I Have Observed I'm Ready to Start Blogging Again

Looks like I'm back from my blogging hiatus.  School has begun in earnest and tons of time and energy is going in that direction. Yet, I felt the need to check in here.

This year I am teaching purely 7th grade. This is a big change -- the last time I taught one grade level was the 2009-10 school year.  I have intensive readers and I have got to say, I am loving it.  

In the classroom we have been spending a lot of time setting up our reader and writer's notebooks.  The writer's notebooks are decorated and covered with contact paper. The students have taken complete ownership, from my observation.

And that is what this blog is about -- observation.  This summer I taught myself to slow down and pay attention, and I'm glad to say that I am remembering what I learned this summer and am continuing to apply it.

My return to writing started today when I was driving to a yoga class. I began to make mental notes on things I observed, and then wrote them down as soon as I got to my destination.

Driving to Yoga Class Labor Day 2014

The town is quiet

A dusty white pony dips his head to graze at the fence by the side of the road

Dry palm fronds sway slightly as they lean over in the late summer heat

"God bless the broken road" plays on country radio

Royal palm tree trunks create shadow stripes along MacGregor Boulevard

I miss my turn-off to my usual parking lot

The road I'm on has a farmers stand with a sign that says "Georgia Peaches"

I realize I have found a better place to park

A shady spot

The mid-morning air hangs heavy

Now some gentle movements

For balance, clarity,

And even deeper awareness

*

This is the kind of thing I started training my students to do last Friday.

I started by asking them to make observations of the classroom, and then observation of themselves. We then proceeded into a listening observation. Each time they were expected to write specific things about what they saw and heard. The listening exercise included me playing my Tibetan singing bowl. One class got into an extended conversation afterward about lucid dreams and deja vu, all brought to mind by the sound of the bowl. It so happened that by 7th period my principal was in observing my class, and she loved it, too.

Then we moved to the poem "Observer" by Naomi Shahib Nye. This poem is about observing the world. 

I watch how others things travel
to get an idea how I might move.
A cloud sweeps by silently,
gathering other clouds.
A doodlebug curls in his effort to get there.
A horse snorts before stepping forward.
A caterpillar inches across the kitchen floor.
When I carry him outside on a leaf,
I imagine someone doing that to me.
Would I scream?

In the heart of the day
nothing moves.
No one is going anywhere
or coming back.
The blue glass on the table
lets light pass through.
Something shines
but nothing moves.
I watch that too.

We picked it apart a bit as we sat in our gathering place for the lesson, and then I sent them back to their seats to think about creatures and things from nature they have observed-- how a pet snake moves, what a butterfly does, how a tree moves in the wind. During fifth period we had some tech support people come in to fix up something on the smart board. I told the students to observe them and make some notes about what they were doing. 

I think the word for how I've been operating is "emergent."  

Finally, we got to the Marty Stuart song, "Observations of a Crow."  

We listened to the song and followed along with the lyrics. Miracle upon miracle, I did not have one complaint about it being "country."  In fact, my one student, who can do a mean moonwalk, was nearly dancing along as he sang.  We talked about all the things the crow was observing, and that in his dialogue the crow made up some words. They then had to write from the perspective of the creature or a thing--what does that creature or thing observe about the human world? What does it see as it goes through its day?  They were advised to write in first person to make this come alive.

It was a relaxing and easy lesson, and got them writing and collecting ideas in their Writers Notebooks.  The students aren't writing as specifically as they need to, but we have a beginning, a foundation to get us started.  We'll see what emerges from here.

Seeing Through Different Eyes -- Gratitude

Literally, I'm not far from this saying , as I continue to adjust to seeing the world with a different "eye."  I have chosen distance vision and because of that, I now have one eye that sees with 20/20 vision, but everything is fuzzy up close.  My "old" eye -- the one still containing a cataract -- cannot see distance, but can see up close. Because of this, everytime I pick up my phone for any reason, I have to close my "new" eye so I can see.

It's a minor annoyance.

What has stunned me the most is how bad my eyesight had become.  I expected to see things more clearly, but I had not realized how the cataract created a yellow glaze over everything.  I am reminded of the old Tide commercials with the sock comparison. Right now my left eye is the sock washed in Tide with bleach, while my right eye is one washed in that "other" detergent.

Given this situation, I find it difficult to spend too much time on the computer, even when wearing my old glasses with one of the lenses popped out.  I also am finding it difficult to read.  If ever there was a time to get those projects done around the house, it is now.

In response to the quote above,  I'm going to make a random, spontaneous list of the poets, writers, painters, songwriters, etc. whom have assisted me in seeing the world through new eyes. I encourage everyone to do the same. Share your list with me...I'd love to see it!

 I am grateful to....Vincent Van Gogh, Henry David Thoreau, Natalie Goldberg, Kathleen Norris, Anne Lamott, Stephen Hanks, Georgia O'Keefe, Paul Simon, Madeleine L'Engle, Justin Isaaksen, Julia Cameron, Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Mary Oliver, James Wright, Rumi, Sylvia Plath, Walt Whitman, Allen Ginsberg, Naomi Shihab Nye, W. B. Yeats, John Nieto, Minnie Vigil, A.A. Milne, Jackson Browne, Joni Mitchell, James Taylor, Daryl Hall, Todd Rundgren, Taylor Goldsmith, Tim O'Brien, Mark Twain, Bernie Glassman, Thich Nhat Hanh, Bill Watterson, Maya Lin, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Sara McLachlan, Carole King, Paul Winter, Will Ryan, Tina Fey, Jackson Pollack, Pema Chodron, Cheryl Strayed, Steve Almond, S. E. Hinton, Jeannette Walls, Herman Melville, Annie Dillard, Alice Walker, Jean Shinoda Bolen, Albert Camus, Jean Paul Sartre, Hermann Hesse, Michael Meade, Kevin Powers, Ruth Ozeki, Marianne Williamson, Gram Parsons...

The Shared World

Different kind of morning today because I am getting ready for cataract surgery. This means no coffee :-(  

I couldn't decide if I wanted to write anything today, and knew it would just have to be something short.  Then I remembered a beautiful poem shared on Facebook by Roshi Joan Halifax of the Upaya Center in Santa Fe.  The poem is called "Shared Words, Shared Worlds" and it was written by a well-known poet, Naomi Shihab Nye.  The thing is, Naomi didn't write it to publish; she wrote an experience she had in poetic form, shared with friends, and it went viral from there.  

The beauty of this poem is the underlying message: when we are fearless, when we choose to cherish others no matter who they are, it creates a better world.  I firmly believe this. The last two weeks I have attended Sunday morning dharma talks on world peace, and the teacher (Kelsang Jangchen) is focusing only on this: we must cherish all living beings.  It is where world peace begins.  It is actually easy to do, because it can start with something as easy as a smile.  

Enjoy the poem.  I'm off to prepare for a new eye!

Shared Words, Shared Worlds
by Naomi Shihab Nye

After learning my flight was detained 4 hours,

I heard the announcement:
If anyone in the vicinity of gate 4-A understands any Arabic,
Please come to the gate immediately.

Well—one pauses these days. Gate 4-A was my own gate. I went there.
An older woman in full traditional Palestinian dress,
Just like my grandma wore, was crumpled to the floor, wailing loudly.
Help, said the flight service person. Talk to her. What is her
Problem? we told her the flight was going to be four hours late and she
Did this.

I put my arm around her and spoke to her haltingly.
Shu dow-a, shu- biduck habibti, stani stani schway, min fadlick,
Sho bit se-wee?

The minute she heard any words she knew—however poorly used—
She stopped crying.

She thought our flight had been canceled entirely.
She needed to be in El Paso for some major medical treatment the
Following day. I said no, no, we’re fine, you’ll get there, just late,

Who is picking you up? Let’s call him and tell him.
We called her son and I spoke with him in English.
I told him I would stay with his mother till we got on the plane and
Would ride next to her—Southwest.

She talked to him. Then we called her other sons just for the fun of it.

Then we called my dad and he and she spoke for a while in Arabic and
Found out of course they had ten shared friends.

Then I thought just for the heck of it why not call some Palestinian
Poets I know and let them chat with her. This all took up about 2 hours.

She was laughing a lot by then. Telling about her life. Answering
Questions.

She had pulled a sack of homemade mamool cookies—little powdered
Sugar crumbly mounds stuffed with dates and nuts—out of her bag—
And was offering them to all the women at the gate.

To my amazement, not a single woman declined one. It was like a
Sacrament. The traveler from Argentina, the traveler from California,
The lovely woman from Laredo—we were all covered with the same
Powdered sugar. And smiling. There are no better cookies.

And then the airline broke out the free beverages from huge coolers—
Non-alcoholic—and the two little girls for our flight, one African
American, one Mexican American—ran around serving us all apple juice
And lemonade and they were covered with powdered sugar too.

And I noticed my new best friend—by now we were holding hands—
Had a potted plant poking out of her bag, some medicinal thing,

With green furry leaves. Such an old country traveling tradition. Always
Carry a plant. Always stay rooted to somewhere.

And I looked around that gate of late and weary ones and thought,
This is the world I want to live in. The shared world.

Not a single person in this gate—once the crying of confusion stopped
—has seemed apprehensive about any other person.

They took the cookies. I wanted to hug all those other women too.
This can still happen anywhere.

Not everything is lost.