September 12, 2016h

Sweatshirt weather.  I am a person made for sweatshirts and mugs of coffee on cool evenings.  It takes me back to camping and bonfires.  Perhaps I have not told you but I was a very good storyteller and memories of autumn evenings take me back to my outdoor education days.  I was in my twenties and could run on very little sleep when I was the program director at a place called Nature's Classroom.  Every week from September to early November a new groups of junior high students would move into the valley on the Illinois River with the education staff.  Other then during heavy rain, we were out in the woods.  Dirty, wet, silly, serious, and involved.  Suddenly math and science were fun as they were cleverly disguised in building rope bridges, calculating how many trees you would need to cut to build a cabin, and identifying animal prints.  In the evening we would gather around the fireplace and I would tell stories.  Not too scary but enough to keep them close to their cabins.

Many years have passed.  I wonder if any of the stories survived.  If you find me I'll tell you about Panther John.