I made a post on Facebook a couple of days ago theorizing how so many Americans seem to truly believe that oil is dead dinosaurs. I suggested that it was probably an evangelical thing as I couldn’t begin to figure out why so many people would believe something so silly. I was shocked by the replies. Many of my American friends told me that, indeed, they had been taught EXACTLY this at high school!
Really?
Apparently so. So now, when I watch the odd You Tube video showing how American kids don’t know much I know why.
Actually though, this doesn’t gel with my own experience. I raised three sons in Texas and I recall being quite impressed with the education they received at The Woodlands High School at that time. I felt that they were taught a broader range of subjects than I had in the UK. I was a little shocked by the importance placed on sports but figured that out come college time….. I was also a little shocked at how spoiled many US teens were in what we now mutually refer to as ‘Disneyland of The Woodlands’. See, this was an affluent area and it wasn’t uncommon to see 17-year olds smashing their Porsches together and laughing about it because - well, they could.
I was also shocked one day when driving home. A police car pulled me over and accused me of doing 30 in a 20. I looked at my watch and told the Officer school was over. He smiled and told me not on his watch - it still had 1 minute left. I laughed because I thought he was joking but soon realised he wasn’t. So, then I asked why he had stopped me after all I was being passed at the time my a lady in van. Why didn’t he stop her? Simple, he said - you are in a new Mercedes, she was driving an old mama van! You can afford it, she can’t, he said.
He was correct. I could. I made more money then than I do now - a lot more and this was back in the late 1990’s so when you factor in inflation - I was rolling in it. Looking back, I was a dollar millionaire - just! We had a huge home with a huge lot, a huge custom designed and built pool and jacuzzi, three cars - two Benz and a suburban and a sleep four cruiser on Lake Conroe. I was living the American dream…. and revelling in it. My eldest played ice hockey for the Junior Aeros and roller hockey for a top US team so I spent in excess of 15k a year in travel to support his hockey, one other son played Football etc. etc.
These days my life is rather more modest and by design. That American dream came with a boat load of stress and was always two pay checks from disaster at any point in time…..
However, I suppose living in a good and wealthy area meant our kids got a better education even at the local High School. I shall ask my eldest what he was taught about oil and let you all know - but I am pretty sure he wasn’t told a fairy tale about dinosaurs……
As the late George Michael wrote ' You can have your money or your life, but you can't have both.'
I put two lad's through private school here in the UK. My ex wife never worried about money, she left that to me! See grey hair, haggard looks and broken body. Nothing lasts forever, I always knew the days of a well paid gig would end. Like manufacturing at the hands of Thatcher.
In the early 1970s, I was taught in elementary school science class that oil was called a fossil fuel because it came from dinosaur remains (and plants) under heavy pressure in the earth's crust. It wasn't until I was almost middle aged that I heard other explanations.