Mr. Exline and I had different views on life. I had taken a biology class the semester before that was taught by Mr. Farrell. That was an interesting class, and because of that, I decided to learn more about the subject. Perhaps I'd even start a career in biological science.
Unlike Mr. Ferrell, Mr. Exline didn’t have a single poster hanging up in his class. He didn’t have any props: no live animals in cages, no bottled bugs, nothing. It was a completely different approach to biology, and I found Mr. Ferrerll's more to my liking.
About a month into the class, we had a little disagreement. Up until that point, everything in the class had been pure bookwork and lectures. It was pretty boring stuff, and I was rapidly losing interest.
Mr. Exline decided it was time to perform some lab work. I guess he figured this was a biology class, and we should learn the subject more directly. He decided to begin with a frog.
He began by passing out frog carcasses to everyone - one carcass to each person. Then he passed out scalpels and other dissecting tools, and began lecturing us on how to cut apart a frog.
I was turned off immediately. First, the smell of these things was awful. Formaldehyde can really stink up a room. Second, I had played with frogs when I was younger. They were my friends.
Mr. Exline put the frog on my desk - I stared at it for a few minutes, and then leaned back, folded my arms over my chest, and glared straight ahead at the blackboard. He spoke for a few minutes, then told everyone to pick up their scalpels. I didn’t move.
Mr. Exline didn’t question me for quite some time, until it became completely obvious that I wasn’t going to dissect that frog. He asked me why, and I tried my best to explain my position. At first he tried to get me to go ahead, but I think he realized how stubborn a Lowe can be and soon gave up.
Each of us was supposed to write a report based upon our findings. I presented him with a masterful document describing all of the internal organs of a frog, which included a detailed description of everything I would have expected to see if I had dissected it myself.
Either he forgot that I didn’t do any dissecting, or he didn’t care, because he gave me an A+ on the report. I think by mutual agreement, the subject didn't come up again. I was not going to dissect and that was that.
Unless otherwise noted, all photos and text is Copyright © Richard G Lowe, Jr.