It's been so long since a post here.
But now it's exam time, and I sit watching my students scribble away their last hours of school, and I have a chance to reflect. Because what else are endings for, but that.
I am stunned at the swiftness of time. But as I look back, there is a fullness to it all (and I love that phrase, "the fullness of time") that I didn't expect to find. So much has happened, I bear witness to change and growth all around me.
I don't know--and don't think I do the best job of it--if my students know how much many of them have meant to me this year. They helped me laugh on days when I didn't know what I was doing, they offered depth and insight that often left me stunned and nodding "very good. that's a good point..." but thinking I have never thought of that before.
Frank McCourt, a high school teacher for years, and a writer for less time, said the first day of class he always said, "I'm Mr. McCourt, and this year in Literature, I guarantee that at least one person in this class will learn something this year. And I guarantee you that person will be me."
I resonate with that statement. Did my students acquire any knowledge? I think I grew so much that it seems impossible for any extra learning to occur. That my newness left little else in its path. But I hope that's not true. I pray many of them learned to see poetry, stories, and writing in a new way--that they begin to learn what I also only faintly grasp. It is this: words are powerful, infinite, frustrating, beautiful, limitless and limiting, soothing and hurtful....contradictions, and mostly--necessary.
I hope they see me not just as Teacher, but as a person. One on the journey with them all. One who is blessed by the side-by-side steps on this Path.

"You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus."
--Mark Twain

When you were little, what did you "pretend?" What do you pretend now?
I was a weird child. Many of my classes would tell you that I'm a weird teacher. All that to say, I didn't play "house" or "teacher" when I was little. I played "The Monkees," which pretty much consisted of me pretending that I toured around with the 60s music group. That's all I remember. Their show used to come on Nick at Nite, and I had a huge crush on Davey Jones. He was British and cute and...I was in the third grade.
I also played "restaurant" with my best friend Jessica Martell. We set up shop underneath her deck and would pretend to serve food to lots of famous people. Andre Agassi and Stephan Edberg were frequent visitors (who are those guys? famous tennis players, of course. my older brother Brandon was a tennis fanatic, and I loved whatever he loved. hence, a tennis restaurant.)
Oh, and embarrassing of all embarrasings, I used to play "pioneer." I loved Little House on the prairie, and would set up camp in the woods behind my house and pretend to cook things over a "fire." One time my "fire" was really fire. My family loves to tell the story of When Beth Burned Down the Backyard. It wasn't that bad. Really.
Writing down all of those "pretends" can be pretty humiliating. But it reminds me of my childhood innocence, of my capacity for play. We don't play enough when we get older, we don't imagine as much. We pretend to be unhurt when we are hurt, we smile when we are sad, we ignore those in pain or humiliation...our pretending is not as fun. And not so simple to get away from.
I think a lot of times, I pretend to know what I am doing. That I have it all together. Instead, each day I am surprised by something, each day I am learning. All moments are new, and I don't know what to expect. Not really.

"A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral."
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Think about this quote. When was the last time you felt truly motivated?
Ummm....
I haven't written here for awhile, so it obviously took some motivation to write again. Why is it that the moment something becomes "required," we immediately shut ourselves off to it? I know it happens to me. And I see it happen to my students whenever I say, "read this for..." Their eyes glaze. All excitement and enthusiasm (and think of this: three of my four class occur before 11:oo in the morning!) seems to leak out into the floor--they stare at the puddles, their eyes burn holes into the carpet. I find myself saying shocking things to jar them back to the fluorescent tubes of class...
So maybe I'm motivated to wake my classes up to these verses I love, to this poetry that challenges and wrestles with me. I get up out of bed each morning to do that very thing. To share what someone once shared with me, to invite them in...
I don't know if I've recently felt like the quote above, that feeling of seeing beauty in each thing, to look for possibility. I feel myself lacking there...don't I? I read aloud to my middle school Creative Writing class today. Their words were honest, simple, and gorgeous. They weren't putting on a show, they weren't writing what they couldn't understand, what they thought would sound "deep." They wrote plainly, and it was gorgeous, and they were proud of each other and beaming at their own good work. I am motivated to bring out beauty in all of my classes. To call forth poetry in all things.