snob
Do you ever feel yourself becoming/acting like a snob? Lately I have in regards to the school/county I work for.
Demografically, I am very different from the people in this place, we'll call it Pettyville. I grew up in the suburbs of the biggest city of North Carolina, I am a minority, I did not go to a Title One school (a school which 50% or more of the students are on the free/reduced lunch program), I never hunted or lived on a farm. I'm from a whole different type of life. Well, it'd be an understatement to say that I often feel baffled by the ways of Pettyville.
I'm new in town and am only here for a short time, so it's not like I'm trying to change it, but there are often times that I think "there's a better, more efficient way" or something along the lines of disapproving how something is being done.
The other night I was at he high school band concert, I know most of the kids because I interned there a few years ago and helped with the marching band last Fall. Sitting there, in the auditorium, I felt indignation rising up in me. I was aggravated that so many people were talking, messing on their phones (one literally answered his phone during a beautiful quiet part in a piece), walking around, clapping at all the wrong times, and essentially breaking all the rules of concert etiquette. Two seats down was one of my students, whose brother is a senior in band and whose dad was sitting next to him, who was playing some game on his phone during the first third of the concert. As the next group was setting up I told him to put his phone away, like in his pocket...why did I have to do that, why didn't his dad say something? Now I admit that I am a stickler for proper concert etiquette and dress (what the performers wear), but that's because it not only looks and sounds good, but it makes for less of a distraction for the performers. It's about the performers. But, in this case, the performers didn't know any better, so it likely bothered me more than anyone else there.
There are plenty of other examples where that come from, but my point isn't to bash Pettyville; I'm quite grateful that I am employed and that I am learning about so much more than teaching, but how smaller towns run and the mentality behind it. Although, I know not every small town is like this.
It's my hope that since I've realized my up and coming snobbery, that I will correct my mentality of thinking "I know better than that, why don't they, what is the deal?" and just choose to love and learn.
Demografically, I am very different from the people in this place, we'll call it Pettyville. I grew up in the suburbs of the biggest city of North Carolina, I am a minority, I did not go to a Title One school (a school which 50% or more of the students are on the free/reduced lunch program), I never hunted or lived on a farm. I'm from a whole different type of life. Well, it'd be an understatement to say that I often feel baffled by the ways of Pettyville.
I'm new in town and am only here for a short time, so it's not like I'm trying to change it, but there are often times that I think "there's a better, more efficient way" or something along the lines of disapproving how something is being done.
The other night I was at he high school band concert, I know most of the kids because I interned there a few years ago and helped with the marching band last Fall. Sitting there, in the auditorium, I felt indignation rising up in me. I was aggravated that so many people were talking, messing on their phones (one literally answered his phone during a beautiful quiet part in a piece), walking around, clapping at all the wrong times, and essentially breaking all the rules of concert etiquette. Two seats down was one of my students, whose brother is a senior in band and whose dad was sitting next to him, who was playing some game on his phone during the first third of the concert. As the next group was setting up I told him to put his phone away, like in his pocket...why did I have to do that, why didn't his dad say something? Now I admit that I am a stickler for proper concert etiquette and dress (what the performers wear), but that's because it not only looks and sounds good, but it makes for less of a distraction for the performers. It's about the performers. But, in this case, the performers didn't know any better, so it likely bothered me more than anyone else there.
There are plenty of other examples where that come from, but my point isn't to bash Pettyville; I'm quite grateful that I am employed and that I am learning about so much more than teaching, but how smaller towns run and the mentality behind it. Although, I know not every small town is like this.
It's my hope that since I've realized my up and coming snobbery, that I will correct my mentality of thinking "I know better than that, why don't they, what is the deal?" and just choose to love and learn.
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