On My Shoulders

I love the light this time of year.

The angle of the sun is so long that it casts warm, gorgeous gold on even the coldest afternoons which subsides to fiery orange, smoldering red, and then cool silhouettes of purple and black. Even on cloudy days, the light finds a way-- igniting billowing stacks of cumuli in a last blaze before darkness, or casting dark pink rays up and under the somber gray dawn.

It was just such a light I saw this morning, painting the buff underwings of a pair of hawks rose and coral as they circled on the warming air.

And a New Building on the Side

They've been building an elementary school about 20 yards from my classroom window for the last year or so. The building is scheduled to open next September, but right now it's a fascinating tangle of steel beams and back hoes, which are way more captivating than the ginormous hole in the ground that was the site last school year. The work also invites a daily parade of colorful construction crew members and their unusual tools and tasks right by my window the entire time I'm teaching.

My co-teacher pulled the blinds on the show this afternoon, and I understand why he did that, but I'm also of the mind that if children are never distracted, they will never learn to focus. Plus we have plenty of distraction in the classroom, too: we can't block it all out for them.

Even so, the adults that gathered in my room for our semi-monthly leadership team meeting were drawn to the spectacle, too. When the last two teachers left after the meeting, one turned to me with a mock bow. "Thank you for letting us meet in your room," she started. "You are always the host with the most..." She paused, looking for the perfect compliment. Just then the room shook from some epic construction task.

"The most activity outside my window?" I supplied for her.

Nothing New

I was walking in to school behind a bunch of kids this morning when I noticed one of my students dipping a candy pacifier into some weird blue powder and eating it. "It tastes like chemicals!" he cried, "but I like it!"

"Candy in the morning?" I shook my head as I passed them by.

"Twenty-first century breakfast!" he answered.

Small Dog in a Big City

The afternoon was beautiful, 60 degrees and sunny, but still with a bit of November in it, and so we decided to take Lucy and Beckett, the little dog we were sitting, down to the Tidal Basin for a nice walk. There were lots of folks with the same idea as ours, but we found parking without any trouble and started our stroll. Well, Lucy, Heidi, and I walked, but Beckett is a mini Australian Shepherd with limited leash experience, and he kind of danced along on the end of his tether.

A little while later, though, he was trembling as he pattered nervously along, clearly terrified of something. We paused at the Jefferson Memorial, and as my eyes swept over the scene, I tried to see it from Beckett's point of view. In addition to the traffic roaring over the bridge behind us, there were bikes and scooters and strollers coming at us, and lots of legs and feet in his face, not to mention at least 50 Canada geese larger than he was and honking proprietarily right along the water.

It seemed like it might be too much for a puppy from the suburbs, but he took advantage of the break to check in with Lucy, who was genuinely enjoying the outing. Some message must have passed between their noses, because he visibly relaxed and we continued on our way.

Over Under

On the final day of our family Thanksgiving Holiday we did one of our favorite things: we played a game. This was a trivia estimation challenge,  and we learned quite a few nuggets of knowledge that may [never] come in handy someday.

For example, How fast does a bumble bee fly? That would be 7 mph, or just about the same speed that a rain drop falls, but much faster than a centipede crawls and a lot slower than a porcupine can dash 50 yards.

But the most important statistic of the day was that we will all be together again in 31 days.

Contrary

Something there is in me that wants to greet Black Friday with raised fist and resistance. It has long been my goal to not spend even a single cent on this, the most materialistic day of all. But dinner with friends and family has almost just as long blockaded me-- there was always fresh bread and salad greens to be purchased.

This year was promising-- a kind invitation to brunch and a bit of early holiday fatigue put leftovers on the menu tonight, but then I opened my email, and damn! There was a deal I couldn't? didn't? pass up.

Thanksgiving

I was the first one up this morning, and the neighborhood was still when I took Lucy for her first out. Later there would be parades and pies, wine and gravy and dear family, but now the sun filtered through the tall trees to the east turning the frosty air golden. High above my head a messy vee of geese honked through the clear blue, and even as my day began, the breath caught in my throat and gratitude filled my heart.