- Updated 2024.4.24 17:16
- All Articles
-
member
icon
-
facebook
cursor
-
twitter
cursor
An Associated Press article about a New Hampshire woman who earned her bachelor’s degree in education three weeks after her 100th birthday caught my eye some weeks ago. Harriet Richardson Ames had earned a two-year teaching certificate in 1931 and began teaching in a one-room schoolhouse, then later spent 20 years as a teaching principal in Pittsfield, where she taught first-grade students.
Throughout those years, she took classes toward an education degree at the University of New Hampshire, Plymouth Teachers College and Keene State College. She stopped after retiring in 1971 with failing eyesight, and was never sure if she had enough credits to achieve her goal.
Her dream to earn that degree became known when a Keene State film professor interviewed her for a piece on the college’s centennial last year, and the school reviewed her coursework. It was determined that she did qualify for the degree and on Jan. 22, Ames received her diploma at the bedside of the hospice where she was in care. The next day she died, pleased that she had finally accom-plished her goal, her daughter Marjo-rie Carpenter said.
“She had what I call a ‘bucket list,’ and that was the last thing on it,” Carpenter said.
The term bucket list refers to the list of things one wants to achieve before one dies, or “kicks the bucket,” and was the subject and title of a 2007 movie featuring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman.
The story of the teacher made me muse on my own lists for life and how expectations and goals can define one’s reality.
A recent conversation I had with friends showed how our limits can also be defined by our expectations and perceptions. One friend remarked that you can’t do everything you want in life, the other disagreed. My own viewpoint is the former, not because I don’t believe we can’t achieve any-thing we care enough about but because when I tick off something on my own list, I replace it with another dream.
Travel overseas? Check (many times). Travel to Antarctica? Still to be realized.
Each accomplishment brings up the options of what else is possible. Like Ames, I was a latecomer to university study and academic life, not enrolling until after my 30th birthday, and the desire to do so only came about when I checked another item off my list. Unlike her, I earned my degree in the more common four-year-period, but I understand her sense of pride in the achievement. And I hope, also like Ames, to still be dreaming such dreams and striving to fulfill them for as long as I am alive.
For to me, that’s the essence of what makes life worthwhile, to continually strive toward new experiences and learn all one can from them.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
ⓒ Jeju Weekly 2009 (http://www.jejuweekly.net)
All materials on this site are protected under the Korean Copyright Law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published without the prior consent of Jeju Weekly. |
|
|
|
|
| Jeju-Asia's No.1 for Cruise |
|
|
|
Title:The jeju Weekly(제주위클리) | Mail to editor@jejuweekly.net | Phone: +82-64-724-7776 Fax: +82-64-724-7796
#503, 36-1, Seogwang-ro, Jeju-si, Jeju-do, Korea, 63148
Registration Number: Jeju, Ah01158(제주,아01158) | Date of Registration: November 10,2022 | Publisher&Editor : Hee Tak Ko | Youth policy: Hee Tak Ko
Copyright ⓒ 2009 All materials on this site are protected under the Korean Copyright Law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published
without the prior consent of jeju weekly.com.
|
