Time flies

It is hard to believe that school starts in just a few days.

It seems like just yesterday that students were packing up their desks and saying their goodbyes for the summer.

Being that I was a student teacher when the last school year ended, I realized just how emotional the last day can be for both students and teachers!

Many students were in tears either because they would miss their friends, were moving away or maybe a little scared of leaving the comfort of elementary school.

* And yes, even teachers are known to become a little sentimental at the end of the school year. When you spend that much time with the students, getting to know them, encouraging them and helping them on their path to success, you become attached to them.

But the school bell is about to ring on another new year and that process will begin anew.

It is hard for me to believe that my oldest is moving on to yet another grade. It is even harder for me to believe that this time next year our youngest will be entering kindergarten. Time flies.

My daughter is still at the age where she is excited about going to school, seeing her friends and yes, even learning. It gives us such a great joy to see the dedication she has to learning and trying her best. Sure, there are times when the motivation just isn’t there, but for the most part, she is one eager learner.

Hopefully that is a trait that sticks with her and her sister for the extent of their lifetime.

The community of Three Rivers and the surrounding area lost a great friend with the passing of Bruce Snook. My encounters with Mr. Snook were few, and for that I am sad. But the legacy he left behind is one of extreme and impressive dedication. When a town, such as Three Rivers, loses someone of Mr. Snook’s caliber, you have lost a strong and sturdy pillar of the community. His loyalty to bringing out the best in Three Rivers and its citizens was a sight to behold.

I came to “know” Mr. Snook from hearing his voice on the airwaves during his time at WLKM. I am sure that I can speak for many of us when I say his voice is one that was so well known that any time you heard it, whether on the radio or across the room, it brought a smile to your face.

His loss will be felt for quite a while in Three Rivers, but think of the legacy he left behind. That legacy is something we can all learn and grow from and that is best way we can honor him. I am sure Mr. Snook would be too humble to accept the accolades that will surely be coming his way over the next few days and weeks and he would instead thank the community. For your many years of selfless promotion of the city that you called home, we thank you. You will be missed.

“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.

“It doesn’t matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that’s like you after you take your hands away. The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said. The lawn-cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there a lifetime.”

— Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451