My dog Dudley knows that as soon as he finishes his dish of food, he will receive a dog biscuit and a chew stick (good for his teeth). This pattern has been in place over the past three years, but Dudley has learned to try coming to me, licking his chops, as though he has finished his food, even though he hasn’t actually even touched it. I fell for this deception only a couple of times, but once in a while he still tries it again, hoping for his dog treats without having had to eat his real food.
It’s an old trick, one that I should have recognized sooner, because as a kid, I tried the same thing on my parents, hoping to get dessert without having to eat my spinach. The irony here is that it was my dog Sleepy during my childhood, who was only too happy to take off my hands things like spinach or Brussels sprouts under the table. No wonder he lived such a long time!
About John
About John
John Bolinger was born and raised in Northwest Indiana, where he attended Ball State University and Purdue University, receiving his BS and MA from those schools. Then he taught English and French for thirty-five years at Morton High School in Hammond, Indiana before moving to Colorado, where he resided for ten years before moving to Florida. Besides COME SEPTEMBER, Journey of a High School Teacher, John's other books are ALL MY LAZY RIVERS, an Indiana Childhood, and COME ON, FLUFFY, THIS AIN'T NO BALLET, a Novel on Coming of Age, all available on Amazon.com as paperbacks and Kindle books. Alternately funny and touching, COME SEPTEMBER, conveys the story of every high school teacher’s struggle to enlighten both himself and his pupils, encountering along the way, battles with colleagues, administrators, and parents through a parade of characters that include a freshman boy for whom the faculty code name is “Spawn of Satan,” to a senior girl whose water breaks during a pop-quiz over THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS. Through social change and the relentless march of technology, the human element remains constant in the book’s personal, entertaining, and sympathetic portraits of faculty, students, parents, and others. The audience for this book will certainly include school teachers everywhere, teenagers, parents of teens, as well as anyone who appreciates that blend of humor and pathos with which the world of public education is drenched. The drive of the story is the narrator's struggle to become the best teacher he can be. The book is filled with advice for young teachers based upon experience of the writer, advice that will never be found in college methods classes.
Another of John's recent books is Mum's the Word: Secrets of a Family. It is the story of his alcoholic father and the family's efforts to deal with or hide the fact. Though a serious treatment of the horrors of alcoholism, the book also entertains in its descriptions of the father during his best times and the humor of the family's attempts to create a façade for the outside world. All John's books are available as paperbacks and Kindle readers on Amazon, and also as paperbacks at Barnes & Noble. John's sixth book is, Growing Old in America: Notes from a Codger was released on June 15, 2014. John’s most recent book is a novel titled Resisting Gravity, A Ghost Story, published the summer of 2018
View all posts by John →
Very interesting and common to my life in Indiana . I was born in northern Indiana in l934 and lived there until I enlisted in the army (WAC). My sisters were teachers and graduates of Indiana University, both sisters have passed away. I never attended college but wrote family stories and poems until my vision failed. I enjoy reading your style of writing.
Thank you, Ethel, for your kind words. I’ve been retired since 2004 but will always keep many fond memories of my 35 years in the classroom as a teacher. Best regards, John