Raising A Science-Based Daughter
The world will be tough enough for her. I’m not adding ignorance to her list of burdens.
One morning back in the 1980s, mom and I crossed the border from Juarez, Mexico, to El Paso, Texas, to check out the garage sales. This was a favorite pastime of my mother’s as she could find deals on things that we needed around the house, clothes that my grandmother could sell to make some extra money, or toys that were not expensive. We would get up early in the morning, get in the car, and set out to the suburbs of El Paso.
The best deals were in the homes close to Fort Bliss, since military families were always on the move and always looking to get rid of things.
On that particular morning, we came across a garage sale where a blue container was being sold for $10. I opened the container to find a light microscope with extra slides and lenses. Mom agreed to buy it for me, and the world has never been the same.
The minute I got back home, I set it up according to the instructions, and I went out to the yard to collect things to look at. That whole afternoon, I looked at leaves, sand, rocks, drops of water, and even some of my own skin cells. I was amazed at all of it, even if I didn’t know what I was looking at.
