Dear Humans,

There I was: shoving my kitchen garbage down into the can; making more room for coffee grounds, leftovers gone bad, and banana peels; putting off taking the garbage out to the can. Because there was something on TV. Because I would do it later.

But later comes soon enough. And later comes with a vengeance.

So here I am now: sweeping up coffee grounds that spilled all over the kitchen floor; trying to put the ripped garbage bag into the fresh garbage bag without spilling more; wiping up the trail of rank garbage juice that’s dripped all the way to the door.

Cursing the guy who put me in this position.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Problem Solvers,

Think of math class as practicing scales on a musical instrument. You don’t go to a concert to watch someone play scales, but scales teach us something central about patterns in music. And if you play scales enough, you start to “see” those patterns in real music.

Also, playing scales strengthens your music-making muscles; we call that chops.

Likewise, most of the problems you’ll solve in real life are much more complex than the math we practice in class. But in math class we work with the patterns that exist everywhere around us. And we also work on our chops.

And then we’re ready to make music.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Humans,

I have drawers full of colorful plastic kitchen gadgets: garlic mincers, garlic presses, egg crackers, apple slicers, and on and on. And I don’t ever use any of them. But when I bought them, I honestly thought they were going to make my life better. I thought, “I won’t have to worry about garlic juice on my hands any more!”

But I kind of like garlic juice on my hands.

I mostly use my chef’s knife, a wooden spoon, and a few pots and pans. And I’ve learned the best “life hack” there is: do something over and over and try to get good at it.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Humans,

When I hear you talk about Fortnite, there’s a lot I don’t understand. And when you hear me talk to Mr. Vince about our fantasy football teams, there’s probably a lot you don’t understand. We all live on the same planet; but we live in different worlds.

But on this first day after the fall equinox, we should remember that there is a wider world of seasons and change that we all share. And while it’s fine that we spend some time in our fantasy worlds of football and Fortnite, it’s good to remember that there’s a real world out there. And it’s one we all can understand.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Stargazers,

Last night was clear, so I looked at the stars. I saw the Big Dipper, part of Ursa Major (which didn’t look much like a bear) and the Little Dipper with Polaris at its end. And I saw Jupiter in the southwestern sky. It was so bright that at first I thought it was an airplane.

But the coolest thing about looking at the stars is thinking of the people thousands of years ago who looked at the exact same stars in the exact same places. They could probably see them better because they didn’t have as much light pollution. But they also didn’t have an iPhone App that helped them identify all of the constellations.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Humans,

I’ve told you this before: when I was your age, I cared a whole lot about what people thought of me. And because of that, I never put myself out there.

But when I look back now, I see how much time I wasted. I could have spent that time becoming the best me I could be. Instead, I tried to be the me that I thought other people wanted.

You all are some of the coolest people I know. I hope you spend the time you have now working on yourselves. Because that’s who you’re going to spend the rest of your lives with.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Humans,

As my family was pulling into Pet Smart last night–again–to buy more crickets for the bearded dragon–again–we were ruing our decision to buy it. It’s been expensive. There have been a lot of cricket issues. And the cats really seem to want to play with him, or eat him.

But it’s really cool to watch him eat crickets. And forcing ourselves out of our comfort zone and learning something new is probably a thing we ought to do more often. And it’s definitely been that.

Most of life’s irritations–like buying crickets again–are the problems that go along with the good things in life. And so we take them as they come.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Students,

All day long I’m going to be looking forward to grading your math tests this afternoon. I’ll play some country music on my iPad, brew up another cup of coffee, put my feet up on a chair, and uncap my felt tip marker. I can’t wait.

Because my favorite thing is watching you do well. And I know that doing well is different for each one of us. But I know each of you well enough to know what you’re capable of. So when I see you reach that level (or go past it), I get really excited.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Humans,

On Sundays I like to watch the Broncos play. I’ve been doing it for as long as I can remember, and I look forward to it all week.

And, yet, I’m miserable for most of the three hours I’m watching it.

I love spending time with my children, but I spend a lot of that time mediating arguments. You might enjoy playing video games but get frustrated when you have to keep trying to beat a level over and over. It’s a funny thing about life that the things we really love tend to bring us the most pain.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Tinkerers,

The first rule of tinkering is to make it work. Don’t ask for help. Don’t let someone else do it for you. Don’t give up. Just make it work. And the second rule is to just make it work better.

I used to think I always needed to run to the store or amazon.com to buy just the right things: just the right ingredients, just the right materials, just the right tools.

But now I believe we have most of what we need inside of us or around us. It’s good enough. Or, at least, we can make it work.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck