"Teacher Man"

Last night I finished reading Teacher Man by Frank McCourt, the third book about this author's life. Neither the second nor the third book was as good as the first one (Angela's Ashes), but they were interesting. This third book was, as the title implies, all about Mr. McCourt's teaching career. He taught English and Creative Writing in New York public high schools. My favorite phrase from him (about not giving a "fiddler's fart") was in this book a couple times, along with some pretty humorous situations. Overall, this book reminded me to be real with people. I'm not better than anyone else and no one else is better than I am. Each human being has different skills and talents, but being better at something in particular doesn't make a person any more worthwhile or important than someone else. Pretending to be something that we're not or wishing to be something that we're not causes stress and frustration. The wiser way to live is to accept other people for who they are, and accept ourselves for who we are (while, of course, striving to grow more mature and more like Christ). "Fake" has always been a huge pet peeve of mine, and this book reminded me that "real" is so much better, even if "real" isn't exactly "normal" socially.