English,....101...or somewhere thereabouts....

My wife sent me this.

Coming from the Internet, as was stated, its provenance is unknown but as an article it tickled a remembrance, a feeling or whatever you like as a characterization.

You see,...I am an English teacher of sorts. I say 'of sorts' because I am not a product of the educational system, no lofty arreviste nor parvenue of wisdom, no professional...only an amateur.

I volunteer as a tutor under the aegis of the Literacy Council of Upper Pinellas. That is as in Pinellas County Florida, and for any of you that do not know it is a part of ProLiteracy America.

We teach basic literacy and English as a second language to anyone who has the tenacity to stay with the program. That applies to most of the students who enter our sphere of influence and throughout the years (more than 20 now) I have met many memorable students. Many even like the woman who authored the text below.

Nowadays, the main need is for ESL but years ago in the Allegheny Mountains, the emphasis was on basic literacy and as a then young man, that was always a mystery to me. I had trouble believing that students could complete school right here in the United States and graduate without ever having acquired the ability to read. Sad but true.

As a young tutor and barely out of college myself, I was daily and perpetually amazed at the level of skills I found displayed. Some could read an rite but not cipher. Others could cipher some and read but not rite. 'Book larnin' was something reserved for days when chores were not pressing or families did not need food. Some others, from every age spectrum had skills that were even quite rudimentary.

What follows below is representative of that finding and yet, watch just how well this woman actually does communicate. You will understand all of her thoughts without editing and you will be able to look into her being, and her existence with something as simple as a read through.

Try it.


Years ago, a Tennessee grandmother gave a new bride the following recipe for washing
clothes. It appears below just as it was written, and despite the spelling, has a bit
of philosophy. This is an exact copy as written and found in an old scrap book:

sic.
1. Bilt fire in backyard to heat kettle of rain water.
2. Set tubs so smoke wont blow in eyes if wind is pert or airish.
3. Shave one hole cake of lie soap in bilin water.
4. Sort things, make 3 piles.
1 pile white,
1 pile colored,
1 pile work britches and rags.
5. To make starch, stir flour in cool water to smooth,then thin down with bilin water.
6. Take white things, rub dirty spots on board,scrub hard, and then bile. Rub colored don't bile,
just! rinch and starch.
7. Take things out of kettle with broomstick handle,then rinch, and starch.
8. Hang old rags on fence! .
9. Spread tea towels on grass.
10. Pore rinch water in flower bed.
11. Scrub porch with hot soapy water.
12. Turn tubs upside down.
13. Go put on clean dress, smooth hair with hair combs. Brew cup of tea, drink it and rock a
spell and count your blessings.

God Bless America

~ Author Unknown ~

That was it. Simple and to the point and if you follow these directions you will gain mastery of your laundry.

I know these people, their ways and their hopes. They are, some of them, a part of my ancestry. They were and are none, as a people, any different from you or me today. Strange accents maybe but who amongst us has not experienced that, be it 'down east' or 'down south'.

So if,...we might on some day believe that we are somehow superior beings, that we are in some way better for our elevated literacy, then that is the time to stop and take stock. That is the time to back up and read that last sign on the road signs of life, be it 'Burma Shave' or another prophet.

We are our brother's keeper,...all of us, and that is the simon pure. Let us least ways allow that English as a language is morphing daily. Let us allow that it has been doing that since well before Alfred the Great and let us grant some latitude on the strictness of our ken. (Old English, I know but Alfred would have been with me.)

You try to to be with me as well, and always remember;

Literacy, it ain't just for dummies!