WHO YOU ARE SPEAKS LOUDER TO ME
THAN ANYTHING YOU CAN SAY
 
an excerpt from Lee Ryan Miller’s
TEACHING AMIDST THE NEON PALM TREES 

      At the beginning of my 8:00 a.m. class one Monday at UNLV, I cheerfully asked my students how their weekend had been. One young man said that his weekend had not been very good. He’d had his wisdom teeth extracted. The young man then proceeded to ask me why I always seemed to be so cheerful. 

     His question reminded me of something I'd read somewhere before: “Every morning when you get up, you have a choice about how you want to approach life that day,” I said to the young man. “I choose to be cheerful. 

     “Let me give you an example,” I continued. The other sixty students in the class ceased their chatter and began to listen to our conversation. “In addition to teaching here at UNLV, I also teach out at the community college in Henderson, about seventeen miles down the freeway from where I live. One day a few weeks ago I drove those seventeen miles to Henderson. I exited the freeway and turned onto College Drive. I only had to drive another quarter-mile down the road to the college. But just then my car died. I tried to start it again, but the engine wouldn’t turn over. So I put my flashers on, grabbed my books, and marched down the road to the college. 

     “As soon as I got there I called AAA and asked them to send a tow truck. 

The secretary in the Provost's office asked me what had happened. ‘This is my lucky day,’ I replied, smiling. 

     “‘Your car breaks down and today is your lucky day?’ She was puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’ 

     “‘I live seventeen miles from here.’ I replied. ‘My car could have broken down anywhere along the freeway. It didn't. Instead, it broke down in the perfect place: off the freeway, within walking distance of here. I'm still able to teach my class, and I've been able to arrange for the tow truck to meet me after class. If my car was meant to break down today, it couldn't have been arranged in a more convenient fashion.’