September 7, 2012

This is the time of year when, suddenly it seems, it's dark later, the day begins in the dark before dawn, and the early evening shadows prove the days are shortening toward winter.  Soon, the powers-that-be will fix that and we will fall back and have Standard time again, though I believe that Standard time now months shorter than Savings time, and I am not sure what we are saving time for any more.  The streetlight still shines its orange light on the corner, and I have not seen anyone out this time of dark.  There may be some hardy souls out there walking the dog but not around our corner.

It seems like teaching a class is akin to going back to school yourself.  You have to learn what you need to teach, and that can be an interesting process that makes you feel like a student again, no matter that now you are the one doing the grading and supposed to know enough about the subject to be able to teach it.  When teaching something like Art Cards, there is history behind it, though a short one as art goes, and then there is the question of art.  What is it anyway?  I asked my students to bring some representation of art they love, a book of pictures by a favorite artist, a print out of something they saw that they loved, just something to show what kind of art appeals to them.  I have a book of Georgia O'Keeffe's work that I will use for my show-and-tell.  But I also have a book that introduces a bunch of different artists from a lot of different schools of art, from antiquity to the present.  Sometimes I introduce them to some artists they have not seen before or do not recognize, and they do the same for me.  They are much more familiar with modern art and with things like the art of anime and manga.  So we all get to say hello to work we might not otherwise have seen.  It makes for an interesting morning!!

Introductions

Some of what we love

we stumble upon —

a purse of gold thrown on the road,

a poem, a friend, a great song.

And more

discloses itself to us —

a well among green hazels,

a nut thicket —

when we are worn out searching

for something quite different.

And more

comes to us, carried

as carefully

as a bright cup of water,

as new bread.

 Moya Cannon

This morning I think that it might be a little of all those things.  I will stumble on things to share while I am looking for something else, it always happens.  The students will amaze me with their choices, which will be quite different most likely from anything I would choose.  And they will bring me what they love, what they are trying to accomplish, what they dream.  I am lucky to have such an opportunity, at my age to have the door opened every class day to what the people of tomorrow are seeing, what they love, to be part of the dreams that will carry them into that future they see!