Mr Kaufman Moral Lesson

“Who can say where the road goes, where the day flows, only time.” So begins Enya’s most recognized song, and so, in a way, begins the epic story of Mr. Kaufmann, a High School Forestry teacher who was a carpenter before that, and a student before that.
When I first met Kaufmann, I was immediately struck by his eccentrism and clear passion for his job. He is unheeding of barriers, very loud, and tells many stories. He doesn’t take much bull, and is firm but fair. He often claims to be “Almost fifty with a heart condition,” and yet walks faster than almost every single one of his students. He is average height, balding, and usually looking off into the distance, watching sunrises of deep knowledge soar above the horizon of ignorance. He has a thousand stories to tell, many of them not what you would expect from a teacher- and yet, these are precisely what makes him a good one. These stories stem from a past that held an uncertain and constantly changing future, filled with countless conquests of failure and thousands of hidden successes in the face of defeat. These stories are also the reason I decided to talk about his, as they …show more content…
Kaufmann wanted to become a Wildlife Biologist, but was told by his school counselor that he couldn’t, and never would. Mr. Kaufmann believed this, and, being urged to turn towards construction instead, chose to. He had never planned on this, and yet, there he was- working a job he had never really expected, and never really wanted. He did this for twelve years, and eventually came to the point in his job where he was teaching people how to do the job. They listened to him, and he found that he enjoyed helping them. Then, later, another unexpected twist: When talking to one of his friends who was currently in college, Mr. Kaufmann decided that maybe he could after all, and, bearing the well being of his family in mind, decided to go back to school in the field of wild life after twelve long years of