We all have dreams. You know, dreams for the future - what we would like to do with our lives. I was wondering today what it is that pushes each of us toward a particular dream for our lives. What is it that causes us to want to become a fireman or doctor or teacher? Is it our environment at home? Teachers? Friends? Church teachings? I don't know. But what I do know is that we do not have to be raised in the big, bustling city to be successful.
My first teaching job was in a very small Eastern Washington town called Dayton. At that time, Dayton was very busy for a community of about 2,800 folks. Although they produced a lot of wheat, they also employed many people at the Green Giant vegetable canning company. You remember them, "Ho, ho, ho---Green Giant"!! My teaching assignment was four band classes (grade 4 - 12) and one choir (grad 10 - 12). The kids I had were, on the whole, really great and I truly enjoyed them.
One of the classes we did not have in the daily schedule was a jazz band. So I decided that we would start one that would meet after school and maybe we could convince the principal to eventually offer it during the school day. Immediately I had a student ask me if he could play the electric bass. I told him we did not own one and that I really knew nothing about teaching it. He insisted that his parents would buy him a bass and an amplifier. They would even get him lessons!! I could not argue with that. So I said that he could play electric bass. Well, the rest is history. He did very well over the next two years. He played bass ALL the time. He absolutely loved it.
Todd was his name. He went on to become one of the world's finest electric bass players. No really, he truly is a world renowned six-string bass player. He lives in southern California and teaches and travels all over the world. He has written books and has produced teaching DVDs. He even teaches bass lessons online. And he started playing bass in a beginning jazz band in a small wheat-farming community in the middle of nowhere.
But the story does not end there. He was not the only one who had a dream and made it happen. There were many others from my stay in Dayton (only four years) that went on to find an important and successful niche in life. I know I will leave many of them out, but these people come to mind: there is Joe the Ph.D in Pharmacy, Rick the Psychology professor at Idaho State University, there is Ken the Radiology Tech and Jennie who runs the Port of Columbia. There is Vicki who runs her own beauty salon, Steve who is an electrical engineer and his wife, Jeannie, who is an Early Childhood Education professor at Washington State University. Keith is a Network Analyst and Scott coaches high school girls' basketball. There is Taffy who is a Property Manager and there are even three music teachers: Kim, Sharli and Liz. Becky is doing her part to keep our children in safe homes as she works as a social worker and there is Heidi, the physician. Many others, whose names and jobs escape me came from Dayton. I really wish I could remember them all!!
I knew all these people as clarinet, flute, trumpet, sax, trombone and tuba players. There is even a drummer in there. All these people grew up in a community of folks who really cared about offering something important to life. I miss those people and I miss those days. They were good people. People who cared about one another.
One of these days I am going to find a way to see them all again and visit with them. I want to tell them how proud I am of them and how honored I was and am to have been allowed to be their leader for a short time.
Dayton is a place for which I have a special place in my heart. It's a lot smaller now since Green Giant left town. But the people who still live there are the same folks who I remember from the mid-1970's. When I left Dayton, I moved on to bigger things and more advanced musical performers. But the people from Dayton were and are still in my heart. I guess "Once a Bulldog, always a Bulldog!"
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