady said it best:  If he asked a classroom the pros and cons of abortion and that he would leave the room for 10 minutes for their solution, how would our descendants judge us and will they be as kind to them as we are to our ancestors? The point of historical interpreting is INTEGRITY.  A little girl asked "Why would anybody want to kill Lincoln?"  The story needs to be told.

The class began on Thursday and started out with information about speaking that I already knew but the test questions were not.  However, that familiarity did not last long.  Lynn and Grady were so very clear in making their points that I wished I was as patient getting the message across as they had been.  Then the stress of our 50 question open book test and a 10 minute presentation and outline caused a very sleepless night.  
de-stressing with some wine. My presentation was called "Love Letters and Onions". I did really well but forgot to mention my theme in the opener partly because of the double introduction requirement throwing me off. One to set the stage and one on the clock. I did a perfect time of 10 minutes and 4 seconds. Now the wait for the NAI board.  Those questions were very tricky with double negatives and answers that were definitely not word for word.

A classmate was commuting from Normal to Springfield for this class and taking a toll on her so I invited her to my house Friday night.  Saturday night she had to go home for her presentation props but that one night helped a lot.  She told me she was at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum when the Central IL Civil War dancers performed.  I told her "so was I!".  In fact I was there wearing the same dress that I had worn for my presentation on Sunday.  Amazing that we crossed paths. 
 
Since I had to turn in an outline, the added stress of getting my printer to work led me to run over to Kinkos late Saturday night.  I plugged in my jump drive into the machine and it said "please wait.  This may take awhile".  NO SHIT!  I waited and waited.  Later the clerk asked if he could help.  He got the machine to eject my debit card and printed it on his big copier.  He explained that the machines were running on Windows ME and often had problems like that with newer versions of MS Word.  ALDI was nearby.  Knowing that my Sunday presentation will be stressful enough, I picked up some berries and yogurt for my lunch.  I also got some sweet onions for my presentation.  I had cut them up and put them in my blue antique-like sugar bowl for my punch line - "If you were laid up in a Civil War infirmary, which would do you more: a get well card, or an onion?"

I did miss church because of this class but there was no way around that.  

I had my house measured for carpeting on Tuesday.  Not sure which direction I'll go with that but this old lament needs replaced because it is separating.   I am publishing my blog premature of that answer in order that I can put part of this "weekly blog" in letter format to send to my soldier serving in harms way.