Thinking and Seeing Things Differently

All my life I've seen things differently from most people. It's made friendships very difficult. Edith has been a real Godsend because she sees things about as oddly. I think that's what makes our version of school just a little different and a little more fun for the kids. It's a kind of what on earth will those crazy women think of next.

When I worked for the paper, I was always in hot water about what I wrote about. When I wrote for John Reiter, I always made him laugh. He loved the dangerous edges I found and the rock throwing a fair deal.

When John left Evansville, I started writing for Linda Negro, and she found nothing I wrote palatable. Personally, I find her likes and dislikes a bit pretensious - I mean applesauce is applesauce; it all tastes like muck anyway unless you make it from scratch, and few people know how. I remember reading
one of her reviews of a place in Dale, Indiana, Wyndell's, that
I've eaten in for 35 years. She reviewed what amounts to a mom and pop diner like a four star restaurant. It was hilarious and she took it deadly serious.

I'm different and my food likes and dislikes are on a different menu. So are my childcare likes and dislikes. So are Edith's.

I've wanted to write about this since Linda told me to stop writing about day care. I was offending the status quo and that was a sin against man.

But the status quo is pushing an agenda on the public that doesn't work, I lamented. It's a crime against kids and it's bleeding the parent's dry. Apparently that was too bad because advertising is a major $$$ contribution to the paper and childcare is not.

So for a long time, I've kept our differences to ourselves with the exception of doing our own thing.

Since I've been duly fired for being too something or other, I think it's time to launch a review of the real story of childcare. It's going to come out in bits and pieces because that's how I review most things - in little chunks.

You will find a link to two sites that contain rules for childcare licensing and a site for the specific rules for day care on the links list. They are interesting to read for the concentration on space and plumbing. If you get to the lighting and read 5o candle watt hours, think that we have 200 candle watt hours, 100 with the lights off. If you can't grow a plant, you can't grow a child. So look around most childcare facilities and watch the flowers grow!

Now the Garden School is not a day care. We decided ten years ago that the idea of school suited us a lot better than day care. And naturally, there is no category for us. We are listed as a licensed exempt center because we have a real kindergarten and a first grade classroom with licensed teachers. It's not on the books, so they came up with that.

The State of Indiana told us not to bother them with licensing us as an elementary school because the expense and time would not be worth the effort unless we added a second grade. We just don't have the playground for second graders.

I'm friends with Bob Mills who happens to be the consultant for childcare through the Welfare Department, but it took a long time. Bob has his own ideas on childcare and is usually a dreaded figure among directors. I invited him to the Garden School and he just loved us. He wanted me to get a day care license, but Edith and I want a school not a day care.

So here we sit in between with a place to grow for kids ages three through seven. We've been copied, however, by a place in Newburgh. Haven't been there yet.

In the next few weeks, I'm going to post a lot of things to think about. I hope you enjoy it.