My passion for education once found me commuting over 2 hours a day to try to teach high school out in the desert. The best gifts those 12 months gave me was depth of prayer and a visceral sense of what I really wanted. (And what I did not!)
What I didn't want, was life in a car, only to deliver me into a system of education so removed from the human soul that participating in it seemed to bleed my own soul right out of me. And what I wanted, came to me in simple images and feelings as I let my tired spirit soar over the inland landscape as I drove back and forth.
I wanted to make bread. To drink milk warm from a pitcher. To feel earth in my hands and the sun on my head. To laugh on a daily basis.... The images were simple. The list was short.
With the mantra of these images in my mind, I walked away from my secure job so that I could be a mother in the way that made sense to me. I didn't know at the time what my life would look like one year, one month, one day after that, but I felt that I was opening myself to embrace that which spoke to my spirit. Maybe it would involve bread. And growing things....
This past April, our 2nd graders journeyed to the Sugarman's Sugar Sweet Farm to experience a day in the life of a farmer. They gathered eggs (and chickens), pet the wooly lambs, drank milk straight from the udder, came nose-to-nose with llamas, and learned about the rhythms of a rural life. They came home covered in hay, dirt, and sweat. And grinning from ear to ear.
Yet another reason why this way of learning and growing makes sense to me. It is rooted in life. The real touch and feel and smell of life. It is about sun, and bread, and growing things.
Maybe I left teaching in the public system because I finally realized I couldn't create a way that felt true from within it. Stowing away in the belly of the ship hoping to re-steer the ship was not the most efficacious approach. The only result was nausea. No, give me dry land. With earth I can dig my fingers into, with the clucking of chickens, the wholesomeness of fresh milk, and the earthy smell of sunning lambs.
Our children need to touch things, and pick them up, taste them, and try them out. To engage with the world that is a part of who we are. And our world can be a simple world. I believe we all really want it to be. I believe we would all be happy to slow down a bit. To feel the sun and the earth. To take some silent moments to watch things grow. To consider who we are when we are nose to nose with a llama, or heartbeat to heartbeat with a chicken. Maybe we would breathe a little slower. Let go a little more. Learn without effort.
This makes sense to me. It is a simple list. But somehow I get the feeling that so much more is happening that cannot be seen behind the glowing smiles of these children's faces.
I get the feeling that, if given the chance, so many more people would want to live, and learn, like this.
(Photos thanks to Cindy Issel.)
What I didn't want, was life in a car, only to deliver me into a system of education so removed from the human soul that participating in it seemed to bleed my own soul right out of me. And what I wanted, came to me in simple images and feelings as I let my tired spirit soar over the inland landscape as I drove back and forth.
I wanted to make bread. To drink milk warm from a pitcher. To feel earth in my hands and the sun on my head. To laugh on a daily basis.... The images were simple. The list was short.
With the mantra of these images in my mind, I walked away from my secure job so that I could be a mother in the way that made sense to me. I didn't know at the time what my life would look like one year, one month, one day after that, but I felt that I was opening myself to embrace that which spoke to my spirit. Maybe it would involve bread. And growing things....
This past April, our 2nd graders journeyed to the Sugarman's Sugar Sweet Farm to experience a day in the life of a farmer. They gathered eggs (and chickens), pet the wooly lambs, drank milk straight from the udder, came nose-to-nose with llamas, and learned about the rhythms of a rural life. They came home covered in hay, dirt, and sweat. And grinning from ear to ear.
Yet another reason why this way of learning and growing makes sense to me. It is rooted in life. The real touch and feel and smell of life. It is about sun, and bread, and growing things.
Maybe I left teaching in the public system because I finally realized I couldn't create a way that felt true from within it. Stowing away in the belly of the ship hoping to re-steer the ship was not the most efficacious approach. The only result was nausea. No, give me dry land. With earth I can dig my fingers into, with the clucking of chickens, the wholesomeness of fresh milk, and the earthy smell of sunning lambs.
Our children need to touch things, and pick them up, taste them, and try them out. To engage with the world that is a part of who we are. And our world can be a simple world. I believe we all really want it to be. I believe we would all be happy to slow down a bit. To feel the sun and the earth. To take some silent moments to watch things grow. To consider who we are when we are nose to nose with a llama, or heartbeat to heartbeat with a chicken. Maybe we would breathe a little slower. Let go a little more. Learn without effort.
This makes sense to me. It is a simple list. But somehow I get the feeling that so much more is happening that cannot be seen behind the glowing smiles of these children's faces.
I get the feeling that, if given the chance, so many more people would want to live, and learn, like this.
(Photos thanks to Cindy Issel.)
