I was thinking today about the enormous power of ramification, especially as it applies to teaching. A ramification occurs when an action, decision, judgment, or thought has a consequence, usually unintended, that may complicate the situation or make the intended result more difficult to achieve. This process happens continually in every aspect of life. Each of our actions, decisions, judgments, or thoughts has innumerable ramifications -- small and large deviations and swervings that cause other deviations and swervings, which cause others, and so on ad infinitum. In fact, the word “ramify” itself comes from the Latin word for root, suggesting a plant that sends off stems, twigs, and branches as it grows. What’s intriguing is that each of our experiences is like a plant in this sense, except that the ramifications of our experiences are without end. A plant eventually withers, dies, and its spreading comes to an end. In human life, this never happens. Even the smallest idea, word, or action causes a ceaseless – you might say eternal – series of effects. It’s like a pebble dropped into an ocean with no shores: the ripples never stop.

I often think of this as I am going about my work as a teacher of adolescents. Each word I speak to them, each gesture I make, each passing glance, is like that pebble. I may say a sentence to a class with a particular purpose in mind, but I can’t possibly know all the trillions of ramifications it will have. The consequences of that sentence will begin branching out as soon as the words are spoken, and they’ll still be branching hours, days, weeks, even years from now. Lives will alter because of that single sentence. The world will be a slightly changed place for all eternity because of those few spoken words. And of course, the same is true for every sentence, action, gesture, or glance, whether by me or by my students. In Room 2, we’re all continually remaking the world just by being alive and lively – by dropping pebbles into the borderless sea of life. The ripples of our actions cause other ripples which cause other ripples, and so on. The branches keep dividing and multiplying forever.

Some teachers might feel a bit overwhelmed, even discouraged, by this realization. After all, it seems to imply that we really have no control over what effects our teaching has. If the ramifications of our words and actions are random, uncontrollable , and endless, why even bother trying to organize lessons with specific goals? My answer is simple: Because the ramifications are precisely what make teaching such a thrilling enterprise. We and our students are, each moment, at the center of enormous power. Every one of our actions, however slight and seemingly trivial, starts an endless unfolding of effects, consequences, results, and outcomes. Each thought and action makes us unbelievably powerful creators. True, we can never know exactly (or even slightly) what we have created, but that’s part of the great pleasure this work holds for me.

I spent several happy hours yesterday reading some of Milton’s poems, and a bit of his biography. Oddly enough, I read on my laptop from an on-line edition while I was watching a football game. (I wonder if I’m the first person in the history of the universe to combine Paradise Lost with football.) At every commercial I muted the sound on the TV and read a few lines. Somehow, it seemed just right, as though the rhythms and wisdom of the poems somehow complemented the graceful hostility of the game.

Now, as I write at 4:38 a.m., I hear the rain quietly landing outside. It’s a soft, reticent rain, as thought it doesn’t want to disturb anyone on this Monday morning. “I’ll be very quiet,” it seems to say. “I’ll go about my business of meticulously watering your town and then I’ll silently slip away.”

A quote from Paradise Lost :
“...this Heaven which we behold
Distant so high, with moving fires adorned
Innumerable; and this which yields or fills
All space, the ambient Air, wide interfused,
Embracing round this florid Earth.”

And two quotes from George Eliot's Middlemarch:
“...a girl who would have been requiring you to see the stars by daylight.” (referring to Dorothea Brooke)

“[I]t was now time for him to adorn his life with the graces of female companionship, to irradiate the gloom which fatigue was apt to hang over the intervals of studious labor with the play of female fancy, and to secure in this, his culminating age, the solace of female tendance for his declining years. Hence he determined to abandon himself to the stream of feeling, and perhaps was surprised to find what an exceedingly shallow rill it was.” (spoken about Mr. Casaubon)

I spent some fine hours up in Millbury with Luke and young Joshy today. Luke wanted to look for some shoes at the mall, and he also wanted to give Krissy some time by herself, so we three guys (Josh in back in the car-seat) headed out for some quality time together. We first drove along the highway for a few minutes so the little fellow would fall asleep, which he almost instantly did. The hum and gentle roll of the car worked its magic, and by the time we reached the mall, Josh was in z-land. Luke gently transferred him (still in the car-seat) to the stroller, and we headed into the shoe store. Luke quickly found two pairs that he liked, and after browsing the aisles a bit, we made the purchases and checked out. By that time, Josh was awake again and smiling in his amiable way, so we drove over to Barnes and Noble and sat in the café and talked. Luke fed Josh some of his bottle, but Josh seemed way more interested in the sunshine coming through the window and in the many curious people passing through the store. He cooed and smiled and chuckled as he lightheartedly tugged at the nipple. Luke and I shared in his obvious happiness as we sat at the little table.

Yesterday, one of the final days of my winter vacation, was as relaxed a day as I can recall. It began, as my days nearly always do, with some quiet reading and writing in the early morning hours. As I sat at my desk in the silence of the apartment, my life seemed utterly serene . Nothing was pressing, nothing had to be done, no future situations were clamoring for my attention: all was perfectly centered in the page I was reading or the words I was writing. The serenity continued into the early afternoon, when I joined some good friends for lunch at a stylish but peaceful café in a nearby village. We had a wonderful time together, and we didn’t have to work hard to do it. Our laughter came as freely and easily as the rain outside. While we sat and talked for over two hours, I felt as restful as I’ve ever felt. In the late afternoon, I again experienced a magical kind of relaxation when I sat by the rainy window in my apartment and watched the end of a classy British mystery show on DVD. That situation is almost my favorite kind of peacefulness: a rainy day, a window from which to enjoy the storm, a good movie (or book), and a pot of steaming tea. I felt thoroughly grateful as I sat there enjoying my magnificent life.

It’s interesting to discover that the word “indolence” derives from the Latin “indolere”, meaning “not subject to stress”. I find this especially intriguing this morning because yesterday I spent three thoroughly indolent hours with my grandson -- hours when I felt utterly stress-free. While Noah and I were sitting on the floor playing with Noah’s Ark or a miniature parking garage or one of his other toys, not even a hurricane could have unnerved me. I was completely relaxed. During those idle hours, the most serious worry would have flowed through me like a harmless stream.

I have always taken my work as a teacher very seriously. There have been countless times, in fact, when I have felt that what I was doing in Room 2 at my little school was one of the most significant activities anyone could possibly do. I guess I’ve felt important as a teacher -- essential, crucial, indispensable. I’ve often considered it absolutely vital that I get a lesson taught thoroughly and efficiently, almost as if something bad will happen to the universe if I don’t. What I’m realizing more and more lately, however, is that the universe will do just beautifully no matter how I teach a lesson. I am an infinitesimally tiny part of a cosmos that has been admirably creating itself for many billions of years – and it doesn’t need any special help from me. The innumerable stars will continue to flash and spin whether or not my forty students learn what a participle is. What I may need to do, occasionally, is take a few steps back and have a good laugh at myself. I may need to take my teaching work a little less seriously and a little more playfully. After all, the universe plays a lot more than it works. I don’t think of the sun as “working hard” to provide light for the solar system, nor does the wind seem to make a big effort to blow. The entire grand universe seems to do so well precisely because no one part tries to be more important than another – i.e., takes itself too seriously. Each part knows that the universe will continue in its majestic and harmonious course no matter what. This doesn’t mean that I should not be the best teacher I can possibly be. On the contrary, by not taking myself so seriously in the classroom, I will allow the truly vast power of education to do its marvelous work. By getting my diminutive, self-important ego out of the way, the powerful river of teaching and learning will be able to flow a lot more freely.

Yesterday I started on a new path in my life, one that I hope I can stay on for at least the rest of today. What makes this path so new for me is that it’s a non-alcoholic one. I have been imbibing a little alcohol each and every day for as long as I can remember, but yesterday I didn’t. Yesterday I was dry, on the wagon, temperate, clear-headed , alcohol-free. Mind you, I have never been a heavy drinker – just a single glass of wine before dinner – but still, the alcohol has, in an odd, hidden way, sort of dominated my days for all these many years. I often started thinking about my evening glass of wine around lunchtime, or before. As the evening hour drew nearer, I day-dreamed about the tall glass of wine more and more, until it was probably my overriding thought just before dinner. Well, I guess I decided yesterday that I don’t like that feeling. I don’t like being controlled by a single, irresistible idea, and I definitely don’t like the feeling of slowly falling into a swoon and then into a soporific, sleep-inducing condition by 8:00 in the evening. So, I purchased some alcohol-free wine at a local package store, and started off on my new path. I enjoyed a glass at lunch (without feeling bleary for the next several hours), and then partook of a delicious glass before dinner. I enjoyed the meal immensely, and – wonder of wonders! – felt awake enough to do stay out of bed until almost 10:00! It appears to be an attractive and possibly rewarding path. We’ll see what today brings in my new one-day-at-a-time life.

I’ve been reading Milton lately, and enjoying it immensely. Yesterday I went through “L’allegro” and “Ill Penseroso” for the first time in many years, and once again experienced the pleasure of the smooth rhythms as well as the almost inexplicable beauty of the writing. While reading it, I had by my side the on-line edition of Cleanth Brooks’ classic Understanding Poetry, which was a great help in illuminating the inner machinery of the poem. I also got out my old Cambridge edition of Keats, which has wonderful introductions to nearly every poem, as well as abundant notes. I sat in my comfortable chair overlooking the quiet street and read with great contentment. Life felt fairly perfect with Milton in my lap.

The deluge of Monday came to a halt overnight and yesterday the sun was bright and the air often felt as warm as March. If it’s like that again today, I intend to spend some time in the park, lolling about and dreaming of temperate spring days.

I had a fine workout at the gym yesterday, hunched over the handlebars of the bike and spinning the wheels as I listened to rousing songs on my iPod. Both sweat and calories streamed off me.

The first day of 2007 has proven to be a wet one. The rain must have started during the night, because I noticed the glazed pavement when I looked out in the early hours. It was a light and silent shower then, so much so that I barely thought about it as I did my morning reading and writing. For all I knew in my lamp-lit apartment, it might have been dry and clear outside instead of cloudy and showery. However, as the hours passed, the rain grew stronger and noisier, to the point where it was a constant background sound as I read or worked on the computer. Cars splashed past the house as if they were passing through a deluge, and the rain drummed on the pavement in the parking lot beside my house. It seemed like the clouds had decided to unfasten all their moisture just above our small defenseless town. Now, as dusk draws on, the rain has slowed to a light shower. The splashes on the street have just about been silenced, and the evening promises to be dry and quiet. I may even go out for a walk at halftime of the Rose Bowl, just to feel the freshness of the air after a full day of soaking rain.

Many of us have a double standard when it comes to listening to music and reading. While no one thinks it odd for someone to listen to a favorite song hundreds of times in their lifetime, almost everyone considers it a bit peculiar that a person would read a favorite poem or novel that often. We understand the need to hear a song over and over, but we don’t give the same deference to a reader. Perhaps we feel there’s more substance in a song than in a piece of literature – more depth in a hit by The Eagles than in a chapter in Great Expectations. No one, for example, would be surprised to hear that a friend is listening to a 60’s song yet again, but wouldn’t we be slightly dumbfounded to find that the same person has read a sonnet of Shakespeare hundreds of times? If we asked the person why she keeps reading the same poem over and over, she might say, “Well, for the same reason that I listen to a song over and over.” If there’s endless magic in a song, why can’t we accept the fact that the same type of bottomless pleasure can exist in literature? I’ll likely spend the rest of my life re-reading things I’ve already read many times: Paradise Lost, Shakespeare’s plays, novels by Dickens and George Eliot, and poems by Keats and Wordsworth. Someone else may listen to the Beatles’ songs again and again, while I’ll be bopping along to the music of Milton. I fully understand the music lover’s passionate attachment to favorite songs, and I hope my friends will similarly understand my devotion to a handful of beloved authors.

Whenever I feel inspired by my work as a teacher – whenever I feel like I’m doing a great job and am becoming a better and better teacher – I know I’ve lost my way temporarily. I know I’ve taken the familiar but dangerous path toward arrogance instead of the narrow and correct one that leads to humility. I’m patting my own back instead of my students’. Like a confused gardener, I’m admiring the soil more than the flowers. After all, a teacher’s only job is to see to it that his students grow as abundantly and gracefully as possible. His job is not to be a brilliant teacher but to make it easy for his students to be brilliant students. All the spotlights in his classroom should be on the students, and none on himself. To go back to the garden analogy: Who wouldn’t be amused at a gardener who, at the end of the growing season, was more thrilled with the quality of the soil than with the wealth of the harvest? The harvest, not the soil, is the whole point of a garden, and productive, resourceful students is the whole point of education. Like soil, a good teacher is helpful, but he should remain relatively hidden, like the featureless, unassuming soil in which a profusion of beautiful things grows. A good teacher doesn’t need to feel successful; he only needs to know that his students do.

Yesterday could serve as a “model” day for me – one that seemed flawless from start to finish. It started with a vigorous workout at the gym, followed by a breakfast that was absolutely perfect: one toasted bagel with homemade raspberry jam and fresh, appetizing coffee. I felt surprisingly strong as I pumped the bike at the gym, and I’m not sure I’ve ever had a tastier breakfast. As I sipped the last drops of coffee, I felt like the day was off to an ideal start. Later in the morning, I drove with Annie up to Jaimie’s house to drop off his car, and then we had a drive home together that somehow seemed just right. The car hummed effortlessly, we talked with love and sincerity, and the hour passed gracefully by. I felt fortunate to spend these excellent minutes with such an admirable young person. The rest of the day was just the thing for me – many faultless hours watching football games, reading, writing letters, and just letting one fine though after another come to me unbidden. That perhaps sounds supremely dull to some people, but to me it’s a superlative way to spend a Saturday. All was right with my world during those pleasant hours.

10:30 a.m.
As I relax on a plane returning from a peaceful and fulfilling trip back to my roots in St. Louis, it’s time to review the high points of the week. I think, first of all, of the many happy meals I shared with the family: a dinner at Steak ‘n’ Shake with mom and Al; a lively lunch at Schlafly’s in Maplewood with Al, Mike, and Pete; a family-style buffet at the lovely Innsbruck home of Barb and Mike; an elegant dinner (and poetry reading!) at Pete and Barbara’s; and delicious home-made soup with Maysie, Don, and their cheerful family. I ate well on this trip, and with good food came good companionship. French fries, salads, and smiles seemed to go well together. Another good chunk of my visit was spent just seeing a few St. Louis sights. Some of us went to the Missouri Botanical Garden to view a display of exotic glass-making, and mom and I enjoyed the drive through the countryside on our way to Innsbruck. I also spent a number of hours aimlessly cruising old, memory-filled neighborhoods in my rental car. All in all, though, I guess the highest of the high points was simply being with my extended family again. I loved (as usual) the comfortable hours with Al and Mary Anne, and being with my gracious and admirable mother was like turning back the clock. I am lucky to be part of a remarkable family, and this past week I felt luckier than ever.

As is fitting in this special season of light, when I awoke this morning I immediately lit several candles around the apartment, and they glowed softly as I read and wrote. Every so often, I paused in my work and walked through the dark rooms, admiring the radiance of the little candles. They didn’t take up much space on the tables and bookshelves, but they sent out a healthy light throughout the apartment. This is an extraordinary day in the year, and the candles, as they should, glowed magnificently. It made me think of the power of many kinds of light – the light of lamps that allow people to see each other; the headlights of cars that take people to important rendezvous; the silent light of stars above this sometimes anxious world; and – best of all – the light of thoughts that continually flash and show us the way we should go. Our lives are surrounded and suffused with light. Even the tiniest light on a Christmas tree suggests the impressive power of light. As I drive to the airport this afternoon for my holiday visit to my extended family in St. Louis, I will watch for the lights shining along the way – lamps in windows of comforting homes, lights of holiday decorations, lights along the roads to help us all get where we wish to go. And I will think of the great light of the sun, which is the source of all light, and the even greater light of limitless Mind (which some call God). I’ll see and feel the shining that is in all places, all hearts, and all times.

On this mild, blustery Christmas Eve, the family gathered at Jaimie and Jess’s in the late morning for a celebratory brunch. There seemed to be a touch of spring in the air as we were all arriving, and I didn’t hear any complaints about it. If it hadn’t been for the decorated Christmas tree, I might have felt like I should be in shorts and a summer shirt. As a warm, gusty breeze swayed the tall treetops around the house, we greeted each other and began a warmhearted day of festivities.The mood inside the house was as easygoing as the weather outside. It was a day for the children, and Noah, Kaylee, and baby Josh entertained us continuously with their gentle antics. Noah and Kaylee beamed as they opened gift after gift, and Josh was as calm and kindhearted as he always is, whether rocking in his mother’s arms, or swaying in his dad’s lap, or sprawled on the floor with what seemed like a perpetual smile on his face. After most of the presents were opened, I wandered outside for a bit of fresh air. The air seemed soft like April as the trees leaned this way and that in the relaxed breeze. I felt like running and skipping across the faded winter grass, but I didn’t. Instead, I wandered back inside to enjoy more of our family’s mellow holiday cheer.

It’s a silent Saturday morning in Westerly. Outside, a car whispers by every so often, and when I listen carefully I can hear the sounds of a gentle rain falling and perhaps a car’s tires splashing along the street, but otherwise the town seems utterly muted. It’s as if the entire population is enjoying a late and peaceful sleep. My small apartment is just as silent. Some holiday candles are glowing on tables and bookshelves here and there, and my reading lamp is giving a golden light to my laptop as I type, but, thankfully, there’s no noise whatsoever. All is hushed in these peaceful rooms where I’m lucky to live. It seems fitting, at this holiday season, that I’m enjoying a morning of silence, for the beauty of silence is one of the main points of Jesus’ teaching. Noise is caused by confusion and chaos, and Jesus brought a message of order and harmony. He taught us that only in silence – in the “closet” of prayer -- can be found the quiet truth of reality. And that’s exactly what I’m experiencing on this drizzly, serene holiday morning.

Lately I’ve been mulling over an intriguing thought – that a person can actually stay calm even while rushing. In fact, calmness can be enjoyed in any situation, regardless of how frenzied, scary, or upsetting it might be. Being calm simply means accepting what’s happening, and I can do that no matter where I am or what I’m experiencing. If I say to every moment, “I accept you exactly the way you are,” I might feel a steadier and deeper calmness than I ever thought possible. It is indeed a strange truth that the key to finding calmness in life is simply not resisting the present moment. It seems almost too easy. I’m often tempted to dismiss the notion as poppycock and claptrap, a lame-brained theory out of some esoteric self-help book. However, every time I examine the idea carefully, its utter truthfulness becomes clear beyond any doubt. Tension and stress arise only from resistance to some present moment, and calmness and coolness are always restored by accepting that moment. If I have to get somewhere quickly, I can give up all opposition to that fact and, instead, simply flow with it. If I do that, my “rushing” will be thoroughly peaceful. People who see me dashing along the sidewalk might say, “Goodness, that man looks so calm!”

As usual in the last few days before Christmas break, there was great exhilaration at school yesterday. Teaching and learning was replaced by laughing and hugging. In the classrooms, in the halls, in the library, and on the playground there was little else but pure enthusiasm. The holidays have definitely begun. It’s a somewhat frustrating time for we teachers, especially if we’re of the controlling type. If you like to run an efficient, well-managed classroom where great lists of goals are reached and checked off each day, you would not enjoy these last few days before vacation. For the most part, educational goals at my school were in complete tatters yesterday. It could be, though, that other worthy goals were reached by all of us, students and teachers alike. Perhaps we found a little more elation for our lives, a little more joy to carry with us into the days ahead. Maybe instead of learning how to be better students and teachers, we learned something more about how to be people of high spirits and delight. We might deserve a higher grade for yesterday than we realize.

Yesterday I learned something about calmness. The word derives from the Latin for “the heat of the day”, and I felt like I learned a little something yesterday about being restful when things get really “hot”. Nothing extraordinary happened – just a little confusion as I was using my new computer – but I was proud of the way I remained serene as I dealt with the situation. When I started to get anxious, I just relaxed, stayed cool, and allowed the natural good results to gradually take effect. It’s interesting that the word “calm” originally meant the part of the day in ancient Rome when the sun was the hottest. I can picture the Romans resting in the shade as the day heated up. They obviously knew that there’s no point in fighting the heat – that the easiest way to stay cool is to find your vast reservoir of inner peace, settle into its shade, and let the coolness take over. It’s a lesson I need to continue to learn, day after day. When students grow restive, when a carefully constructed lesson seems to be falling part before my eyes, when a problem feels as uncomfortable as a scorching day in August, I need to seek the shade of my own inner peacefulness. Actually, it’s not my own peacefulness that I need to get in touch with, but the peacefulness of the entire universe. Like the stars, planets, winds, and seas, I need to simply let things happen as beautifully and as naturally as they always want to happen. There’s shade all around me, if I only look – and I discovered this again yesterday.

I’ve been having a wonderful time with my new computer, exploring it to discover its many capabilities, searching the internet while sitting in my lounge chair in the living room, and typing out little pieces like this paragraph. It’s an astonishing machine. Some human beings dreamed it up and others put it all together, and now it sits in my lap as I enjoy its powers. I feel grateful to the brilliant minds that designed and built it so I could enjoy a miracle each day. It’s an utter mystery to me, but that doesn’t prevent me from thoroughly taking pleasure in it.

Even though I didn’t especially need it, I got tons of comfort yesterday from my two grandsons. Anyone feeling disconsolate about the condition of the world would only need to spend a few hours with young Noah or Joshua to feel considerably reassured. These boys bring a sense of encouragement with them wherever they go. All seems well – even perfect – with the universe when I’m hanging around with these active yet somehow tranquil boys. While Noah and I and Jaimie and Jessy enjoyed our customary Saturday breakfast (French toast for some, an egg and cheese sandwich for others), I occasionally exchanged a few quiet words with Noah. He seemed extra peaceful as he munched his food and smiled and chatted with me. It was a mild morning outside, and he made the inside of the house every bit as mild. After breakfast (and some relaxing playing in the studio), I drove up to spend a few hours with what has to be (at least when I visit) one of the calmest families I know. Josh was at his cuddliest best, whether rolling on the floor, giggling at Luke’s antics, or just peacefully resting in Krissy’s arms. It gave me enormous pleasure simply to be near him and his small treasure of quietness. Who needs a tranquilizer or a glass of wine when he has two soothing boys for good medicine?

In my fortunate life, everything seemed harmonious yesterday . In the early morning, I had a quiet, productive study period at my desk, slowly reading through some spiritual pages. As I read, I felt a pleasant balance between work and play. I tried my best to focus with intensity on the ideas in the book, but I also relaxed and allowed the meanings to arise in an effortless manner. At school, although I wasn’t the greatest teacher in the world, my classes did flow along in a well-balanced way. There was a little of everything: some quiet periods, some brilliant conversation, some tedium, some effusive bursts of wisdom and happiness. My students and I didn’t change the world yesterday, but we did experience some of the great pleasantness of life. After school, I drove two of my students over to my son’s school to talk with him about tutoring kids in his 3rd grade classroom. During that time, I felt a pleasing combination of emotions: for instance, disappointment that my students had to ride in my messy car, but elation at how well our visit went. In Matt’s well-organized classroom, we sat at the tiny round table and enjoyed a beneficial conversation about their forthcoming duties as tutors. Driving back to school with the kids, I thought about how blessed I was to live such a sweet and even-handed life.

Like most people, I've always loved the look of majestic mountains, but lately I've been pondering the interesting fact that without valleys, there would be no mountains. It may seem like an obvious fact not worth mentioning, but in order for mountains to stand out in all their grandeur, they have to have valleys as foregrounds. If there were no valleys, the earth would be one immense mountain, which means it would be totally flat. Nothing would stand above because nothing would lie below. As often happens with newly realized truths, I've been applying this to my teaching, and intriguing ideas have emerged. Like any teacher, I want my students to "stand out" -- to rise to their highest level of achievement -- to be, I guess we could say, like magnificent mountains. What I'm realizing, though, is that this means I must be the valley. If my students are going to be conspicuous as exemplary scholars, that means there must be an inconspicuous foreground -- a valley behind which their greatness can stand out. Their lights will be bright only if there's darkness around them -- and, odd as it sounds, I must be that darkness. I've always intuitively felt that humility plays a significant role in successful teaching, and these reflections only reinforce that idea. As the teacher, I must be less and less and my students must be more and more. My job is to shrink while they grow. If I lie low, they will rise and shine.

Over breakfast recently, several colleagues and I talked about the complicated, daunting, frustrating, rewarding, and fine art of teaching -- and these helpful thoughts emerged:
1) In some ways, good teaching has to be impersonal. (This is a paradox, of course, because in many ways good teaching must be highly personal.) Several times during our conversation, we referred to the idea of "not taking it personally". When a group of students seems out of control, it's not because they don't like us, nor is it an indication that we are "bad" teachers. They're simply behaving in a way that is not appropriate, and it is our job as professionals to ensure that they correct their behavior.
2) A teacher is like a Global Positioning System. Each day in our classrooms, our students have to travel to some educational "place" -- some goal they need to reach -- and it is our task to guide them to this goal. In a sense, our students come to us fairly "lost", but fortunately they have human GPS's in their classroom. Just as the GPS in a car says things like "Turn left at the next stop sign", we teachers must sometimes give explicit instructions as our students "drive" along the roads of learning. In this way, like the motorist, our students can reach their learning destinations in a relatively timely and stress-free manner.
3) Another paradox: In spite of the truth of #2, a huge part of teaching is helping students learn how to get past obstacles and reach their goals by using their own resources. (Incidentally, my colleagues wonder if kids born in the years after 9/11 are being excessively coddled, to the point where they sometimes seem utterly incapable of helping themselves. Perhaps for these children, the classroom GPS needs to be turned off occasionally.)
4) And a final paradox: Teachers need to have both long memories and short memories. We need to remember patterns in kids' learning and behavior, but we also sometimes need to quickly forget so we can move on with a totally clean slate.
5) Laughter is vital. My colleagues said the five teachers in their team laugh a lot throughout the day. Maybe laughter is not only good medicine, but also a pretty fine GPS.

This morning I’m wondering if my students might sometimes rejoice during my class. Admittedly it seems a little far-fetched to think of anyone actually rejoicing during English class, but it would be a goal worth aiming for. After all, the word simply means “being happy ”, and I surely do want my students to feel happy during my classes. I’d love them to have a smile on their faces throughout most of the time they're with me. Perhaps this is not as implausible goal as it may at first seem. Maybe my students can rejoice in my class simply because they feel satsified -- satisfied that things in Mr. Salsich’s English class are the way they should be, and that respectable feats are accomplished there. My class is not a playground or an amusement park or a place where kids can throw up their arms and dance, but perhaps it’s a place where they can feel fulfilled because something good and right is happening. That might be worth rejoicing about. Today I’ll keep a close watch on how often my students smile. I’ll do a “smile survey”, and maybe I’ll be convinced that the kids are, in fact, doing a considerable amount of cheering as we go through our lessons. They won’t be jumping around with glee, but they might be feeling quietly contented that Room 2 is not a bad place to be at any given hour. That could be cause for at least some reserved and silent rejoicing.

The other day, I began to get annoyed after waiting in line at Dunkin Donuts for about ten minutes, but then, fortuitously, I remembered a truth I've often contemplated: whatever I'm doing at any given moment is exactly what I'm supposed to be doing and need to be doing. This universe I'm part of is infinitely bigger and more powerful than I am, and I need to trust that larger picture. Life is not about little me getting what I happen to want at any given moment. It's about life as a whole, the entire immense cosmos, doing what it must. In any situation, I need to take a breath, step back, and allow this wonderfully harmonious universe (which some people call God) to do what it's going to do. If that means waiting in line at Dunkin Donuts for ten or twenty minutes, then that's what I will do, and patiently, too, because I will be looking and listening for what life is trying to teach me in that situation. If, instead of fighting that present moment at the donut shop, I had abandoned all resistance and asked myself what gift I could find in that predicament, I might have been surprised at how lucky I actually was.

Yesterday I worked at my desk at home in the early morning hours. It was whistling, windy, and frigid outside, and I was happy to be cozily warm in my apartment as I graded papers and prepared some things for next week’s classes. My hazelnut-flavored coffee tasted especially good as I worked. Later I drove to school and puttered around for a few hours, rearranging bulletin boards and setting up for the coming lessons. The kids came around 8:15 for the SSAT tests, dragging in with sleepy and shivering looks. We held our Christmas dance the night before, and some of the kids looked fairly exhausted. They went quietly down to the testing room and I hard no more of them. The building relapsed into its usually pleasant Saturday morning silence. In the late afternoon, after writing some Christmas cards, I took a walk in the park. Even with my warmest clothes on, I felt thoroughly chilled as I strolled along the silent walkways. The park was nearly empty of people. The stripped trees waved in the wintry wind, and the western sky was streaked with cold-looking lines of pink and orange.

The weather turned bitterly cold today. After a rather balmy Thursday, Friday blew in this morning with frigid winds and arctic temperatures. At school, we all rushed along when we had to move from building to building, and at recess the students huddled together like farm animals trying to stay warm. Luckily, I had my small white space heater cheerfully humming all day, which made my classroom a fairly pleasant place for our serious reading and writing.

I’m often amazed at how unaware I am during many of my classes. I often pass through the entire 48 minutes of class on “autopilot”, just cruising along through the steps of my lesson plan with hardly a clear thought given to the astonishing nature of what’s happening. To use an analogy I’ve often employed, I’m like a person walking through a wonderland with a blindfold on. I get to the end of a class, take the blindfold off, and have no genuine idea what wonderful things have been occurring in the last hour. Of course, what happens each day in my room at school is no more wonderful than what happens each moment everywhere. To me, the universe is an infinite and eternal miracle, from the spinning stars right down to the mechanical pencil in my hand during class, and to the tiny ant crawling down the wall as my students and I work our way through the lesson. It’s all miraculous – the thousands of totally new thoughts we generate in each class, the feelings that sweep through us, the understandings that suddenly come to us like sunrises. It’s all an absolute marvel, and yet I am usually completely unaware of it as I’m teaching. I have my carefully made lesson plans in front of me, and, with blindfold on, I march through them from beginning to end, quite oblivious to the wonders around me. I pat myself on the back, get the next lesson plan out, adjust the blindfold, and wait for the next class to arrive.