How strange that 46 years later, I should be thinking of a geography teacher in school; one I didn’t particularly like. A “Miss,” a spinster, a maiden lady as polite society said in those days. I remember how my father of blessed memory would explain the pathology of any woman of a certain age who had not married.  I know now how inaccurate his inferences were, but I was convinced even then that I would be in some kind of trouble at some point, because I might not be the kind of person men wanted to marry.

Miss. G. taught us what she said would be one of the most important concepts of our young lives. We were in suburban Boston, and she had migrated up from the South, the Atlanta, Georgia region, with an accent that did not exactly engender trust in nice Massachusetts girls.

She said the most important thing to learn in geography class was not geography. Countries would change quickly, climates would change less quickly, but we had to learn to think. Read more on The Nature Of Definitions…