Voice recorder

I'm kicking myself. Well okay, not literally, but I should be. Today I went down to Goodwill Chattanooga to sit in and observe on an adult reading class for my Literary Journalism project. (Some background: My project is on illiteracy and adults who can't read or don't read very well.) There was an intensely amusing moment when I first walked into the classroom. I don't want to go in detail about it on here since it's perfect for my project and I want to save it for that, but I'll give you an overview:

I walk into the room exactly two minutes late for the class. Only the teacher and one student sit at the table. As soon as he sees me walk in the student jerks his head up and proclaims, "It's Alison!!!" (Yes, he said my name with at least three exclamation points, maybe even a few more.) I stop just inside the door, blinking in surprise. He was a totally stranger to me. He jumps up and lumbers over to me, squeezing me in a hug before I have time to react. He then informs me that I had visited Hosanna Community and told me his name. It all started coming back to me. Last January (the 2009 one), Danielle and I had gone to Hosanna Community, a community in Hixson which fosters independence for adults with disabilities, to help clean up the grounds and the buildings for Community Service Day. This guy lived there and remembered me coming to help out. More incredibly, he remembers my name from that one-day visit 14 months ago. Needless to say, I was astonished.

So that was the most random part of my visit. The rest of the first class went by in rather ordinary fashion. The second class did as well and I was getting a little discouraged that I wouldn't have any material to show for my two-hours of time downtown. While the volunteers helped the students in the more advanced class, I interviewed the teacher, getting lots of good information about her, but not too much that would actually help me for my project. Near the end of the class she let me talk to the students, just like she had in the beginners class. I wasn't too optimistic about getting good info. The first class hadn't given me much, but I went ahead and interviewed them anyway. I asked one guy some questions and he gave me short, brief answers. One of the volunteers tried to help by explaining my questions further, but his responses were the same. Nothing I could use for my projects. Just "yes" "no" "yeah kinda" "I don't know" etc. I'm not sure how he managed to give those answers for my open-ended questions, but trust me, he did. I ran out of questions before he gave me anything good. I turned my attention to the second student. Before I even asked him a question he was off. He gave me the most beautifully eloquent motivational speech I had ever heard. My pen was going at top speed trying to get all the stories and top-notch quotes documented correctly. Just as he was winding down, I realized that I had my voice recorder with me. I was so mad at myself for not getting it out of my backpack before the second student started talking. I'm pretty sure I got most of his speech down on paper, since he talked slow and deliberately, but I wish I'd recorded it anyway. It was really touching and almost made the volunteers cry. I'd give anything to go back to yesterday at 2:50 p.m. and do that interview over again.