I’m going to be completely transparent and honest here – as a child, I really hated hearing adults tell me that I’d understand something more when I grew up.
It felt like I was being brushed off and told that that person was too busy to answer my questions or to explain something to me.
Come to find out as I did get older, those adults might not have had the answers I sought, so instead of admitting such a thing out loud, they just chalked it up to some sort of adult secret.
Now, I’ve heard that some parents and teachers also told this to children because said child was probably asking too many questions.
I keep meaning to ask my mom if I was a nosey kid that asked too many questions, but work keeps getting in the way!
But, I do recall that hearing such statements from adults also fueled a slightly compulsive need to research things to get answers on my own.
And this was when the Internet was entirely dial-up exclusive while public and school library resources were limited.
I’m still not sure if having a college reading level in the fifth grade helped drive this or made things harder.
I do know that after I exhausted my local options, I was either left forming my own conclusions or taking time to skim other materials in bookstores.
Being driven to always seek out answers back then definitely helped me hone my investigative skills alongside my vocabulary and writing ones, too.
Apparently, a handful of others were noticing that before I did!
A great example came to me by way of my former junior high Texas History teacher.
While attending the Women’s In Touch Initiative (WITI) luncheon last week, I got the chance to sit beside her and we had a lovely conversation where she complimented me and the paper.
I don’t exactly remember too much of her class because it was a facet of history and I didn’t have the heart to tell her that I still don’t find Texas History all that fascinating – but, she brought up a mock trial classroom assignment from back then.
Evidently, she knew that even back then I was destined to be a writer, or work in a field that I’d put my writing skills to use best.
I was surprised and asked her how she noticed that – because I remember finishing notes quickly so I could hunker in the back row and read a fiction novel to pass the rest of the class period more than anything else.
She told me that I had taken very detailed notes as the mock court stenographer for the trial and that they were some of the best she had read.
Plus there were other written assignments where I had excelled and she added that she was proud of me and the work I’m doing now.
Her personal view is that newspapers were records of history that keep accounts preserved for future generations – and I’m paraphrasing here because she said a lot more than this overall.
But, I was mostly just surprised and touched that she felt that way about me and the Sentinel.
Naturally, I thanked her and hope to continue to make her proud while keeping the local news coverage understandable to all.
