It Never Gets Old

The new semester begins, and I enter the room to greet a fresh group of students.  The magnificent people sitting there fill me with wonder each and every time.  What a privilege to meet them!  What a sacred vocation to teach!

It never gets old.  They take out pen and paper and write.  It starts again--this beautiful journey--where I ask them to walk, and I find them dancing. 

I sit behind the desk, and I gather their stories into my heart.  At this time in history, on this very day, I enter their story, and they enter mine. 

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What a blessing to say a task "never gets old."  Do you feel that way about your work?  Why or why not?

Talking to Penn State Students about the Scandal

Campus feels heavy, quiet, and ashamed.

What a strange contrast to the beauty and warmth of this fall day in Happy Valley.  It's as if an undercurrent of sadness and confusion carries us to our classrooms beneath the shadow of that grand football stadium.

For once, nobody cares about the big game on Saturday. 

I ask the freshman how they feel, and they say that they "don't want this terrible news to be what our school is remembered for."  College students from other schools tease them on Facebook and on twitter and make jokes about their great university.  Their hearts are broken for the children harmed.  They feel humiliated.  They feel deceived.

How will we move forward?  

Penn State students reply: "The actions of the few don't reflect the character of us all." 


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My students tell me how hard it is to feel let down by adults.  How have you recovered from that kind of disillusionment?

What Our Elementary School Principal Calls Herself

Our elementary school principal manages extraordinary tasks like learning the first and last names of all 495 students in the school.

That's nearly 500 students.  Last September, I wrote about observing her in action in the hallway.

Last week at Back-to-School night, she introduces herself, not as the principal, but as the Lead Learner.  She signs all her correspondence this way as well.  

The Lead Learner!

For some reason, I want to cry right then and there.  No wonder she's been at this school for over 20 years and has the best reputation of any school principal I've ever known or heard of.  No wonder the students at this school love learning so much.  The leader of this school is a learner.  How could we not follow her with that attitude of curiosity, humility, and reverence for this sacred act of learning? 

I recall Parker Palmer's quote, "We teach what we most need to learn."  I want that truth to shape my teaching philosophy and the ways I interact with other instructors, my students, and the material I teach.

I'm not the teacher, I'm the Lead Learner.

I'll think about this tonight at Neighborhood Fitness Group.  The children will learn to jump in and out of the double dutch ropes, and I will too.   I'll try to get a picture of me in action (Lord, help me!). 

Living with flair means being the Lead Learner.  

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Journal:  Did you have a teacher (or principal) that acted more like the Lead Learner?

What College Freshmen Said They'd Keep Forever

After our project on how advertisers persuade us to purchase a whole array of non-essential items, I ask my students to name one thing they'll keep forever.

Baby blankets (some brought them to college)
Military dog tags
Jewelry given from parents or grandparents
Musical instruments
Photographs

Not one student mentions anything related to trendy clothing or technology.  Nobody claims any attachment to their phones (we're addicted, not attached!), their laptops, their purses, or their toys.

I realize that most things I'm tempted to purchase for my children have no lasting value.  What does?  Simple fabric objects of attachment, emblems of service to our nation, symbols of love passed down from generations before, musical instruments, and experiences captured on film.

If we pare down and trim off the excess of our lives, we'll find what really matters.  As I raise my daughters in a world saturated with stuff, I might ask myself before I buy it, "Will they keep this forever?  What would this purchase symbolize?  Can it be an emblem? An experience?  A musical object?"

My students' answers remind me of what I love and value.

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Journal:  What do you own that you'll keep forever?

Doing What You Love

Today I remember a conversation I had with my husband years ago.  We were talking about careers and our future.  We asked this question:  "What makes you feel most alive and most like yourself?"  His answer matched exactly with what he was already doing with his life.

Mine didn't, but I was getting there.  I felt most alive and most me when I was teaching and writing.  So I reasoned that God made me for these things.  In His goodness and creativity, perhaps God made it so that when we are doing what we are supposed to be doing, it will feel like we're fully alive, energized, and truly ourselves.   

I'm starting to believe that when we find that thing we were made for, it won't feel like drudgery.  Maybe it won't feel like work.  

Psychologist Greg Hocott was once asked how he could manage his difficult counseling practice.  He writes, "I think the answer is found in doing what God created us to do. We are all endowed with specific talents and gifts, and as long as we live within them, 'work' seems less difficult."

Maybe this explains why blogging never feels like work.  Maybe this explains why I can't wait for the new semester to start.  I'll tell my students that I love teaching and writing so much that I would do it for free.  That's a good thing, I'll tell them, because I practically am doing it for free.  Nobody teaches for the money!

Living with flair means finding ways to do what we love.  It means being brave enough to pursue those paths. 

______________________
Journal:  Do you love your work so much you would do it for free?

A Turning Point Statement

During the summer of 1994, a friend told me she thought I had the spiritual gift of encouragement.  She posted a little note by my bed.  It said, "You are an encourager."  I remember exactly what it looked like--the handwriting, the color--and how it felt to have someone name something like that about me.  My friend saw what I couldn't see. 

That single comment shaped the next 15 years of my life.  I wasn't just an average girl; I was a hope giver, a courage finder, and an inspiration provider.  I wasn't just a nobody.  God wanted to use me to point others towards a beautiful future. 

It took someone naming it to help me see it. 

I had a student who told me that of all my weeks and weeks of teaching, the most memorable thing from my class was a single comment I wrote on one of his many essays.

In the margin of his paper, I wrote:  "You sound like a great teacher right here."   He was overwhelmed that I named that in him, and he later wrote about his dreams for graduate school to become a teacher.  As my husband and I discussed these turning point comments, he told me he remembered the exact words of a Scout leader who pointed out some unique gifts he saw in my husband.   Those were turning point words. 

Today, as I guide students through their memoir drafts, I realize that I'm not naming what I see enough.  I wonder what I need to name in my children, in my friends, and in my students.  I see this in you.  Maybe God will use it to shape a life.  Maybe those words will be a turning point for someone today.

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Journal:  Did someone speak "turning point words" to you when you were younger?  Can you speak a "turning point word" to someone in your life today? 

A Very Important Person

Today in my class, we discuss dignity.

What gives a person worth?  Why do we esteem other people (and ourselves)?  It is because of what they accomplish or because they have inherent value?

These questions matter.  Our answers determine how we view others and ourselves.  We tend to make ourselves into commodities; we believe that what we produce and what services we provide make us valuable, worthwhile people.

When I think about unconditional love, I'm challenged to radically love others regardless of their contribution.  I think that's the way God loves us.

Dignity relates to the word "dignitary" or very important person.   I remember watching American Idol last week and hearing Jennifer Lopez talk about a contestant.  She said that when she watched him sing, she knew she was "watching somebody very important."

What if I felt that way about everybody I met today?  What if I felt that way when I looked in the mirror?

You are somebody very important.   It's true in light of God's truth.  Not for market value or contribution.  Not for appearance, affluence, or achievement.  Not for anything other than who we are as declared by God. 

It's freeing and humbling.  We don't need to prove our worth.  It's already in there.



___________________
Journal:  Do I feel like a very important person?

Next Time, Try This

I'm sitting next to a stack of essays, coffee in one hand, pen in the other.  As I read, I celebrate great writing with enthusiastic comments in the margin.  Bravo!  Genius!  Fantastic!

I circle mistakes; usually I find semicolons used improperly, weak verbs, or sentence patterns with no variation.  Immediately, I find myself writing, "Next time, try this," as I scribble out a plan for their writing improvement.

I realize how discouraging a bad grade feels.  The only thing that soothes sometimes is that plan for "next time."  These strategies for development keep our focus on growth, not setbacks.

I remember a parenting book that taught me to correct a child's behavior and say "next time" right away.  "Next time, don't jump on the furniture," or "next time, don't spread the peas all over the kitchen wall."

It really works.   It's like a little mantra that reminds us we are all on a journey of growing, of getting it right eventually.  "Next time" invites me to rise up to a challenge, and it keeps me from the despair of failure.

I think of that with my overeating, my fits of dark emotions, my bad choices with my time, my harsh words.  Next time, I'll change something.  Next time, I'll grow a little bit more into the woman I want to be.  And the beauty of the "next time" expression is that it starts immediately.  I don't have to wait till tomorrow or next year. 

When I get it wrong, I think of an immediate plan for development.  We're moving forward, don't look back.  Start fresh!  It's next time right now. 

There's always another chance to grow.  I want to be as gentle with myself as I am with my children or my students.  If I fail today, I remember that next time, I can try this. 


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Journal:  If I've already messed up today, how can "next time" help me?

My Top Ten Name Game Questions

If I were to write a book called, "How to Teach with Flair," I'd have an entire chapter on the power of name games.  Before I teach any class, I have to know these folks, and they have to know me.  The foundation of teaching--that base of solid rock supporting the whole framework--is community.  We have to know each other, and then, we transfer information in that beautiful and mysterious moment called teaching.

And yes, we all have to know first and last names.  Knowing names changes something. 

When you know each other, barriers drop, the mind opens, and we recognize the dignity and contribution of every person in the room.  I can't imagine teaching without this foundation in place.  

It's the same for Sunday school classes, neighborhood groups, business seminars, book clubs, family dinners, or any other gathering.  When we connect with one another, something marvelous stirs and rises within us.

Here are my Top 10 Name Game questions with some of the best or most common answers I've received in ten years of teaching.  So, say your name and:  

1.  What were you known for in school?  (embracing mediocrity)
2.  What accomplishment to date are you most proud of? (beating cancer)
3.  What was the last thing you googled? (the snowy owl)
4.  What's something you consider yourself addicted to? (the Food Network)
5.  What's a movie you think everyone should see?  What's a movie you think nobody should see? (Life is Beautiful / Hancock)
6.  In a group of 3 people, find the most bizarre thing you have in common. (All obsessed with the cartoon, "Thundercats" and knowing lots of Thundercats trivia)
7.  What's a song or youtube video you like to listen to or watch over and over again? (Hit Me Baby One More Time / Crazy Cats)
8.  What was your favorite childhood toy? (a tree)
9.  What is your favorite home-cooked meal? (homemade mac-n-cheese)
10.  What is your favorite way to procrastinate?  (Facebook)

I love name games because they connect us.  Tomorrow, I'm asking students to tell me their favorite quotation.  I'll learn more about them in that moment than you can imagine.

Living with flair means I play name games when I'm in a group.  It might be silly, but it creates serious connection. 


___________________
Journal:  What's another great get-to-know-you type of question I can ask a group?

A Great Verb for a Mission Statement

Today, I ask students to tell me what they will devote themselves to in their future careers.  In two sentences, they tell me 1) what they want to contribute to their field and 2) a few professional goals.

As we read aloud our statements, I'm suddenly aware of how self-focused and self-promoting such an assignment might become.  We listen to independent dreams and glorious self-actualization.  We build private kingdoms with our names on the highest building.

But one woman announces that her primary professional goal is collaboration.

Collaborate means to work together towards a common goal.  It's a great verb to think about for a career and a life.  While many of us forge ahead with solitary tasks and private ambitions, we forget the power and importance of collaboration.   My student recognizes her dependence on other people and other organizations to reach mutually beneficial goals.

I start to wonder with whom I might collaborate in my life.   Is my personal goal really a communal one?  Is my self-focused personal dream really a much larger project involving a system so much bigger than myself?   How much more efficient might we become if we collaborate?

That verb challenges me to think about myself as a collaborator and not a solitary agent pushing my own agenda.  I know I'd often rather work alone, but surely there is strength, vision, and synergy when I collaborate.


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Journal:  Sometimes I think I'm too busy trying to make a name for myself to consider the value of collaboration towards shared goals.  What people or groups might I collaborate with in my parenting, teaching, writing, and ministry goals?

I Just Couldn't Do It

You lay your clothes out, you pack your backpack, and you hardly sleep because you just can't wait for it all to begin again.  

It's a new semester here at college. 

I've been packing a backpack for 30 years, but for the last decade, I'm the teacher and not the student.  My backpack has syllabi, course rosters, grammar books, and a tattered anthology of literary works.   I still have a red pencil case (some things never change), lunch, and notebook paper.  But I'm the teacher now. 

I study them: I learn their names and remember their hometowns and majors.  I'm suddenly fascinated.  I can't help it. I'm a student of the students, and maybe that's my secret. 

One just returned from Africa and will introduce us to his passion for African modern art.  Another just switched majors from nuclear engineering to classics (there's a great story hiding there!).  Four of them have parts in a musical theater production in April (which we all must attend).  A dozen kinesiology majors, seven history majors, five communication disorders majors, and three education majors captivate me with their career paths.  I forgot to mention the philosopher, the criminal lawyer, the animal physical therapist, and the international stateswomen. 

Here we all are together in one place for a college semester to learn advanced writing and professional development. 

That's why I couldn't do it;  I couldn't turn on all the technology and hide behind elaborate presentations.  I sat with them in the circle, looking into the white of their eyes.  Once the big screen comes down and the hum of electricity rises like a swarm of wasps around me, I know I won't see them the same way.  And they won't see me.  I'm not ready for that.  There's too much to learn. 

Living with flair means I'm a student of the student.  I earn the right to teach by learning first, and sometimes (most times) technology impedes rather than promotes authentic connection.  We'll see what I do with this high-tech classroom.  I'm still learning.  

Take a Minute

I'm officially overloaded with work obligations and writing tasks.  As I sit at my computer, I become annoyed by my cat, Louie Von Whiskers, who knows the exact moment when I start to type on my keyboard.

This crazy cat believes that my computer work signals his need to nap across the keyboard.  I push him down onto the carpet, and he jumps right back on top of the computer--audacious, insistent, and. . . adorable.

"OK, you kitty," I say.  I take him in my arms, and he immediately curls up into a soft ball.  Purring loudly, he stays put, and when I try to lean over to type, he actually puts a paw on my arm to restrain me.  So I'm stuck here, holding this ball of fur. 

I do have one hand free.  Can I type with this one hand?  Not really.  But I can reach for my hot cup of tea that I'd forgotten I'd made. 

Here I sit, cup of tea in one hand, purring cat on my lap.  I think God gave me this cat to make me take a minute--a non-productive minute--to do nothing at all. 

I find myself so refreshed that I have to wonder what other non-productive minutes I might take today.  More tea?  More snuggling with animals?  What if I listened to a new song or gazed out the back window?

It can't all be work in 2011.  Imagine a cat sleeps on your lap and you can't move at all.  You have no choice but to lean back, drink your tea, and enjoy yourself for a minute. 

How Ridiculously Inconvenient!

I receive a desperate email from one of my best students.  He's applying to this great new program, but the deadline's been changed to tomorrow.  He has no choice but to beg his professors to write last minute recommendations. 

It's a ridiculous inconvenience.  It's exam week here.  I'm grading papers, posting grades, and barely keeping my head above the water.  Not only is the recommendation due now, but I have to stop everything, drive across town to my office to pick up the appropriate letterhead, write the narrative, and then arrange to meet the student to drop off the forms. 

What makes this one student's life so precious, so important, that I would bother to do what I do not have time for?

I bundle up in my coat and scarf, pull on my gloves and boots, and brave the ice.  As I drive, it's as if God has a message for me about the beauty of the ridiculously inconvenient.  God, after all, takes on the inconvenience of flesh, and if I think about it, Christmas is actually a celebration of radical inconvenience. 

A student needing a recommendation seems a small thing, really. 

I know, I know.  I've also memorized the quote:  Your lack of planning doesn't constitute an emergency on my part. 

But what if it did?  What if I embraced being ridiculously inconvenienced for once in my life and made your particular need my current emergency? 

I'm smiling as a race into the English department.  It's because the student is precious--profoundly so--and why wouldn't I go to extraordinary lengths to help him move forward in the direction of his dreams? What makes my time more valuable than his? 

Years ago, I was that flustered student trying to meet deadlines, knocking sheepishly on my professors' doors.  How many folks did I inconvenience on my journey?  How many emergencies did I bring into the laps of folks I needed to help me? 

Living with flair means I learn to embrace inconvenience.  The inconvenient things often usher in the magnificent, the life-changing, and the divine.  I felt myself transforming into the type of woman I want to be as I drove back home.  I did a ridiculously inconvenient thing for someone, and I knew it was full of flair. 

Write Like A Jellyfish

Today, one of my favorite on-line communities, The High Calling, features my flair for the day.  Enjoy the beginning of the post here, and please read more over at a great website that helps us deeply consider life, work, and faith. 

It's the last day of the semester.

I smooth out a new page, unzip my red pencil case, and attempt--along with these college students--the art of writing with flair.   The rain outside transforms to ice.  We hear its tiny fingers pelt the window begging for entrance into this warm space. 

With my own pencil poised, I ask the question again:  "How do we get our own voices--the authentic ones deep within our hearts shared by no other living soul--onto the page?"  Lately, I've made my writing lessons all about voice. Early in my writing teacher career, I learned that high school and college writing instruction attempts to remove voice from writing.  Make it academic.  Make it sophisticated.  My students always, always ask me (in a timid, near whisper) if it's OK for them to use the word, "I." 

It's like they're trespassing, violating some rule.  If they put the voice back into their writing, somebody will cross out the sentence and send them back to their desk to imitate some other scholar's prose.  The subtext: Don't sound like you.  Sound like us.

But there's something that only they can say, in only their way, in their own voice. 

What's a voice in writing?  How do I get to it?   Read on. . .

Will Technology Destroy My Teaching?

This morning my daughter announces that her class is going on a field trip to the University Astronomy Lab.

Her personal favorite planet is Jupiter.

All day, I've been thinking about the wonder she'll feel.  These planetarium shows, according to the website, "feature spectacular astronomical images from the surface of Mars, to dusty nebulae, to dazzling galaxies, rendered in three dimensions with the aid of special eyeglasses and projection screens."

This kind of technology might just provide a sublime experience for these children.  They might go on to study astrophysics, probing deeper into the mysteries of the universe.

I wish I were there with her.

But I had my own experience with technology and education today.  I received my classroom assignment for next semester, so on my way back to the parking lot, I casually pop into my future classrooms.  One of them hides deep within an ancient campus building.  The tiny room has 25 chairs and desks and a long table up front (for me).  I'm not sure I even have a chalkboard to use in that room.  These are the rooms instructors beg to get switched.  They shed tears over these assignments and bribe administrative assistants to send them to any other classroom. 

But I love rooms like that.  I request the simplest classroom.  

The second classroom resides in a building I haven't visited yet--the Business School.  I walk in, and I'm immediately transported to another universe.  A ticker on the wall brags out the stock market numbers.  Flat screen TV's broadcast major network news.  Coffee shops send out an aroma that, in this environment, makes me feel rushed and nervous.  Everybody's in suits, and the click of high heels on the floor breeds a strange insecurity in me.

I find my classroom.

It's spectacular, dazzling.  Each wall has a projection screen, and I count no less than 7 white boards that light up for my notes.  My podium up front features more buttons than I could ever figure out what to do with.  It has a microphone. If I touch this one button, the lights dim and a huge screen descends behind me.

Maybe another button ushers in my avatar who teaches for me while I go get a latte.

The students' seats swivel, and I'm not sure, but I wonder if each desk has its own laptop built in. 

I turn a circle in this future classroom, and then I immediately think:  "This is so . . . distracting!" 

What will I do with so much technology?  What could it inspire in folks trying to learn to use strong verbs and varied sentence structure?  Am I now putting on a show with lights and sounds? At what point does the technology distract rather than enrich?

I've posed the question to my technology-inundated students.  Shall I change my course?  One man leaned back (in his old desk) and said, "Don't do it.  Don't use the technology.  People want to talk about their ideas together in class.  That's what they really want."  

But is there something I'm missing? 

Living with flair means I figure out how to use technology in ways that enrich and offer sublime experiences.  Because it can.  I just don't know how--as a writing teacher--it will.

Do you know?

How College Should Be

Last night, an entire class of students comes by my house with food for a huge potluck.  This isn't part of the job description of a college instructor, and I know it's unusual--at least at a big state school--to invite students into your home.

I'm supposed to keep my professional distance.

But my undergraduate education at the University of Virginia ruined me regarding professional distance.  In those days, I dined with professors nearly every evening.  As part of the Jeffersonian ideal of the "academic village," professors joined students in dining halls or else invited them into their homes for dinner, dessert, or coffee.  Some of my favorite memories from college have to do with meeting my instructors outside of the classroom.  I remember walking into the living room of my English professor and sitting around a table with a group of other students and just talking--like it were an ordinary, everyday thing--about beauty.

Another professor, Rita Dove--the Poet Laureate of the United States at the time and Pulitzer Prize winner --actually hosted class in my dorm room.  She actually sat on my bed and talked to me about my poems.  The other students sat in a circle on my floor.  How could I not feel like I'd entered a portal into adulthood, into intellectual communities that wanted to hear my voice?

Later that semester, Ms. Dove hosted us all for dinner.

I talked about my life.  I talked about things I hoped for and things I cared about.  Those conversations changed me forever.

Those conversations made me feel truly adult, truly independent.   It was college at its best.  

My class piles into my living room, and one student plays her guitar while others sing around the piano.  We decide to talk about creativity, future careers, and the burden of having to decide how to choose a career when you love too many things.  And these students actually want to talk about their writing projects.  They pose questions, make comments, and grapple with their revision process all while petting my cats and eating homemade apple pie.  One student says, "Dr. H., I want to write my memoir about this," as she gestures to our group gathered about her. 

I have to force them out the door so I can go to bed.  

When most people think of the college scene, they visualize the alcohol and the parties.  But for at least one night, a group of students sat around and talked about ideas--not because anybody was taking attendance--but because they wanted be together and share their ideas and their lives.  That's what makes college so good.

Where No Pie Belongs

Getting Ready to Teach

I'm in my classroom, trying to muster up some flair. 

And then, I see a student has baked two pies to share with our class.  She made an apple pie with a lattice crust and a key lime pie with a graham cracker crust.  One student sees the pies and says, "I'm having the best day ever."

Students gather, grab forks and plates, and we feast on pies in the midst of writing lessons.  It's still morning.  This whole thing seems crazy.  

A View of Campus

We have pie where no pie should be, for no reason at all, other than a student wanted to bring the class a treat.   We can't stop talking about these pies, their crusts, and the whole experience of eating together in a college classroom when we're supposed to be writing.

We eat and write, talk and eat.

Key Lime Pie

Meanwhile, I take a picture of this beautiful crust.  In the world of baking, a crust represents the foundation and the substance that holds the filling in.  It keeps everything together. 

We did feel held in--held together--by an unexpected treat.  And the writing seemed stronger, but maybe I'm imagining things.

Living with flair means bringing a pie where no pie belongs.  

3 Rules of Civility

As I teach about "civility"--showing politeness and regard for others--I realize how foreign of a concept kindness has become.  I ask the class why it's so hard to be civil.  We practice writing arguments that persuade others, and adopting a civil tone makes all the difference when trying to persuade. 

"It's more interesting to be angry and mean," one student insists. 

It's true, perhaps.  It's more entertaining to insult another person than to argue with fairness.  And it's easier. 

It's hard to be kind.  It's nearly impossible to be civil when we feel so passionately about our beliefs.  We speak from our anger and our passion.  

But our anger and passion do not always persuade.  

If we want to begin to have conversations that change individual minds (at least in today's communication climate), we have to begin from a point of fairness.   

What does it mean to be fair?  We mention 3 ways:  recognizing a good intention within the opposition, uncovering the story that generated their viewpoint, and summarizing their opinion without condescension.  Only then have we fostered a suitable communication climate where people feel heard and ready to engage. 

"This is hard," we all agree.  It's hard because if we feel condescending--if we feel superior--it inevitably comes out in our speaking and writing.  So we have to admit some difficult things about ourselves.  We have to admit we don't know everything.  We have to concede points and believe that our opposition's viewpoint might contain an element of truth.  We have to treat that enemy with dignity even if we disagree with their point of view. 

Only then can we hear people.  Only then can we open the door to a conversation.  Civility in conversation means we are discussing, not fighting.  We are finding common ground, figuring out what we believe, and journeying together towards truth. 

A Little Secret

A student announces that she's no longer drinking.  At the beginning of the semester, she tells us she's known for partying, but today, she wants to stop it all.  We cheer for her.  Suddenly, the class feels like an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.  I don't mind at all.

I tell her that my husband and I aren't drinkers.  In disbelief, she smiles and asks, "You aren't?  Really?"  Other students chime in that they, too, have abandoned the drinking scene.  Here we are, at one of the top party schools in the nation, and some students opt out.

They're seniors.  It's a lifestyle they can no longer sustain. 

"I need to know more people like you," she says to them.  She needs to be able to imagine a world where people have nothing to recover from in the morning.

All day, I ponder choices I make that I need to recover from.   It's not just over-consuming.  Something as simple as staying up too late makes the morning horrible.  Last night, I sit down to work, and I realize how sleep-deprived I am from the night before.  Instead of working, I could get a good night's sleep.

So I go to bed.  Early.  

My choice to sleep seems profoundly spiritual.   I wake up without needing to recover.

I love that my students are thinking about the kinds of living they can sustain.  They make me think deeply about my own choices--what I can sustain for well-being, and what I can't sustain and harms me--everyday. 

I want to wake up without needing to recover.  That's another secret for health and mood:  if I need to recover from the night before, I wasn't living with flair.

The Bored Student Speaks!

My I-Really-Just-Don't-Care student hands me some of his writing to read.  He's typed eight single-spaced pages.  I didn't assign him this project.  He wrote something on his own, and he wants to meet today to talk about writing.

He gives me permission to tell you this:

It's a personal memoir about watching his brother leave for service in the Marine Corps.  It's about the first letter he receives from him. 

It's about the first time he sees his face again. 

At one point, the student recounts the moment when he's about to see his own brother.  Mid sentence, he includes in parentheses: "I've stood to type this section because I can still feel the excitement."

I can't put it down.  The writing is so good, the story so profound.  I'm overcome with the fact that a student has to stand up to write because the emotion is that great.

The poet Marianne Moore writes in her poem, "The Student," a line I'll never forget.  She claims that a student seems "too reclusive for some things to seem to touch him--not because he has no feeling but because he has so much." 

I have to remember that.  I have to remember that the reclusive soul sitting before me who doesn't care about anything might actually care too much.  The silence, the frown, or even the bored comment masks something underneath.  Something so thrilling he has to stand up to write it.

I ask him again if I can write about him today.  He says, "I really just don't care."   Now I know what he means.