Inside Out Reflection

    Whoa, this is a heavy set of baggage when it comes to movies. It’s heavy emotion wise for me, both movies, actually. 

   I know I usually have some witty starter to my entries, but I don’t really feel witty of late. It’ll come back, I am sure, hopefully soon, because writing about “heavy” stuff isn’t my usual style. Of late, I have been bogged down with a lot of emotions. All I can say of that is, IT’S ABOUT DAMN TIME!

   For a long time now, I can’t even pinpoint exactly when it started, I have had an emotional wall around me, a strong one that kept a lot inside. I think it was designed to protect myself from, well, whatever. Not a lot was getting out except a few moments of anxiety, frustration, and anger. But once those moments were gone, the wall repaired itself. 

   I was not even aware there was a wall. I should have been. Looking back on the recent past , I see where I wasn’t being myself, not opening up to people who are important to me, especially my own family.

   Then I saw “Inside Out 2”…and a few days later I saw the first one. The wall crumbled. Slowly at first, but a week later I rewatched some parts of both and after a talk with my counselor, I began to understand that I was finally beginning to feel liberated in terms of feelings.

   I’ve been crying a lot at odd moments. Lots of thoughts, Lots of reflections.

   In the first one when Riley is finally able to tell her parents she is sad, wow, I think that moment will elicit tears from me every time I see it. That’s ok, that’s my personal connection. Really, I see that moment in the movie and I want to hug that girl myself and let her know her feelings are normal and right to have. The fading of Bing Bong is also a biggie, though I appreciate Richard Kind’s perfect voice for a character created in a toddler’s mind. It made his fading away all the sadder just like the fading away of all young children’s wonderful imagination.

   Some might think it’s only a Pixar movie, why am I getting so worked up and emotional? I guess the answer is that it had to happen. I have been reading and watching videos online about these movies and that I am not the only one reacting this way.

   The main musical theme in Inside Out is also a touching one for me, evoking a lot of emotions about my daughter and the carefree innocence she once had before becoming a "moody" teenager. Believe me, I feel that sense of loss now regularly. I know that childhood innocence and fun is an era I will not feel again, nor see again in Natalie. Another sad feeling, but one I really have no choice but to accept. Thank heaven for all the recorded bits we have of her!

   A lot of sadness and grief in a short time. Playing catch-up I guess, and it is YEARS worth. That's ok. I feel more alive emotionally than going through the motions.

   I am happy to be experiencing these feelings again and to be enjoying a better relationship with my family and myself. So if a couple of animated movies got the tear ducts going, so be it. 

Inside Out

    Whoa, this is a heavy set of baggage when it comes to movies. It’s heavy emotion wise for me, both movies, actually. 

   I know I usually have some witty starter to my entries, but I don’t really feel witty of late. It’ll come back, I am sure, hopefully soon, because writing about “heavy” stuff isn’t my usual style. Of late, I have been bogged down with a lot of emotions. All I can say of that is, IT’S ABOUT DAMN TIME!

   For a long time now, I can’t even pinpoint exactly when it started, I have had an emotional wall around me, a strong one that kept a lot inside. I think it was designed to protect myself from, well, whatever. Not a lot was getting out except a few moments of anxiety. But once those moments were down, the wall repaired itself. 

   I was not even aware there was a wall. I should have been. Looking back on the recent past , I see where I wasn’t being myself, not opening up to people who are important to me, especially my own family.

   Then I saw “Inside Out 2”…and a few days later I saw the first one. The wall crumbled. Slowly at first, but a week later I rewatched some parts of both and after a talk with my counselor, I began to understand that I was finally beginning to feel liberated in terms of feelings.

   I’ve been crying a lot at odd moments. My biggest moment, though was to my daughter. With my wall up, I was sharing things with her that a teenager did not need to hear from her dad. I apologized for that. A moment in the second movie when the main character Riley was having a panic attack struck me immediately and I made the connection to Natalie’s own struggles as a teen. I had no right to add to them.

   And in the first one when Riley is finally able to tell her parents she is sad, wow, I think that moment will elicit tears from me every time I see it. That’s ok, that’s my personal connection. Really, I see that moment in the movie and I want to hug that girl myself and let her know her feelings are normal and right to have.

   Some might think it’s only a Pixar movie, why am I getting so worked up and emotional? I guess the answer is that it had to happen. I have been reading about these movies and that I am not the only one reacting this way.

   The main musical theme in Inside Out is also a touching one for me, evoking a lot of emotions about my daughter and the carefree innocence she once had before becoming a "moody" teenager. Believe me, I feel that sense of loss now regularly. I know that childhood innocence and fun is an era I will not feel again nor see again in Natalie. Another sad feeling, but one I really have no choice but to accept. Thank heaven for all the recorded bits we have of her.

   A lot of sadness and grief in a short time. Playing catch-up I guess.

   I am happy to be experiencing these feelings again and to be enjoying a better relationship with Natalie. She is the best thing I ever created and the best part of me. So if a couple of animated movies get the tear ducts going, so be it. 

Transitions

    About six years ago, I looked at all the rent I paid to landlords over 16 years. It came to about $150,000. What I got from that is, hey, I wonder if we were able to buy a house, would we save some money? Strangely enough, we found a person who worked the numbers and found a way for us to get in someplace. After a very brief search (1 day), we found a house that appealed to us, and after all of the signings and applications and what not, we were homeowners in early August of 2018. In fact, we presented it to Natalie as her big 9th birthday present. Of course, we bought her some other presents, but this was the biggie. 

   And of course, for a few years our mortgage payment was higher than our rent had been so we had to negotiate that with one income. On top of that, our AC unit was old and rusted and needed replacing. Another expense. Plus, the water was crappy, so when a water softener company came knocking, we opened the door and bought. 

   I have no regrets about ANY of this, because I know after a little while, the rent would have become more than we could have handled. I have known for a very long time that with Vickie's health problems she would likely not be able to work again in a traditional job. 

    Having said "no regrets", I think new anxieties came up as a result of the new home dynamic and I did not deal with it well...meaning I did not deal with it in a healthy way at all. My anxieties were turning into sarcasm and anger and Vickie and I fought frequently as a result. And going from a fairly cramped apartment to a decently spacious house, I was able to find some space to "get away" here and there, and often that getaway was on the computer with the headphones on with Vickie watching TV in the same room. We had not fully utilized the loft yet so we were downstairs a lot.

   I am beginning to understand now that my walls were coming up big time at this point. I think I had a similar though shorter-lived period after I got married. Married life was a new thing to me for the first six or seven months, for Vickie, too. We had not talked about the changes we would have to deal with. For a long time, she had the partly negative, partly funny nickname "bachelor teacher guy" for me because even though we were living together for months before getting married, I still had a lot of habits and behaviors from years of being single...MALE single. I still looked up porn on the computer and lef tclothes all around and also said things offhand which I thought were mildly funny but I had not realized made her upset. It was a long period of adjustment. 

   Also in those early days we realized we had something else big in common: bad spending hsbits. I don't remember how many times our bank account got in the negatives back then but it was often, and a fuel for argument, especially at Christmas time. I remember one argument we had after Christmas about funds and I think I moved my body in a way that she thought I was going to hit her and she moved back a bit. I would never have done that to her and it changed a bit how I approached arguing...but not exactly in a healthy way...I just chose to let little bits of anger come out when I felt them but did not find a full release mechanism.

   Coming back to new homeowner days, I was withdrawing without knowing it by early 2019. I was also eating quite unhealthily and not moving a lot. Somehow through all of that I was getting some good blogging done. 

   Not only was I emotionally withdrawing, I was also feeling anger and frustration at work that summer as my bosses did not know what I would be teaching until 3 weeks before we reported back. I was also fearful of a kidney stone procedure coming in late August. Not long after that, we took in a 2 day old kitten that we needed to feed like a newborn, menaing many late night feedings and resulting lack of rest for a month. 

   And then months later COVID came. I was trying to get healthy by eating better and exercising. While this produced some good results, it was creating distance between me and Vickie. She supported what I was doing but she also knew I tended to throw myself head on into things and then crash and feel down about it. Well, time took its toll as I went about my health mission. We slowly got more distant. Well, I got distant, she reacted by buying lives and power-ups for games on her device and buying what seemed like the entire Amazon warehouse. 

   I reacted angrily to those instances which were many and I retreated into many social media platforms and posted and respended to others' posts, really just trying to get attention that I should have been seeking from Vickie. Not necessarily sex but just good 1 on 1 honest communication. She had seen some of what I posted and got very upset, understandably. Natalie had seen me be sneaky on the computer or phone and it affected her as well. And all of my harmful shenanigans were taking a toll of Vickie's relationship with Natalie, resulting in many dinner table arguments and storming off. I did not know how to deal with any of this, how to referee. I shut down even more.

   Bigger shutdowns were happening in 2023 when a debt relief program I had signed up for two years before was showing it had failed and creditors were coming after me. On top of that, an old friend from my early teaching days was drinking herself to death and reached out to me for some kind of help. I had many long phone conversations with her just to keep her alive. She finally went for treatment in late July. When she was fully back on her feet, our conversations continued, but now I was sharing a lot of my grief in life as I saw it then. Once again I was talking to someone else but not my own wife and it was Vickie I was talking and complaining about. My mom was worried about Vickie hurting Natalie and my own frustrations made me lash out about that, too.

   In late November, everything came crashing down as Vickie told me she had seen messages between me and others, particularly the friend and my dad. It was a definite fork in the road on my birthday: sell the house and go our separate ways or work on things just the 2 of us. We chose to work. I was still doing things on social media, not thinking anything of it being damaging, but that was dealt with down the road as well, my need for attention. 

   Wow do I need help!

COVID

    I don't think there has been an era in my life that had as much of a negative effect on my life as the COVID did...or have. I leave that last part ambiguous because I am not entirely sure the whole thing is over.Most people say it is and that there are a just few cases here and there. 

   Either way, it put life into a strange sort of emotional vacuum for me. Well, not an entire vacuum. It left me with feelings of anxiety, obsessiveness, anger, and a good amount of withdrawal. Maybe the better thing to say is a HAPPINESS vacuum.

   Before the whole debacle began, I wasn't doing all that great, either. It's not like the pandemic suddenly thrust me into hell, I was kind of there to start with. My weight was not good and I looked horrible. The summer of 2019 had me diagnosed with a kidney stone and an uncertainty of  what I would be teaching in the fall. Not much exercise going on, either. In fact I remember a photo taken of me and Vickie at the Christmas party at a colleague's house. I looked atrocious. In fact, now when I see a photo of me anytime between 2012 and 2019, I feel a bit sad that I let myself get to that point. Very carb addicted, no self control when there were sweets in the house...and I sought them out at the store. Strange that about 15 years before, I was going to the gym and for a time was looking damn good. Also we had spent a good part of the fall raising a rescued baby kitten from two days old, menaing late night feedings. That had an impact on health as well.

   Right before the 2019 Christmas break, some people at work decided to lead a Biggest Loser challenge for the staff. I figure what was there to lose (except weight). I had already gotten an iWatch for my 47th birthday. The trick was to how to start things right. Someone from back home in Pennsylvania gave me a tip on low carbing my diet. I let the rest of 2019 roll by, getting the bad stuff for the last time for a while. 

   After some early stumbles in terms of my body adjusting (including a bout of gout when I didin't monitor my beef intake), I finally got into a groove of good fats, protein, and low carb snacks. 

   I preface the COVID era with all this because it was what had a major impact for the next few years. 

   In late 2019, I was 226 pounds. By mid March of 2020, I was 202 pounds. A triumph for sure. 

   And then COVID came.

   Well, let's back that up. The various sketchy news reports were starting in early February, translated by Trump as a "no problem, carry on" thing. 

   On March 13, nobody knew what was happening as more cases were reported nationwide and worldwide.

   On March 14, Vickie and I were given tickets for Billy Idol that very night. Not seats, right on the floor standing about ten feet from the man himself! Vickie and I took photos of each other ready for a good time. I was looking so much better than that Christmas party photo already! We had a great time!

   On March 15, Natalie had learned that school was canceled for the next week from her friend's mom and the news came within an hour of that officially.

   The next week was nothing except making sure we had good supplies of necessities in the house. I remember people hoarding water and toilet paper. I just wanted good food in the house.

   For the next two months aside from Spring Break week, we teachers were checking in with our kids weekly, sometimes giving assignments that mattered not whether they were done or not. It was already weird for me. Aside from the well checks and occasional Google Meet, I was doing puzzles and going to the store and watching whatever on the tube. My good eating slipped a bit but not badly.

   After the impromptu "drive thru" 5th grade graduation ceremony in mid to late May, I began what I now consider the insane walking program. It started with some simple walks to the mile-away Starbucks and back. The walks slowly increased to five miles, then six, seven, eight, and finally just one time a ten mile walk! I did this a few times a week, alternating with a "foot rest" day doing practically nothing. 

   All the while, I was still eating pretty well....wait! Not so fast. In my quest for low carb goodies, I got into a bad habit of listening to and reading ads for "healthy low carb" food and snacks. What I did not realize was that many of these snacks were filled with salt, the pork rinds in particular. Still, by July I was down to 185, my lowest in 16 years.

   I had also shaved my head in April, the reasoning being that I hated hair maintenance and if COVID was the end of times, I wouldn't be worrying about hair care. This look would continue for two and a half years.

   Mask mandates began in the summer. They are not missed.

   Our nice next door neighbors moved due to being kicked out unfairly by their landlords.

   In August, we were getting ready for a virtual school year, learning to combine "synchronous leanring time" with "asynchronous learning time" along with creating templates for a system called Canvas that wasn't really used until the next year. For the next three months I taught my kids for small bursts of time on Google Meet, then have a lot of nothing in between. I was sitting in my classroom alone, sometimes going outside for a quick stroll.

   Masks and daily health checks online were mandatory for work.

    And I walked and walked and walked, sometimes going into a short jog for a few feet. I am understanding better now that this was due to a lot of anxiety about myself. One of the things keeping me sane  on the work end was my weekly coffee rotations and brief chats with my friend and colleague Candice.

   In November, on our 14th wedding anniversary, I found out that with the COVID cases on the high rise, all of the teachers were being sent home to work from there for the time being. This was not to be the best time. We had two warring cats that I cussed at in front of my Google Meet. Coffee with Candice was also done as a result until we were all back at school.

   Alex Trebek passed.

   We got new next door neighbors who smoked regularly on their front porch, just 10 feet from our front door. It was to be an acrimonious year and a half.

   My stepdad Don passed on New Year's Day 2021. The odd thing still, to me, is that I shed a few tears when watching Alex's final Jeopardy episode and had not shed a tear over Don.

    In January, Vickie and I got 2 bikes for a total of $100 from an independent seller.

   And a new kidney stone from all of those salty snacks. Tried decaf for a while. Not fun.

   The day after that stone blast, Vickie had a hysterectomy. A week off for both recoveries.

    I finally met all of my kids in person in April. I had met with one over Christmas break at Starbucks. It was a fun almost two months. Even though we were online most of the year, that was one of my best groups ever.

   Another drive through graduation in May.

   With lots of Federal COVID money available, summer school was offered for all of June. I took the whole month for a good amount of pay. Deprived me of a full summer, which in hindsight might have been a mistake. I transitioned from walking to bike rides, including a massive 22 miler one morning, similar to my 10 mile walk a year before. Once again something to prove to myself.

   With that extra money, Vickie and I finally had a chance to stay at one of the Mt Charleston cabins for a night. We also went to Laughlin with our friend Kimberly for a couple of days.

   The new school year began in-person in mid August. Same mask crap, same daily check ins.

   And a new kidney stone from apparently not enough lemon water. Switched back to caffeinated.

   It was around this period, mid to late 2021 that I wasn't acting like myself. Spending way more time online, longer bike rides, avoiding quality family time. Natalie was changing from cheerful kid to  preteen, kind of like Riley in Inside Out.

   In early December, I accidentally backed into the neighbor's car as he was backing into his driveway. Nothing like adding fuel to a cold war!

   In early 2022, all the anxieties over masks, online checkins, available funds and what not, adding in my increasing withdrawal from life, was causing a depression. A few free sessions with a therapist over the phone hit at the iceberg's tip but really didn't resolve anything. My Dad reached out with some money for a fun Spring break and an offer to help with a new car, which came in June.

   Final drive through graduation in May. Mask mandates has gone away unless otherwise directed.

   Only three weeks of summer school offered and taken. 

   Asshole neighbor moved away. Left a bag of cigarette butts in my backyard as a memento.

   In the fall, the daily check-ins went away.

   You'd think with all of that strange hell leaving that I'd be feeling better. I wasn't. In fact, the worst was to come in 2023. 

   I am sure I am not the only person by far who this COVID era traumatized. 

   But then I am also figuring out things started further back than I realized. And it's helping to know that. I'm turning 52 this year and whatever time God has allowed me to have, I want to enjoy that time with my wife and daughter. Before we know it, Natalie will begin to drive and then down the road, leave the nest. I do not look forward to that. 

   Then again, how many parents do?

   To those who made it physically but are struggling emotionally from the COVID era, my heart is with you and wishes you peace. 

   

   

Celebrity Price is Right

    I will admit right here and now that I am a huge fan of game shows, always have been, right at the age of two. Yes, I have vague images of that, watching Chuck Woolery host the original version of "Wheel of Fortune". I also loved "High Rollers" as a kid. That show introduced me to Alex Trebek. Other early loves were "Hollywood Squares", where I saw the comic genius of Paul Lynde's bitchiness and the hosting mastery of Peter Marshall; "Joker's Wild", where I got a glimpse of what slot machines were, and "Tic Tac Dough", which used early computer graphics on a tic tac toe board. 

   An old favorite which has since grown stale for me was "Family Feud". What I really looked forward to as a kid was the fast money game, the rest of the show was just filler...kind of like the old "Ultraman" shows were...the first 2/3 of the show was filler until Iota turned into Ultraman to defeat the episode's threat to Japan...er, Earth. Back to Feud, as an adult, I watched the John O'Hurley and and Richard Karn versions with Vickie. When Steve Harvey started, it was pretty cool but as the years have gone by, it's like the answers got dumber and/or raunchier just to get Steve's famous facial reaction and retort.

   One show I did not watch much as a kid but caught more of as an adult was "Match Game". I enjoyed this one less than Hollywood Squares, at least the 1973-82 version. Lately, Vickie and I have been watching the Alec Baldwin era, which is raunchier but funnier and has a better rotation of celebrity panelists than the 1970s version.

   Of course, we have to mention "The Price is Right", a favorite for any kid home sick or faking sickness to stay home to avoid PE. All those pricing games are classics, along with the wheel and showcase showdown. I am old enough to remember when Bob Barker kept his hair artificially dark until I was in 9th grade. The natural gray only helped his ratings and the old ladies loved him even more than they already did.

   And then there is the classic "Jeopardy". I never caught the 1964-75 years with Art Fleming except in rare YouTube clips. To me, there will never be a better emcee of this straight out quiz show than Alex Trebek. His passing still saddens me as I grew up wth the man, as a viewer anyway.

   Sometime in the 1990s, there was a new trend of game shows...letting celebrities be the contestants instead of crap-shoot panelists. I say crap-shoot because it was obvious to me that some celebrities were out to make sure a contestant they did not care for lost. Now, if a contestant had made a pile of money already, this tactic made sense. There was no social media or other media hype of game show contestants back then, so there was no viewer pressure. There was a bit in Peter Marshall's book about Squares when there are times when Paul Lynde didn't like a contestant and he was brutal...of course he was often several drinks in anyway.

   Incidentally, if I ever had the opportunity, I'd host a local version of Squares, with local celebrities. Peter Marshall, John Davidson, and Tom Bergeron always looked like they were hosting the greatest party in the world. That's an enviable gig!

   The first celebrity contestant experiment was Jeopardy, and this was often funny to watch. Quite often we associate actors and reporters as larger than life, but when they try to buzz in or are wrong when they so confidently gave the answer in question form, it made them just a bit more real and down to earth. Of course, the money won went to a favorite charity.

   We also had Celebrity Family Feud when it was on ABC. Lots of retro shows and soaps "battled" it out for charity. The laugh here was seeing our old favorite show actors older.

   Here's what I would like to see...Celebrity Price Is Right! However, there's a catch. These celebrities need to be down-on-their-luck has-beens who never did their own shopping until recently. Also, we need a bit more sarcasm to fit this kind of show. As much as I love Drew Carey, I think Joel McHale would do well here, both as host and announcer.

"Mel Gibson, come on down! Nicolas Cage, come on down! Lindsay Lohan, come on down! Kim Basinger, come on down! You're the first group of has-beens on The Price is Right!"

   I can just picture their difficulty at guessing how much common consumer products cost. I would imagine Donald Trump having the same kind of difficulty and he’s always been well-off.

   Now, as these are has-beens who have experienced financial troubles, they would be their own charity, but having been at the top, the prizes would need to be more humbling. I can just see it:

   Joel: Come on up, Nic. Ready to win something for a change? 

   Nic:Hey, I won an Oscar, asshole!

   Joel: Yeah, 20 years ago. Now you're the king of straight to video.

   Nic: Enough already!

   Joel: Well, let's see if you'll feel enough for a USED CAR!  (an old tan sedan is rolled out) Yes, it's the 1980 Chevy Citation! Shakes when it goes past 55, an AM only radio, and a ceiling that sags on your head. This can be yours IF the price is right!

   The showcase showdown would have none of the frill of what we see daily. "The first showcase is for Mel...where does everyone like to shop? You guessed it: Wal Mart! Enjoy a $500 Wal Mart gift card so you can enjoy the everyday wonders of waiting behind two women in their pajamas arguing over ramen flavors while texting, making your wait for a week's worth of soup dinners interminable. And for Lindsay: the same Chevy Citation that Nicolas Cage didn't win, plus a cash prize of $5,000, which will go directly to those you owe money to."

   Too over the top? Maybe. Too humiliating? Perhaps. It really doesn't matter since this is all fantasy. Just remember to gets your pets spayed or neutered. Bob IS watching!

   

Darnell

    Well, with all good (and bad) things in life, all eras come to an end, and I am currently at the end of a big one. A 13 year era in fact. Of course, it doesn't hold a candle to Johnny Carson's 30 year reign as the host of the Tonight Show, but hell, that guy was only working a couple nights a week anyway in his last decade.

   I have been a classroom teacher for an entire 22 years now. Well, if you include my northern California subbing years, it's actually 26 1/2 years, more than half my life. Yet, the subbing years were not an every day thing at first. The consistent 5 days a week gig began when I moved to Las Vegas in August of 2002.

   In that time, I have worked at 3 schools. The first one was Tom Williams Elementary for an 8 year period. It was a good school with a lot of diversity in its student population and boy did I learn a lot of lessons there. The big lesson was to not try to get promoted to a position where I had no competence. Lots of teachers were promoted to a position known as "Title I Specialist"...and their main job was to infiltrate teacher conversations and report anything suspect back to the boss. Other than that, they looked to buy things with title money from the Federal government that eventually were stored and no longer wanted or used, especially technology.

   My second school was also good. It was Gilbert CVT, a magnet school focusing on the arts. If circumstances had been better I could have done well there, but life threw me some monkey wrenches before I even started at Gilbert, and the result was not being prepared for good classroom management and coming into constant conflict with the boss. I lasted precisely a year and a month and a half there.

   And then we come to era number 3: Darnell Elementary. This place has been my home for 13 years and it is a bittersweet departure...sweet with some things and bitter with others. But with any long period at a workplace, that just happens.

   I arrived at Darnell in October of 2011, still shaken from my time at Gilbert, which had just ended a day or so before. I was assigned to 4th grade, a classroom where a long term sub had been teaching for over a month. A lot of people working there were not sure about this new guy at first. Neither were the bosses and they soon decided to get this traumatized guy some help and encouragement, and by the year's end...my 10th one in the Clark County School District...I was feeling much better about myself and more confident in my teaching.

   In the next year, I was put in a different classroom (with windows) and now doing 2nd grade. I was also with a solid team who helped me get on the right track quickly. Later in the year, I was invited to take part in a school play, part of a series actually, that helped kids to learn life skills. I was so eager to get into it that I MEMORIZED my lines, not realizing that it was readers theater and that I could have my script in my hand. I'm not sure if I impressed or scared my colleagues then, but the play served as a good way for all of the staff and kids to know who Mr. Moore was.

   In that same year, my wife thought it would be a good idea for the kids to write letters to the namesake of our school. The day before Christmas break of 2012, my class and I got a visit from Dr. Marshall Darnell and his wife, thanking us for our letters. It was then that I knew that I had found my new happy home. On top of that, our art teacher Frank who led the televised morning announcements, wore black on my 40th birthday and told everyone to bow their heads in respect of my 40th!  I will miss Frank next year dearly!

   The following year, I was asked to move classrooms but stay in the same pod. I would teach second grade in that windowless room for 3 years before being asked if I would move out to the portables. Thatwas a good move because the portables had great and controllable AC! I would teach 2nd for two more years and then first for one year.

   In all this time I became a de facto producer of the life skills plays as well as a co-producer of the televised announcements before the studio shut down in favor of intercom announcements in 2015. As a lot of the school's TVs were breaking down ne by one, this was a good move. The life skills plays were pretty much fizzling out due to staff reluctance to participate and I had to cancel our early 2019 show...that one was a bummer. I also became the intercom announcer in the fall of 2018, a position I'd cherish for the next 5 years. During COVID I recorded announcements and shared them with teachers to play to their class.

   In 2019, I was asked (2 weeks before teachers reported back to work) to take on 5th grade in a class rotation among 3 teachers experiment. I started in the portable, but by October it was clear that the system did not work in the switching of classes so I moved into the 50s pod. It was still a disastrous system, but we stuck by it right up to March 13 before we all went out on COVID. For the 2020-21 school year, I moved into the room 2 doors down that had windows, evne though I would be the sole occupant for the next almost 7 months. When COVID cases got really bad, we all had to teach from home starting in November. We were allowed to come back in by late January if we followed the pandemic protocols.

   In 2023 I went back to first grade by my request for a younger grade. In terms of the kids, it has been a good year, but a lot of factors were in place that made me decide to seek a new school. One of them was a desire to be closer to home and my daughter's high school, since my morning commute was 17 miles this year. Another was the opportunity to finally teach 3rd grade. As for other factors, well, they are not for public eyes.

   In all this time, I had the pleasure of having my daughter Natalie at Darnell for 5 years. She had some really great teachers during that time, her favorite being Mr. Games. Everyone who worked at Darnell got to know her since she was 2 years old and often coming at the end of the day.

   When I first came to Darnell, Mrs Cobb was the principal. She was a warm, friendly boss who accepted me for who the quirky person I was. The assistant principal was Ms. Ivey until 2013, then Dr. Fisher from 2013 to 2015, Mrs. Durham from 2015 to 2019, Mrs. Ivey again from 2019 to 2023, and then Mrs. Cano from 2023 to the present. I would say the assistant principal I had the best relationship with was Ms. Ivey.

   Mrs. Cobb retired in late 2022 (she gave us a week's notice as it was right before Christmas break). An interim boss came in for a month or so while a search commenced. In February, Ms. Gray was our new principal. She was a lot firmer and more direct than Mrs. Cobb...and with our school population of kids and parents, this was an asset. 

   In all of these 13 years, I have met and worked with some good people. Of course, not everyone is a friend, at least outside the school walls. With some I have met for lunch, had drinks at a local bar, did trivia, practiced acting with a local improv group, came to their house for a holiday party, and once even came over just to swim. With most others, I worked with them, and that was it, much like any other workplace.

   I shall walk away form Darnell knowing I spent some good quality time of my life there, and now I look forward to a new adventure.

   

Valley of Opportunity

   

When one hears the name 'hidden valley', they might assume someone is on a salad dressing kick. Of course, there are many valleys that are hidden because they are off the beaten to death path. Often they contain no paved roads and just might be home to a person of means who wishes to eschew general human contact. There are times I envy those who can attain that kind of freedom.

There is one sort-of hidden valley in the Mojave Desert that is of some note. It holds a town that Vickie and I like to frequent when we can afford it. Before a couple of major developments in the 20th Century, this valley was quite barren of human activity...once again, not such a bad thing. This valley is known as the Colorado River Valley.

Aside from the presence of the indigenous Mojave people of the region for centuries, construction of the Davis Dam on the Colorado River between 1942 and 1953 required an encampment of workers, similar to how Boulder City in Nevada housed the workers of Boulder Dam, later renamed Hoover Dam. That settlement would later grow into a town called Bullhead City in Arizona. Davis Dam is another cross-river connection between Nevada and Arizona, much like Hoover Dam 70 miles north.

The other major development in the valley began in 1964 when Minnesota-born Don Laughlin, fresh from selling his 101 Club in North Las Vegas, flew over the desolate valley and saw an opportunity. He bought a boarded up old motel in an area then known as Tri State (California-Nevada-Arizona) and within 2 years remodeled it to have a small restaurant selling 98 cent all-you-can eat chicken dinners and a small group of slots. Within decades, Don Laughlin had built that small outfit into a major hotel-casino boasting many slots, table games, fine restaurants, a top notch bowling alley, and 6-screen movie theater as well as a venue for top comedy and music artists. The town containing his casino, Laughlin, was given its name by a fellow Irish postal worker who said the place needed a name so Don could receive mail. The town of Laughlin, Nevada now holds several casino-hotels on Casino Drive and has expanded to a small but growing desert community outside the casino row, although many residents work in the hotel-casino business as do residents of Bullhead City.

At one time, people had to cross the Davis Dam and then head south from Arizona to reach Laughlin, but Mr. Laughlin funded a modest highway bridge to funnel traffic across the Colorado River in 1987.

However, Bullhead City and Laughlin are just the northern end of the Colorado River Valley, if the most populated. On the Arizona side, AZ highway 95 in Bullhead stretches a few miles south and then passes through Fort Mohave. Miles south, the area is still populated here and there, though not centrally, until AZ 95 crosses a modest bridge over the river into Needles, California.

Ah, Needles! Sadly, this is what I consider to be the armpit of the Colorado River Valley. California holds only a small part of the valley and does not appear to value it in terms of state and/or county government. Another aspect of Needles is that it is a relic of the old route 66, a ghost that is more supported and honored in Arizona. When I 40 supplanted 66, much local business was hurt, and the interstate bisects the town into 2 equally run-down parts. The funny thing is that the locals of Needles don't get their gas in their own overpriced town, they get it in Arizona, where the nearest station is about $3 a gallon less.

Actually, if one follows 40 into Arizona, the first exit is for old 66 into its original roots of Topock and Golden Shores before heading northeast into the high hills for Oatman, a dangerous road that was rerouted to safer areas in 1953. From Golden Shores, there is a small network of roads heading back to AZ 95, connecting that part of Arizona well.

On the Nevada side, NV 163 takes drivers from US 95 (AZ 95's parent route) just north of the CA-NV (within a mile in fact) to Laughlin. Just west of Laughlin, there is a turnoff for Needles Highway, a really neat unnumbered desert road also leading to the armpit town. The Nevada portion is well maintained, the California portion is bumpier. Along the way, the Needles Highway passes through the residential portion of Laughlin. Also, there are two access points to the Avi resort/hotel/casino. Vickie and I stayed there a few times, not bad in terms of a place to stay and play, but away from the wide part of the river that we love so much.

So what is it about this valley that I find so fascinating? For one thing, the people in the whole region seem friendlier than in the more metro Las Vegas. Definitely there is a more pronounced population of the "desert rat" so commonly mentioned by those who pass through and stupidly buy the gas off I 40. Also I just find this "hidden valley" so full of potential riches in terms of story. The scenery on all sides is spectacular, with many of the mountains so ruggedly carved ages ago by the then-wilder Colorado River.

Vickie and I love taking the Celebration Cruise every time we go to Laughlin. It gives a rich history of the river and Don Laughlin (a man so worth a movie by himself) that I never tire of. We play slots sometimes but I know I am a horrible gambler while Vickie often finds small luck. We also cross into Arizona to fill up at the Sam's Club so visible from the Laughlin hotel rooms and swing into central Bullhead to the Pizza Hut where one can still sit and dine. Bullhead lacks a distinct center, and sometimes just driving down AZ 95 is a joy in itself.

The valley is just 100 miles from Vegas via NV 163 and US 95, 132 miles from Vegas via AZ 68 and US 93, about 33 miles from Kingman AZ (a great 66 mecca!) and if you feel adventurous, 30 miles from Oatman, a home to burros and 66 history and good souvenirs...and if you absolutely need to see Needles, by golly go see it. The Wagon Wheel Restaurant is pretty good.



In closing, I highly recommend this area as a desert side trip or even main event as there is a lot to see, do, and just experience and enjoy. Where you get your gas is your own business.