Throat Punch Lessons

Note: If you landed here coming from the lesson plan ideas portion of this site note that this book is not based on lesson planning, but rather it’s a collections of lessons I have directly, or indirectly, learned duing the first half of my teaching career. Most of the accounts are meant to inspire us all to live with more gratitude in the moments we enjoy life absent of tragedy.

Douglas Armendarez grew up in the Inland Empire during the 1970's and 80's. He graduated with a B.A. in English from Cal State Fullerton where he met his wife. Married for 20 years, they have 2 children. Within these 20 years he received a M.A. in Rhetoric and Composition, become an adjunct associate professor, gotten a real estate degree and published one book. He lives in Temecula where he continues to teach high school in Ontario California during the day and teach at East Los Angeles College during the evenings. But you can find him on any weekend or whenever he has time, head buried in a book, putting pen to paper.

“Try as we might, no one escapes life without a throat punch. For some it’s a rare event resulting in reflection and change. Others assume throat punches are a fact of life and cluelessly walk into them again and again.

Throat Punch Lessons is a nonfiction collection of uncolored snapshots of events people get hit with out of the blue. Living in Southern California, a high school teacher and Adjunct Associate Professor, Douglas Armendarez’s style and perspective come from experiences few have, and even fewer have endured. His modest yet meaty accounts are honest, succinct, and focused; leaving readers to experience the punch for themselves.

Throat Punch Lessons does not scare, sensationalize, or sugarcoat. Instead, it peels back the commercial color and glitter that too often shield and immunize, and it lets the punch connect.” —Ryan Dunn

As Seen on the ID Discovery Channel

What happens in Vegas doesn't always stay in Vegas. As seen on the I.D. Discovery Channel, we are given an inside look into the mind of a killer and the ones he left behind. This book is much more though. It is a memoir of birth and rebirth, poverty and internal struggles. Written by a teacher, chronicling his rise from poverty to becoming a professional and the lessons he learned and tragic stories he witnessed along the way, beginning with his son’s diagnosis of narcolepsy, moving from there through school shootings, murders, and the lessons stemming from simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The author’s life chronicled in humor and sometimes despair, the end resulting in what was left—Throat Punch Lessons.

You go out for a jog and end up in a trunk. Throat Punch.

Wake up, put your pants on one leg at a time, and they don’t fit anymore. Throat Punch.

Your holiday party gets explosive and becomes a prison of flames. Throat Punch.

Focused on getting to your next class, homework seems meaningless when bullets start flying and you catch one in the elbow. Throat Punch.

Innocently navigating life, you wake up one day with an incurable disability. Throat Punch.

Poverty becomes hard to ignore when you come back from the kitchen and a roach is about to burrow into your baby’s eye. Throat Punch.