"I wish every class I taught had an institute like this," I told my friend, "because I would be there." After Monday's class of useful instruction on the "what," "how," and "why" of teaching Advanced Placement English, I was thankful I had signed up and couldn't wait to learn more on Tuesday. Then the rain came. I left home Tuesday morning about 20 minutes early, in case I had to take an alternate route from our home outside of Novinger into Kirksville. I soon found out that "alternate" was an understatement.
All three routes were blocked by flood waters from the estimated six to eight inches of rain overnight. I wasn't giving up, yet. I turned around and went home to see if my husband could drive the truck through waters that I wasn't going to risk in my car. He checked the levels and thought we could take the longest route if it wasn't blocked farther down the road, but when we headed that way, the water had risen in the little time it had taken him to come get us. We turned around and went home. We weighed our remaining options. There was only one other way around the waters, and that was by taking deer trails through the woods. Daniel thought even the old Bronco 4 x 4 might get stuck in there and suggested we take the horses until we reached a place where my father-in-law could pick me up. While my husband is an experienced rider, I wasn't really excited about the prospect of sloshing through the woods, bouncing around for three miles on a horse I had barely ridden.
As I walked into class, the mud brushed off my boots and my hair back in place, my instructors and classmates greeted me enthusiastically and listened to how I got to class come hell or high water.
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