Maybe Not

Our students are writing children's stories as the summative task for the fiction unit. After giving them the tools and knowledge to analyze plot, setting, and character, we have them create their own character and give him or her a problem to solve. They might also invent an antagonist or a sidekick to hinder or help the hero.

In order to have a solid start, there is a character questionnaire based on one that Nancie Atwell uses in her writers workshop, and today was the day when students started to flesh out their protagonists.

"Can I have my character be on one of the planes from 9/11?" a young writer asked me.

I frowned. "It's supposed to be a children's story," I reminded him.

"It's history," he replied. "Kids need to know history."

I looked at him doubtfully.

"It will definitely be a children's story," he assured me.

I raised my eyebrows quizzically.

"I'm going to make it rhyme!" he promised.

Maintaining the Status Quo

I think DST has finally won. Despite my past annual rants, I don't really miss my hour at all, and I am rather resigned to dragging around for a few days before I get used to the...

Wait a minute!

get used

to the

obnoxious,
ridiculous,
pointless,
no good

time change, which only burdens those of us who are forced to rise early, and only benefits those people who have the luxury of sleeping late by providing extra daylight when their work day is over?

Never!

If they got up with us, they would have plenty of light at the end of the day!

Cures for the Cold

There was a chill in my bones that no number of steaming mugs could banish this morning. At 9 AM I blew into my hands, stamped my slippers, and still shivered in my layers.  I figured I had a choice: I could warm up through activity, or I could build a fire and pull up a fuzzy blanket. Outside my windows the sky was blue and the sun was bright, but the bend of the bare branches told another tale, one of biting breezes from the north.

Once a cheerful little blaze was burning in the fireplace, I stepped out to the wood rack to stock up on firewood before I got under that blanket. We were a bit low on small logs, so I began to split wood. As I swung the sledge, I remembered what my friend Rob used to tell me in college. Some people build small fires to stay warm. Other people build big fires and stay warm by chopping wood. I laughed, because I did feel warmer, especially out in that blue sky and sunshine.

Back inside, the cats and I enjoyed that fire for an hour or so, and then I took the dog and went hiking.

In Formation

I heard the clattering honks before I saw them. It was impossible to ignore the raucous spectacle, and so I stopped to appreciate the ragged vee of fifty or so geese flying over my head this morning. As they flew, three or four of them detached from the rear at the same time the others slowed the pace to first swallow and then follow the new leaders. In the brief time they were in my line of sight this exchange happened twice.

Flying seems like hard work; how could it be otherwise?

I wondered why human beings don't use such a method more often. We are so focused on specialization that leadership has become a thing of its own, rather than a shared responsibility for the good of the group. And instead of being fluid, our hierarchies are often so rigid.

Soon enough, the geese were gone, efficiently winging their way to their common destination, and I returned my attention to earth.

Mirror Mirror

I pulled out one of the workhorses of my kitchen tonight. A high-end, 12-inch stainless steel sautoir pan, I use it for everything from searing to sauteeing to braising. I can even whip up a pretty nice stew for two in there, with a little leftover to pack for lunch. Tonight I was making winter succotash, a ghost of its full-flavored summer self, but with frozen vegetables, still a satisfying side dish at any time of the year.

As I sauteed the onions, I observed a sticky spot, where the onions were browner, near the edge by the handle. It was easy enough to deglaze, but it was a flaw in the pan I'd never noticed before. I might need a new one of these, I thought, and then laughed, because that was silly. I can save myself a couple hundred bucks and scrape that spot whenever I need to.

As it happens, just this weekend my brother and I were watching old videos we had found when we cleaned out my mom's condo. The first was Christmas '96, and although it rightfully focused on my young nephews, the rest of us made cameos. I especially scored screen time because I was holding 18-month-old Treat, and though the actual unwrapping has been lost to posterity, he and I do spend quite a bit of time admiring our reflections in the brand new finish of that very sautoir.

Treat was an adorable child who has grown into a handsome man. The skillet and I? Have seen better days!

Willing Participants

The students in my morning intervention period are there to write: they have 30 minutes to get their daily independent writing done, and that is the clear expectation. It is true that I make it as pleasant as possible for them, creating a little writing cafe atmosphere with music and snacks, but it is also true that they are 12 years old and we start at 8 am. Add to that that they were chosen because of their general reluctance to put words on a page, and there is the occasional clash of wills-- mine and theirs.

At those moments, when a hood goes up or a head droops down or an iPad is clearly tuned to an unauthorized site, I call the unwriter over to my desk.

"We're here to write," I whisper quietly, keeping my voice neutral, waiting for the nod of acknowledgement.

"But..." I shrug, "if you're not interested in that, I can probably find you another intervention class," I add kindly, waiting for the widening of eyes.

"Should I do that?" I finish helpfully, raising my eyebrows in rapt attention.

Bless their hearts! They always say no, and then sit down to write. It helps if they feel they are with me by choice.

Plus, the snacks!

At the Crossing

I decided to forego my heavy duty back pack this morning and instead grabbed a string bag to take with me to an all-day training. I have fondness for these lightweight sacks and the hands-free carrying convenience they offer, and so I have quite a collection of them.

The bag I chose this morning has the added feature of an outside zip-pocket which is a good place for keys and a wallet. I hadn't used it since late last summer, and uncinching the drawstring, I peered inside. There was some hand-sanitizer, a grocery list (peaches, blackberries, tomatoes, and corn), and four flattened pennies, that I had placed in my bag in Rochester, MN when my mom was a patient at the Mayo Clinic.

Walking over the tracks every day on my way from our rented condo to the hospital, the twin notions of transformation and survival prompted me to lay a line of pennies along the rail just past where it crossed my path.  At first, I wanted to give a flattened penny each to my mother, my brother, my sister, and me to remind us of our strength even under the enormous weight of this ordeal, so every time I crossed those tracks, I checked the coins.

Despite the fact that I heard and saw trains running by there several times each day, whenever I passed by the coins remained untouched. At first, I was annoyed. As the days went by, though, it began to seem miraculous, but I cautioned myself from reading too much into it. Still, I thought that if I could scoop them up, undamaged, on our last day in town, it could only be a good sign.

The morning my mother was going to be discharged, I walked down to the hospital one more time. There in the gravel that lined the railroad tracks I found four crushed pennies. With a catch in my throat, I tossed them in my string bag and kept going.

And that's where they stayed, until today. I laid them in my palm and remembered my hope and disappointment. Then I closed my fingers and jingled them lightly together, listening to the quiet music of four ruined coins, emblems of the inevitable.