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Not Completely Childless

The other day I wrote a list of children-under-19 to whom I have some sort of tie and came up with 24 of them. That was unexpected and made me feel rather cheerful. The thing is, I do rather like children, as anyone who has read my blog for any length of time must know. That said, the children I meet are usually my relations or the offspring of friends and likeminded acquaintances. I do not know   how I would cope as a full-time schoolteacher. Schoolteachers in Scotland quit in droves. 

Today, thanks to the deficiencies of the bus station, I missed my bus to my homeschooling gig. I was so cross I got my fare back, went to the railway station and took a train and then a taxicab to my pupils. I had done quite a lot of preparation for a new writing student, and I was darned if I was going to delay my lesson plan. I arrived in time for lunch, after which I had my first lesson with this new pupil. It went very well. Then I had a lesson with my veteran students, which also went very well.   

It is great fun to visit a household of happy, well-behaved children. Well-behaved, in this context, means disciplined enough to have relatively good table manners and amiable enough not to strike or mock each other (much) or talk back to their parents (often). Even in such well-regulated households there are always elements of spontaneity. Someone loses a diaper, for example, or writes a sudden poem, or needs me to see their new fish, or has an observation about the National Hockey League to share. 

Praise the Lord

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