I feel like I can do just about anything after a good night’s sleep. I’m also able to think in a more clear headed fashion. It still remains a time in my life in which I feel like I’m getting nowhere fast. Beam me up, Scottie. But I’m having a good time doing this.

At some point, things that rise must converge (thank you Flannery O’Conner). Because my interests seem so divergent, I don’t right now see how this will come to be. I have been working on two job applications, something that makes me feel really antsy, so much so that I can hardly do this.

Pete enabled me to get the job done. His high degree of diligence in giving me an assist was a motivating factor. For instance, he noted that I needed a philosophy of teaching statement for the Utah job. I had come up with a statement of teaching for the Montana job. So he attempted to make the teaching statement more philosophical.

Today we sat down and together worked further on my philosophy of teaching. I got into it because he got into it. Then, while out trail riding, I mentioned that I had talked in my philosophy write-up about what I’d teach, but had not said anything about how I teach it.

And so, after dinner, we sat down (again at the computer) and I, by long hand, wrote a two paragraph insert for the philosophy of teaching, focusing on the subject of group work (ummm, very important). It came so fast that I later deduced that my subconscious worked on it. And my subconscious later told my conscious to write it down and get it in that document, which I did. This, of course, was a reminder that one must have good work habits; this then enables the conscious and the subconscious to get the job done. If one is all over the place, then the two can’t do their jobs.

Today I also gave Dick Stoffel a riding lesson that consisted of a lecture/discussion, relaxation/stretches, and riding/groundwork exercises. It all went really well, I think.

Midway through our afternoon together, I had Dick ride Raudi. Imagine it – Raudi as lesson horse. I never, ever, in my wildest dreams ever thought that this would come to be. Raudi did amazingly well, and rose to the occasion in fine form. I was like a parent watching their kid doing the lead role in a high school play.

Dick rode bareback, and I worked with him on using images to bring about physical change and to reduce tension. Raudi responded by letting us both know that he was doing things that were to her liking, some of these being dropping her head, licking and chewing, and snorting softly. It could have been that I know how to read her.

The very best part came when she went past the kids playing on sleds in an upper road driveway. Head went up, Dick’s legs went up. Head went down, Dick’s legs went down. This was a great moment in our being together, for I then saw how a rider’s physical state of being affects a horses’ mental state of being, and vice-versa.

An aside – Raudi did equally well out on the trail. I worked on keeping a loose rein while riding down hills. Challenging, I realized just how rein dependent I actually can be.

So what connections are to be made here, in relation to dissimilar interests? I’m not sure at all. Maybe it has to do with teaching, and the fact that I enjoy this. But as to what capacity I might teach in the future – right now I haven’t a clue. Or maybe it has to do with the use of positive reinforcement in doing both. How I will make this connection is yet unknown. Maybe I’ll find a job in a small college and somehow end up doing both. Wouldn’t that be something. Hard to say. I just have the feeling that I am moving forward – I just don’t know what the outcome is going to be.

Next: 35. 2/4/15: Once a Teacher . . .