Yesterday:05/02/10 Class Begins

The room was rearranged since I'd last seen it a few months ago. My life was also altered. My father died on New Year's day, after a battle with cancer, but that is another story for a different time. Work is incredibly busy with ministry initiatives, steering committees, workshop development, and other responsibilities. My home life is similarly busy with grade 9 course selections for my daughter, the dawn of a new term that includes academic math for my son, a prominent social figure in the grade 10 scene, and the scheduling headaches of upcoming dance recitals and work related conferences. Sleep has not come easy to me these last few weeks and during the days my head is not always as clearly in the moment as it usually is. I longed for the sight of a familiar face.

The tables were set up in a square at the very back of the room. They were those new geometrically correct tables that allow for inclusive seating configurations. Today the learning community was shaped as a square, each side slightly open to allow for those with slim and nubile hips to slip with ease around the corners and into their selected chairs. My rear end did not obey these rules. It squeezed and pushed itself through the opening, making its' own path, as I spotted an open seat in the row against the back wall. The empty seat was coveted because it was beside the friendly face I recognized.

With exclamations of "excuse me," and "I'm really sorry," (after all, I am Canadian) I managed to claim my chair with only a few casualties suffered (coffees grabbed, books moved and laptops lowered).

.... The weekend wore on and I was trying to 'make meaning' from a course funny enough, about 'making meaning.' My thoughts continued to dwell on the idea that I might be able to write my story as a thesis. I kept having to pull myself back to the present and focus on the current discussion. I lost a great deal of time at one point worried with the feeling that my nose was going to run and I couldn't find a Kleenex in my purse. I was trapped in the community seating arrangement and my hip was still sore from not so gracefully claiming my seat. My energy was focused on sending telepathic thoughts to the professor to declare a break. "Please don't let me have to sniffle, please don't let me have to get up and disrupt the group."

...There was a pivotal moment during the weekend when my working theme or central focus became clear to me. One of those 'ah-hah's' that is triggered by a specific event. The professor read aloud to us. I had a sense that reading to students was an important part of her teaching experience. I was lost in the power of the written word as her voice danced across the lines of text. Her voice became the voice of my mother and each teacher, librarian or Sunday School teacher who ever read me a story.

I was jotting down the name of the Helen Humphrey's book that she was reading from, when it occurred to me. A blur of memories, flashing forwards and back, of those wonderful stories told to me and read by me, describing how my enduring relationship with literature has woven itself tightly into my life -- my early life as a reader, my undergrad life studying literature, my life as a young mother reading to her children, my life as a teacher bringing stories to my students, my life as a literacy coach and teacher consultant working alongside teachers to engage students in reading and thinking, and my continued love for reading as an adult. My own passion for telling stories, more recently in the form of blog postings, could provide the format for my annals - and organize the chronicle that I will (eventually) complete.

On another note, the telepathic begging worked. I did get a break and was able to blow my nose, check my teeth and swipe the eyeliner back under my eyelids where it belonged. I returned and remained a keen participant.