PIANO'S AND CRITICAL THINKING
Now that I'm retired I've considered several activities to engage in. Engage in at my leisure and in a way that suits me. Hmmm. That sounded kinda selfish, but there it is and I can't really change the statement substantially and still say what I wanted to. So, one of the things I would enjoy would be to teach begginner guitar and mandolin to those who have a desire to learn how to play them. When teaching these instruments I try to include some music theory, (as much as I feel the student can stand), because music theory is applicable to any instrument they may care to learn in the future and will help them be a more complete musician. As it happens, the piano is the best way, in my opinion, to teach music theory. It's kind of like a physical representation of music theory and can open up a deep and effective understanding of music in general. What I've leaned in my music theory classes, and piano lessons has been invaluable in my advancement on other instruments I have learned to play.
Critical thinking is similar in another area of our lives. If we learn to analyze things systematically we can apply that process to situations as they present themselves in our lives. We cannot use this process to make decisions, but we would be silly not to use the process to HELP us make good decisions. If I may offer a quick example. We may not have delt with new car salesmen before but even on our first encounter we can benefit from analyzing the process. When a salesman says your used trade-in car is worth 3 times more than your friend was willing to pay you you may think your friend isn't as good a friend as you first thought. But if you are appropriately skeptical of the amount of money the salesman is offering you you will likely learn that your car's value is actually more in line with your friends offer. A new car price often includes a significant markup to allow the salesman the chance to offer you the excessive amount of money for your car to give the illussion that they are being very generous to make the sale more likely. They may offer you 3,000 for a car that they will wholesale out for 1,000 while still making a nice profit on the deal. These facts are there for the learning but are seldom discovered. If we know the value of our car before the negotiation we become skeptical of the process and can learn how the new car selling game is played. Then we can negotiate from a position of strength. Strength provided by our knowledge of the process we are engaged in.
This ability to reason is something our schools use to focus on. Unfortunately we have entered a time when colleges are more interested in advancing a particular ideology rather than teaching the ability to form an opinion based on the logical analysis of the available facts. Just like music theory can help us with our endeavor to learn any instrument, so, too, does critical thinking help us in all aspects of decision making.
It was snowing harder now. Coming down very heavy and with those big wet flakes. I love the snow. Ever since the big storm that hit Wichita during my Freshman or Sophomore year of high school I've been a big fan of those lovely crystalline flakes that greet us from the grey winter clouds. We were friends before but that storm cemented our relationship for life. We were out of school for a whole week. A week full of snow forts and sledding. Pushing stuck cars and snowball fights. Gloves and hats occupying the heat vents around the kitchen and living room while we ate our sandwiches and planned our next adventure. What a week. It all started on Sunday morning. It was beginning to snow in earnest as we headed to church. By the time we came out of the service the snow was several inches deep. The anticipation of missing some school was already part of my thought process and the excitement continued to build as the day wore on. By night we were out tromping around in over a foot of snow and it was still falling. My recollection is we ended up with 21" total. Monday morning began our dream week with several consecutive fun filled days in a row. That memory will accompany me the rest of my days, Lord willin', and it is a significant part of my appreciation for snow. Now back to the previous tale. The snow was coming down heavier now and I just thought it could be a sign that I should go ahead a make the call. My room mate at Southwest Baptist College had talked me into going on a double date with he and 2 ladies from the women's dorm. He really wanted to go out with this one girl but she refused to go out with just him on a first date. She required it to be a double date. My room mate can be very convincing and he managed to talk someone who had never been on a date before to go out on this double date. That someone happened to be me. I wasn't exactly a ladies man. I had called a girl up in high school to see if she wanted to go out and get a Coke or something. The answer wasn't no, it was, I can't tonight. Nevertheless, a "no" would have been no less devastating and I tried to avoid her for the next several days because I felt embarrassed. That had been the extent of my social life at least as it pertained to the opposite sex. So after several "no way's" he finally got me to say yes. Now I was trying to get up the nerve to ask this same lady out to a concert of the St.Louis symphony. It turned out she was ok, for a girl, and I wanted to pursue a more substantial relationship with her. The snow was what pushed me over the edge. The snow might have been a sign, I thought, and if not, it still seemed like something I should do. So I met her outside her dorm and asked if I could escort her to the concert that night. She said "sure", or something like that, and the rest is history. We eventually got married and my room mate and her room mate never really hit it off. So now there is another reason to like snow. It's like they say, "just follow your snows".
