Ready ... Set ... Blog

Hello everyone ... I am the Divine Mrs. M. (a/k/a Melanie Miller), an adult student revisiting a dream which began a long time ago with part-time evening college classes (when time and money would permit) in hot pursuit of finally obtaining the one thing I have been striving for but has always been just slightly out of reach ... a degree in Secondary Education English.  At the ripe age of 41, my time has officially come, and I am a full-time college student.  No longer spending my days toiling away writing speeches and correspondence for a local State Representative, I am now filling my hours with reading (a lot of reading) and homework assignments, being tutored by my teenage children in math and biology and forever being humbled as I find myself sitting in class next to students who are less than half my age, some of whom I used to assist as teacher's helper in their elementary classrooms, chaperone on field trips and host slumber parties for under my own roof.  C'est le vie.  Henry Ford once said, "Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty.  Anyone who keeps learning is young."  I guess that makes me 41 years young and counting. 

Becoming a high school English teacher has been my lifelong dream.  Why?  For one, I really enjoy interacting with teenagers.  Strange ... but true.  I find that teenagers are young enough to still be idealists in nature and have increasingly interesting points of view.  If you ever let them speak.  Which, unfortunately in my experience, is not the case with a lot of adults I  have come into contact with whom seem to readily dismiss their opinions.  The fact that I do not may explain why on any given night at the Divine Mrs. M.'s household, you can find a group of teenagers eating and having lively debates around the dinner table. 

Second of all, I have an unabashed love for the written language. I read approximately one book per week.  I believe the youth of today should be required to read the American classics, poetry and British literature as it offers them a glimpse into specific periods of history and the cultural influence and social norms of times long past.  Great literary authors embedded their works with rich insights as to what was happening politically and socially in the world around them under the guise of fiction. 

In my early 20's I started my career as a supervisor at a nationally known insurance corporation in the transcription department.  This job required me to assure that every piece of correspondence, claim information and policy manual to be 100% grammatically correct.  In essence, I was an editor.  This attention to detail has led my children to sometimes go over the edge when I proofread their work and handed it back with countless red marks for correction.  But as the years have passed and they have grown older, the red marks have diminished in number and they earn praise from their teachers on their writing skills.  Which leads you to the other reason I aspire to be an English teacher.  I cannot, no matter how hard I try, read anything without mentally correcting the grammatical mistakes I encounter (Although let me make a disclaimer here that while I strive for perfection, I am not perfect and in the course of blogging I am bound to make a few grammatical mistakes as well.  Perhaps even in the blog in which you are reading.)  In a world that spins on a technological axis, I am afraid the art of writing is in peril.  I believe students should know how to construct intelligent, grammatically correct statements.  Something other than "C U at 2," the shorthand that is now becoming commonplace in the world of texting and e-mails. 

So there you have it.  A lengthy introduction, I know.  But, here I am at 41 pursuing my college degree hoping to open the eyes of the leaders of tomorrow by teaching them the importance of literature and the ability to express themselves clearly and appropriately through written communication.  I am hoping by continuing the blogging process I can find like-minded individuals, regardless of what their chosen specialty may be, who are eager to enrich the lives of today's youth through the exchange of ideas, techniques, etc.