Today was a bizarre day scheduling-wise. Since our school is closing, our kids are being farmed out to a bunch of different high-schools; today, many representatives from the other schools came to ours, to touch base with their respective kids. It was also "Field Day," i.e. the day where the whole school gets one giant recess.
This meant that I only had five students in 5th period. And, those five kiddos were only going to be there for about 20 minutes.
"Do you guys want to blog...?" I asked. "That's what the other classes did, it's an extra credit option..."
"No, let's hang out and talk!" Andy said, plopping down on the floor in front of the fan. "Socratic Seminar!"
"Let's tell fairy tales!" said Maisie, and sat down beside him.
We've been discussing allegory this week, which ties into our unit on Animal Farm. The extra-credit blog option was to create their own allegorical story. We could work that into fairy tales...
I sat down with them and the couple remaining kids followed suit. "We could tell ALLEGORICAL fairy-tales..." I offered. "About our own lives."
Andy-- forever the catalyst-- grinned and said, "You first! Lead by example!"
I thought for a second. "Once upon a time... There was a young maiden. She LOOKED like she was fifteen, but actually she was much older..."
The kids laughed-- Maisie gives me endless grief about how young I look.
I continued: "And she was in charge of teaching all the little squirrels and birds of the forest. That's you," I clarified. The kids grinned and nodded. "And... sometimes the birds would get distracted from their lessons and fly away... and sometimes the squirrels would chatter really loud, but the maiden liked them all anyway. And she would often spend long hours going to collect water and food for the animals after they had gone to sleep. And one day, she met a fairy godmother, and got to make a wish," I said.
"Actually--" I paused. "She got two wishes. Because I want two wishes. Actually--" I paused again. "She got three wishes."
The kids laughed.
"The first wish was that the birds and the squirrels would always know how much POTENTIAL they had," I said. "The second wish was that SHE would always remember how much potential they had. The third wish was for a magic wand that would silence their voice-boxes when they chattered too much." The kids cracked up again.
Maisie's fairy tale started off like so: "Once there was a peasant girl... Who was born to two OBNOXIOUS gypsies. And one day, she started walking towards the castle, towards the kingdom... And she saw a prince who was a JERK-FACED LOSER, and she fell in love with him... And then, you know. He was awful."
"So he was an evil prince in disguise as a handsome knight?" I asked.
"Yes! That's exactly what he was," she pronounced.
Andy's story began, "So there was this CASANOVA..." which made me laugh. Then he continued to tell a story that was very much a straight-forward version of his own, albeit told in third person. "He went to get educated, but... Things kinda got hard. He wanted to go off and be this big shot business man, but, you know..." He shrugged and looked at me, his face a little crestfallen. Andy is very smart, but has failed many of his classes, including ours.
I interrupted him. "And then HE met a fairy godmother, and she told him that he was young and that it was EARLY in his life, and that he still had every chance in the world to become a hot-shot business man."
The stories ended up working with the allegorical theme-- Fiona equated her and her siblings to three different kinds of suitcases, and even though Tommy didn't quite understand how to translate his story into allegorical characters, we worked it out together.
So the Friday Fairy tales ended up being a pretty great way to wind down those 20 minutes. "And they all lived happily ever after..."
Sure hope so.
Showing posts with label allegorizing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label allegorizing. Show all posts
May 29, 2009
Aug 18, 2008
Through the Storm
Last night was a really hard end to a really hard weekend. The big changes are brutally reshaping everything, and I wrote to Annie that, "for the rest of my life, I feel like I'm going to be walking on shattered glass."
This morning I woke up, and it was pouring down rain. I played guitar for a little while in my shadowy room, looking out at the heavy clouds, and the leaves being bent by the steady drops. I wanted to go out into it. I needed that storm on my skin; I don't know why. Maybe I felt that, if the outside felt like the inside, then the inside would hurt less. Maybe the idea of getting soaked in a rainstorm seemed cleansing. I don't really know.
But I put on a t-shirt and running pants, and flip flops and went out. There's a giant hill that leads straight up behind my house, and when you get to the top you can see the lake, and the other side of the city behind it, and the mountains behind that. My friend Aaron and I had watched a lightening storm from the top of that hill just last night. I usually start walks by heading up that hill; my legs like the wake-up call.
My hair was down. I just needed to be in the rain.
I got to the top of the hill and looked at the muddy bleary view; the lines of the city and lake and mountains had all run together. Sometimes getting to the top of the hill is enough, but I felt like I wanted to keep walking.
So I did, and my feet were wet because they were just in flip-flops, and dirt was getting caught between the soles of my feet and the sandals, and so I took them off. I took a few steps on the wet pavement in my bare feet, and that felt right. I don't know why. I stepped into a puddle and it felt soft. I stepped on the bumpy pavement and it hurt a little bit, but not like shattered glass. "This isn't as bad as it could be," I thought. And I kept walking.
I thought of me being in the storm, and how most people were in their homes, protected from the rain, or in their cars, protected from the rain, and it almost didn't seem fair to be in the wet and cold. But then I thought of some of the people I'd met in Africa, and I thought of some of the students I'd mentored that were going through really heavy things, and I remembered I wasn't the only one out in the rain.
I saw a woman with her dog, sitting under her porch roof, tucked back into a garden, and I almost went to talk to her, but then I thought that might have been even more strange than being out in the rain in the first place, walking in bare feet. I was sort of praying the whole time, and I remembered how I had thought that, part of God getting my back meant feeling His spirit curve around my spine and straightening me tall and helping me to walk with dignity, and so I straightened tall and lifted my chin and squared my shoulders and kept walking on that wet bumpy pavement in my bare feet. I had my shoes, and I knew I could put them on if my feet started hurting but I felt like God was nudging me. "You've got them if you need them, but I want you to know that you can do this."
So the walk turned into my own personal allegory, and I allowed myself to think about what the different moments coming in and out might mean. At times, I walked on the grass, and that was soft, and I thought that sometimes it will be easier, and it won't feel quite as stark or hard. I passed people every once in a while, and I thought that they probably thought I was a little strange, and I even thought of offering a couple times, "I think maybe I'm just a little weird," just to be helpful, but I didn't, I just let them think what they would think because people will SEE me walking through this, and I can try to be helpful, but really all I can be is me.
By the end of the walk, my feet were hurting, but I thought of Mary Ingles, who is one of my heroes, and who walked somewhere around 1,000 miles through the unsettled Ohio wilderness in the 1700's after she'd been taken from her home by an Indian raid. She walked in her bare feet, in early winter, with almost no food or clothes, and I thought, well SHE did it, and this walk through a Seattle neighborhood during a rainstorm in August wasn't nearly so hard as all that. And my feet weren't hurting badly enough to need my flip-flops yet, but I had them if I needed them, but, it was good to know that I was able to do it even without.
On the last bit, walking back down that big hill, I saw an apple tree and the apples were big, and probably almost ripe, and it was such a surprise, and it was something beautiful. Further along the road, there were summer roses dropping over their fence, and there were six perfect yellow ones, tinged with pink on the edges, fresh and lovely in the rain. They smelled beautiful. When I walked close to the fence to smell them, I stepped on a thick thatch of ivy that had crept over and along the sidewalk, and it was soft on my feet. Closer to my home, I saw a hedge of clematis, which is a vine that my mom has always had in our garden, and the flowers were bright pink six-pointed stars, open to the sky. I thought of how there will be lovely mercies at the end, even as my feet my hurt the most, that there will be cushioning moments and dear merciful gifts to make it easier.
I thought of how I'd begun the walk knowing that there would be rain, but walking in those cushioned shoes, and I thought that that's how I'd sort of begun this whole hard bit: knowing that it would be hard, but maybe walking on a cushion of hope that wasn't totally realistic. And this weekend was sort of like the shoes coming off, and it was really brutal, but there I was at the end of the walk in my bare feet, and I'd been able to get through it and there had been soft spots even along the way.
And I got home, and I was soaking wet, but the storm had woken my skin, and there was a freshness to it, and I opened the door to my house and I knew that it would be warm and dry and carpeted, and I thought, "Well we are going home, and that will be something entirely different from walking through a storm."
It is very difficult to feel hopeful at times. But I am trying. I'm trying to be in this, and acknowledge this, and to trust that there is a Rescuer, and to keep walking forward. Even when it's in the rain, even when it's just in my bare feet.
I'm not sure what else there is to do.
This morning I woke up, and it was pouring down rain. I played guitar for a little while in my shadowy room, looking out at the heavy clouds, and the leaves being bent by the steady drops. I wanted to go out into it. I needed that storm on my skin; I don't know why. Maybe I felt that, if the outside felt like the inside, then the inside would hurt less. Maybe the idea of getting soaked in a rainstorm seemed cleansing. I don't really know.
But I put on a t-shirt and running pants, and flip flops and went out. There's a giant hill that leads straight up behind my house, and when you get to the top you can see the lake, and the other side of the city behind it, and the mountains behind that. My friend Aaron and I had watched a lightening storm from the top of that hill just last night. I usually start walks by heading up that hill; my legs like the wake-up call.
My hair was down. I just needed to be in the rain.
I got to the top of the hill and looked at the muddy bleary view; the lines of the city and lake and mountains had all run together. Sometimes getting to the top of the hill is enough, but I felt like I wanted to keep walking.
So I did, and my feet were wet because they were just in flip-flops, and dirt was getting caught between the soles of my feet and the sandals, and so I took them off. I took a few steps on the wet pavement in my bare feet, and that felt right. I don't know why. I stepped into a puddle and it felt soft. I stepped on the bumpy pavement and it hurt a little bit, but not like shattered glass. "This isn't as bad as it could be," I thought. And I kept walking.
I thought of me being in the storm, and how most people were in their homes, protected from the rain, or in their cars, protected from the rain, and it almost didn't seem fair to be in the wet and cold. But then I thought of some of the people I'd met in Africa, and I thought of some of the students I'd mentored that were going through really heavy things, and I remembered I wasn't the only one out in the rain.
I saw a woman with her dog, sitting under her porch roof, tucked back into a garden, and I almost went to talk to her, but then I thought that might have been even more strange than being out in the rain in the first place, walking in bare feet. I was sort of praying the whole time, and I remembered how I had thought that, part of God getting my back meant feeling His spirit curve around my spine and straightening me tall and helping me to walk with dignity, and so I straightened tall and lifted my chin and squared my shoulders and kept walking on that wet bumpy pavement in my bare feet. I had my shoes, and I knew I could put them on if my feet started hurting but I felt like God was nudging me. "You've got them if you need them, but I want you to know that you can do this."
So the walk turned into my own personal allegory, and I allowed myself to think about what the different moments coming in and out might mean. At times, I walked on the grass, and that was soft, and I thought that sometimes it will be easier, and it won't feel quite as stark or hard. I passed people every once in a while, and I thought that they probably thought I was a little strange, and I even thought of offering a couple times, "I think maybe I'm just a little weird," just to be helpful, but I didn't, I just let them think what they would think because people will SEE me walking through this, and I can try to be helpful, but really all I can be is me.
By the end of the walk, my feet were hurting, but I thought of Mary Ingles, who is one of my heroes, and who walked somewhere around 1,000 miles through the unsettled Ohio wilderness in the 1700's after she'd been taken from her home by an Indian raid. She walked in her bare feet, in early winter, with almost no food or clothes, and I thought, well SHE did it, and this walk through a Seattle neighborhood during a rainstorm in August wasn't nearly so hard as all that. And my feet weren't hurting badly enough to need my flip-flops yet, but I had them if I needed them, but, it was good to know that I was able to do it even without.
On the last bit, walking back down that big hill, I saw an apple tree and the apples were big, and probably almost ripe, and it was such a surprise, and it was something beautiful. Further along the road, there were summer roses dropping over their fence, and there were six perfect yellow ones, tinged with pink on the edges, fresh and lovely in the rain. They smelled beautiful. When I walked close to the fence to smell them, I stepped on a thick thatch of ivy that had crept over and along the sidewalk, and it was soft on my feet. Closer to my home, I saw a hedge of clematis, which is a vine that my mom has always had in our garden, and the flowers were bright pink six-pointed stars, open to the sky. I thought of how there will be lovely mercies at the end, even as my feet my hurt the most, that there will be cushioning moments and dear merciful gifts to make it easier.
I thought of how I'd begun the walk knowing that there would be rain, but walking in those cushioned shoes, and I thought that that's how I'd sort of begun this whole hard bit: knowing that it would be hard, but maybe walking on a cushion of hope that wasn't totally realistic. And this weekend was sort of like the shoes coming off, and it was really brutal, but there I was at the end of the walk in my bare feet, and I'd been able to get through it and there had been soft spots even along the way.
And I got home, and I was soaking wet, but the storm had woken my skin, and there was a freshness to it, and I opened the door to my house and I knew that it would be warm and dry and carpeted, and I thought, "Well we are going home, and that will be something entirely different from walking through a storm."
It is very difficult to feel hopeful at times. But I am trying. I'm trying to be in this, and acknowledge this, and to trust that there is a Rescuer, and to keep walking forward. Even when it's in the rain, even when it's just in my bare feet.
I'm not sure what else there is to do.
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